Thanksgiving sales are coming. Make room with a pantry and freezer reset

Every fall, as stores advertise Thanksgiving Day sales, I start planning for the coming year. Before I fill the freezer with turkeys or add jars to the pantry, I must know what I already have.

As Thanksgiving sales season approaches, I start my annual pantry reset. I then inventory the kitchen pantry, the laundry room pantry, the refrigerator and the large freezer. Next I review home-canned foods to see what remains and what must be used.

I don’t keep a written inventory. Instead, I’ve developed a few habits that help me track our food, use older supplies first and avoid buying more than we need.

And I don’t tackle it all in one weekend. I work through the storage areas gradually, one shelf at a time.

Start your Thanksgiving pantry reset one shelf at a time

A full pantry can be overwhelming when you start pulling everything off the shelves. That’s one reason I prefer to work in small sections.

I choose a shelf, remove the contents and see what’s there. It’s a chance to clean the space, check packages and dates and put things back where they belong.

I group similar foods together. Jams and jellies have their place, broth has another and home-canned turkey stays together. This makes it easier to find what I need and recognize when supplies are running low. 

I also rotate food. Older items go toward the front and left side of the shelf. When I need something, I take it from the left and shift the remaining food in that direction as I replenish the supply.

It’s a simple version of the first-in, first-out inventory method used by grocery stores and other businesses. The idea is to use older products before newer ones.

You don’t need special containers or an elaborate labeling system. Just give things a place and maintain the arrangement.

I may eventually create more defined storage zones or start keeping a written inventory. For now, I generally know what we have because I know where everything belongs.

Organize your freezer before Thanksgiving sales

The freezer is a little more challenging. 

We have a small freezer beneath our refrigerator for everyday use and a large upright freezer in the garage for longer-term storage. 

I organize the large freezer into zones, with meats in one area, vegetables in another and other foods grouped together. But keeping track of frozen food isn’t always as easy as keeping track of jars and cans on a pantry shelf.

Packages get pushed toward the back, stacked behind other items or overlooked as new food is added.

That’s why I make an effort to work through the freezer’s contents each year. I want to use what we’ve stored rather than continually adding new food to an already crowded freezer. 

As I review the contents, I identify older packages and plan meals around what needs to be used. It also helps me see how much space is available before I start buying turkeys during the holiday sales.

Recommended freezer storage times generally refer to food quality. Food kept continuously frozen at 0 degrees Fahrenheit or below can remain safe indefinitely, although its flavor and texture may deteriorate over time. That doesn’t apply to food that has thawed or been stored at unsafe temperatures.

For me, annual rotation helps maintain quality, reduce waste and keeps the freezer manageable.

Preparedness begins with an organized pantry

My home-canned foods have their own inventory system, although it might not look like one at first glance.

I label each jar with its contents and canning date, group the jars by food type and place older jars in front so they get used first.

When I empty a jar, I wash it and return it upside down to the same shelf where it was stored. 

Those empty jars tell me quite a bit. 

I can see how much of a particular food we’ve used and how much remains. As the number of empty jars grows, I know we’re getting closer to replenishing that supply.

It also helps me remember approximately how much I preserved the previous year without keeping a formal production log.

For example, I generally can at least 20 pounds of turkey each year. Other foods vary depending on what the garden produces and what we have available. 

I don’t reuse standard single-use canning lids for processing another batch. The rings are stored separately on a bungee cord in a closet, while the empty jars wait on the shelves until they’re needed again. 

I also try to use our home-canned foods within a year. The USDA recommends using properly home-canned foods within about a year for best quality. 

That doesn’t mean every jar automatically becomes unsafe after 12 months. Safe preservation depends on using research-tested recipes and processing methods, maintaining proper storage conditions and ensuring the seal remains intact.

Before using home-canned food, inspect the jar and seal for problems such as leakage, bulging lids or other signs of spoilage. Never taste food from a jar with a questionable seal or signs of spoilage. Some dangerous contamination, including botulinum toxin, cannot be detected by sight, smell or taste.

Rotating my jars annually helps maintain quality while giving me an opportunity to review what we’ve preserved and how much we’re using.

Use your food inventory to plan your Thanksgiving meal

Reviewing our food supply each year also helps me understand what we actually eat.

Some foods are easy to predict. I generally know how much turkey I’ll preserve because I’ve been doing it for years. Others depend on what comes out of the garden.

Tomatoes are a good example. Our household uses approximately two to three jars of tomato products a week, or roughly 104 to 156 jars a year.

Eventually, I’d like to grow and preserve more of the tomatoes we use. For now, we supplement what we preserve with store-bought tomato products.

But knowing how much we consume gives me a goal to work toward. It helps me think about how many tomato plants to grow, how much produce I would need to harvest, and how much time and storage space preserving that harvest would require.

It also helps me avoid preserving large quantities of something simply because it’s available.

Growing or preserving food takes time, energy and resources. If we don’t eat it, those resources haven’t been put to good use.

Make room before stocking up at Thanksgiving sales

Once I’ve worked through the pantry and freezer, I have a better idea of what we need and what we should use before purchasing more.

I incorporate older ingredients into our regular meal plans, particularly in the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving. This helps clear space in the refrigerator and freezer while keeping food from being forgotten. 

The timing matters because I purchase whole turkeys only during the holiday sales surrounding Thanksgiving through New Year’s. That’s when I generally find the best prices, so I use the opportunity to purchase turkey for more than just our holiday dinners.

Some will be cooked and eaten, while some will be preserved for use throughout the year. 

But a sale isn’t automatically a good reason to buy more food. 

I still need to consider how much we have, how much we’ll realistically use and whether there’s enough room to store it properly. A freezer full of bargains isn’t much of a bargain if I can’t find what I need or end up throwing food away. 

The same principle applies to the pantry. Before buying more canned goods, dry ingredients or other staples, I want to know what’s already on the shelves. 

Sometimes the best way to prepare for stocking up is to spend a few weeks using what we already have. 

My inventory process has changed over the years, and there are still things I’d like to improve. 

A written inventory might make it easier to track everything in the garage freezer. More defined pantry zones could help keep things organized as our food supplies change. 

For now, I rely on grouping similar foods, rotating older supplies, keeping empty canning jars in their original spaces and paying attention to what our household uses.

You don’t need to reorganize your entire kitchen or purchase an elaborate storage system to get started. Pick one shelf, see what’s there and make a plan to use what you already have. Then move on to the next.

By the time the holiday grocery sales arrive, you’ll have a better understanding of what you need, what you can skip and how much room you have for new supplies. 

For me, taking stock before stocking up is a simple way to make better use of the food, money and effort we’ve already invested. 

New to “In Season?” Learn more about why I share these projects and my approach to living well by living with the seasons.

Subscribe to Greenspeake Insights for original articles, useful perspectives and occasional updates delivered to your inbox.