Defrosting the Freezer

This is a boring post about defrosting a freezer. Or call it a gentle reminder if you wish.

Mine was VERY overdue after having accidentally left the freezer door open for too long some months ago. It resulted in no more ice cubes to be had because the ice cube tray wouldn’t come out without a certain amount of anger. As you can see the ice is completely covering those coils above the narrow tray.

Anyway, step uno was to eat as much as possible before defrosting so I wouldn’t have too much to store wrapped up while the defrosting process took place. I piled all that was left on a wool blanket with a towel on top…

… wrapped the blanket around my pile of frozen foods and added the sofa pillows as insulation.

I’ve been putting of the defrosting process because I’ve been a little worried about getting the oak floor in the kitchen too wet. I have memories from defrosting freezers in the past (not the state of the art Miele we had at the old house though because it was a frost free one, which totally works btw!) and water splashing everywhere so I decided to try this defrosting bag. You just pop it at the bottom of the freezer and it soaks up all the water.

Here’s the set-up. The bag is there at the bottom, a bowl is place under the pul- out spout with a towel underneath in case of any drips. A pot with boiling hot water helps speed up the defrosting process. Oh, and yeah, you need to turn off the freezer too. May seem like a redundant comment but I actually didn’t at first because I pressed the wrong button…

With the help of the hot water in the pot the actual defrosting is pretty quick. It took less than an hour for all the ice to drop down or drip down. The bag caught most of it and I only had a miniscule amount of water in my bowl, and that actually came from pieces of ice falling from the very top rather than water running from the spout.

Our freezer’s quite small so we didn’t really use the bag to it’s full potential but supposedly it can hold 5 liters (1.3 gallons) of water. I have no idea what’s inside but it works. From an environmental standpoint I guess it’s better to defrost the old school way because the bag’s not reusable and you need to sort it as plastic packaging.

While all the defrosting was going on I took the opportunity to empty out the old ice cubes and wash the drawers properly.

Everything nice and clean…

… and filled back up with stuff. It feels really good to have done something that’s been put off for so long. And it was nice realizing that it was quicker and easier than expected. And yes, I remembered to put the freezer back on again!

Comments

[Älvan]

I really need to do this... with both our freezers. I dread defrosting the big one in the basement.

[Lorna Boot]

I'm surprised all freezers there aren't frost free. It was 86 F in Hot-lanta today. It would have been nice to crawl in your freezer. I seem to have sneezed and missed spring.

[Jennifer in France]

I have never seen those dfrosting bags. But it just gave me an idea of how to use the leftover diapers which my son outgrew!

[Elsa-Maija]

When we defrost, we'll take the frozen food outside. Usually it's cooler outside. In Finland that is ;)

[Julia]

A hairdryer speeds up the defrosting process brilliantly. Never experienced any negative side effects.

[Elisabeth]

How interesting, your freezer is separate from your refrigerator. Did you get the freezer from Ikea?

[Leena]

In my freezer the nozzle thing actually works. I do use a towel in front of the freezer too to keep the floor dry from splattering water and ice that drop from the top of the freezer. Water can jump quite far :)

[amycapdet / May Zaragoza]

You can speed up the process by using a hair dryer besides the boiling water. My freezer is a no-frost LG but back in the old days I used to defreeze the Liebherrr I first bought this way (hot water and hair dryer) and washed the ginormous drawers in the bathtub, so as not to splash water off the kitchen sink. It worked for me. Of course the bathtub was pristine :-)!

[Maja]

Nice post! Good job! We do not have a freezer...we just dont need it, I always cook with fresh products, even fish!

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

THAT's what the baf reminded me of!!!

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

I used to use a hair dryer too but that meant having to stand there doing it. The hot water does the trick and I can do other stuff meanwhile :).

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

The Smeg fridge I got only has a tiny freezer compartment so it was actually the Smeg guuy who suggested getting a separate built in freezer. I think he probably meant one of theirs, haha. Yes, mine's IKEA.

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

My spout works too and would have let the water run through it but the bag caught the flow :).

[Milla]

Your freezer has transparent storage boxes! I wonder if I could find some for ours too, since the white ones are very unpractical. At least when we buy a new freezer, it must not have white boxes.

[phillippa]

I recently defrosted our freezer as well. I agree with you about not wanting to stand around with a hair dryer in hand.

