Decluttering - Food, Glorious Food

So the time comes to leave the house in Victoria and travel to Queensland for the winter or vice-versa.

What do I do with the food in the pantry, the fridge, the freezer?

How do I manage moving this between the two homes and my love of cooking which has been filling the house with quality food products?

Rather than just throw out all the food and start again I would need to adjust the way I manage household food.

So what would I need to do. I’d need to:

• keep a minimum amount of food in the house at all times.
• no longer buy in bulk. It will come on special again.
• move towards a European way of grocery shopping (a bit every 2 days) rather than a once a week American style grocery shop.
• shop for just what is needed to get me through.
• shop my supplies first, using up what I can and basing my meal plans around what I already have.
• set limits. One juice at a time, one jam at a time, one salad dressing at a time, one type of pasta etc
• keep a pretty low freezer supply because this is what I can’t transport with me. The last time I moved I got caught with excess stock of soups in summer and pureed pumpkin.
• learn to consolidate ingredients in cooking so I don’t have masses of random spices etc.
• drink water and tea and that’s about it. Keep no excess cans of fizzy drink or alcohol lying around as these are heavy to transport.
• learn what I like to use consistently in cooking and find meals to cook based on that. No random spices need to sit in the back of the cupboard.
• stick to three vinegars only in cooking - balsamic, red wine and white. Plan accordingly.
• stick to three oils only in cooking - olive, canola and olive oil spray. Plan accordingly.
• create a recipe file on the notes section of my ipad so that loved and regular meals can be cooked in both locations.
• work out the best way to travel with excess food taking into account the likelihood of dry goods spilling in the car, fresh food spoiling in the car (esky?) and the weight of dry goods refillable jars and heavy items like cans.
• keep a record of food use by dates and try and use up before expiring.
• buy smaller amount of products that can be used up faster.
• use up unprocessed honey as it looks like that can’t be brought into Queensland.

What have I missed?