I removed all the drawers, placed a pot of hot water on each shelf - our defrosting needs were dire, and then closed the freezer door to keep the heat in. Closing the door sped up the process for us.

[Kim Ballou]

I wonder why you guys have to defrost your freezers? I am in the U.S. and they are frost-free. I agree with the other reader, it must have the same absorbent material as diapers.

[Maggie]

I've been putting off defrosting our freezer even though yanking the wire baskets to release from the ie is making me angry every day. Thanks for showing me it isn't really that hard..

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

Simply because not all freezers are frost free :). Mine is a year old and it's not frost free but the one we bought for our old house was. I suppose it depends on the brand and how much you're willing to spend on a freezer vs the chore of defrosting it every six months or so.

[Elisabeth]

I love the built-in look, one would never know it was there. Had me fooled :)

[Luna]

oh thank goodness! i have been waiting to see if those bags work but i don't know anyone that has used them. i'm very much looking forward to trying this. thanks for sharing :)

[Saskia]

I did this only a few weeks ago exactly the same way (except I didn´t use a defrosting bag). I love to put the food back into the freezer when it´s clean :)

[foo]

Interesting. I don't think they even make fridges here in the US anymore that aren't frost free. They must be much more expensive there?

[Lena]

Hejsan
Antar att du pratar svenska också.
Ett bra knep är att frosta av på vintern
när det är kallt och ställa ut allt på
altan eller balkong. Då behöver man inte oroas
av att ngt kan tina
Skönt när detta tråkgöra är gjort
Hälsar
Lena

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

Det går jättebra på svenska också :). Ska försöka komma ihåg att frosta av i vinter nästa gång!

[Kari]

Gorgeous; nothing l ike a clean frig./freezer. I am frequently surprised how things I really hate and put off take much less time and are much less onerous than I built them up to be.

[Kari]

You can still buy free standing ones (both chest and upright) that are not frost free; they use less energy than frost free versions. That said, our freezer is frost free; it's the lazy American in me. ;-)

[momo]

Why the litterbox? Is it part of the setup or did it just happen to be there?

[Benita ~ Chez Larsson]

It just happened to be there. Mini and Bonus used to almost never use the litter box in our old house. After the move they've used it but I've been hoping to remove the one in the kitchen and have Mini and Bonus use the one in the basement exclusively as soon as they're both comfortable using the outdoors like they used to. Bonus hasn't been willing to until now but it may actually be happening this summer as I've noticed that neither have been getting a lot of use lately. Hopefully that means he's found a nice safe outdoor loo. And that it's not in one of my closest neighbor's gardens...

[Catherine]

I haven't defrosted a freezer in years. Can't say I miss it! Even though you are right, it really isn't such an onerous job.

[Marjorie]

This reminds me that I need to organize my refrigerator... I recently started trying to only cook fresh. I visit the store more often, but my freezer is looking incredibly bare. I love it!

[Debbie from Chicago]

I think most of the freezers in the states are frost free. I do have a little freezer at our vacation cabin like yours that I do have to defrost.

[sandrayyp]

ooh, it is eye opening to me, I don't know there is build in freezer. It looks cool.......and i like drawer type freezer.. it is much more organize that way.. I never know how to defrost a freezer though.. ha ha, Thanks for the post..

[Karen@treechanged]

Here is another gentle reminder - I recently had to clean out our fridge and freezer because I hadn't vacuumed under the fridge. Yup, your fridge may be frost-free, but the new ones have the coils under the fridge and a fan that sucks air past them. The dust builds up on the coils and eventually it overheats and will blow a circuit. Our fridge guy told us it is becoming common. So you may not have to de-frost, but clean under your fridge!!

[Lotta]

Thanks for getting me inspired! I went straight to Clas Ohlson and bought the defrosting bag. What a success!! Our fridge hasn´t been defrosted in a couple of years actually.... And now it´s finally done!!!! And it was a much easier job than I´ve imagined:-).

[bea Wilson]

Cat litter in the kitchen????? And so close to the fridge!!!!!

[un arc-en-ciel dans le lavabo]

thanks for the kick in the *ss ! we are doing ours (big one) this coming weekend. we usually use hot water too (+ hair dryer when in a hurry !) i've never seen any defrosting bag... i have to look online...