What did your parents refrigerate? Mine refrigerated bread.

I live in a humid climate (especially in the summer), and if we don't refrigerate our bread and tortillas, or any baked goods, they get moldy in like 4 days.

Have you tried freezing it?
Refrigerating baked goods accelerates staleness, but most baked goods freeze well.
- Frozen bread or bust. No one's wants that cardboard you kept in the fridge.
- I’ve had bread in the freezer for months, I throw it straight in the toaster and it comes out like, well… normal ass toast.
- Freeze it every time.
  If you're anything less than a family of four, leaving bread at room temperature is just eating half a loaf of bread and then throwing away half a loaf of mouldy bread.
  Most supermarket bread has indeed already been frozen before you get it.
  I even freeze all the cakes from Costco, since they only seem to come in packs of about a thousand.
- Only exception for me is tortillas. I mean they technically freeze well, but they will also stick together which would make quite a thick burrito.
  My parents always freeze them and I always forget until I'm there trying to make a burrito and it tears in half.
- people are downvoting a scientifically verifiable statment.
  owning the bread chillers
- Yes, we freeze some as well
Same. I don't get why people act like putting bread in the fridge is world ending. Unless your eating a whole loaf of bread in 2 days in the fridge it goes.
That or you get a loaf of mold on the 4th day.
- Probably because it sucks to eat cold bread
Well, yes...but 4 day old bread from the fridge is basically inedible as well because of the bad taste.
- I've never had my bread get stale from being in the fridge for 4 days. You have to leave it in a bag or airtight container.
- Keep it in the bag and then warm it up in a toaster oven. Imagine eating sad room temperature bagels...
- My fridge bread tastes exactly the same for weeks?
I had air conditioning growing up and my family tends to make desserts more in the winter.
The first summer living on my own, I made a beautiful blueberry pie, and the next morning I took it out of the microwave (to keep bugs away during the night- I have since learned this was also an idiosyncrasy from my parents. Most people just cover it) and it was already visibly moldy.
I’m glad I got a slice the first day, and I definitely learned a lesson but holy shit was it a surprise.
I too grew up in a humid environment and got used to using either a bread box or the fridge.
Then I realized that our bread was just cheap sugar infused garbage, and that if you pay a bit more for better bread, it does not mold anywhere nearly as quickly.
That's legit. Not really in Canada though.
I had 65% last weekend and since then constantly a bit above 50% in Switzerland. Usually around 30% unless it's summer. How much is "humid" for you?
- We get 90% every day here in Florida
- Humidity where I live right now is 81%. And we're having a "dry spell".
- Today it's 75%

My SO got a chuckle out of me because I instinctively put chocolate in the fridge. I grew up in a hot climate but I live in Canada now.

That's legit though.
- Even when in canada, because cold chocolate below 20°C is cronchier and doesnt melt in your hand as fast.
I put dark chocolate in the freezer, not for preservation or anything I just love the texture.
- crystalline chocolate is the shit, then when you chew it it just sort of turns into gravel and melts, so good
- Gotta give the lead some fridge time too
Wait, yeah I guess it does make sense that people living in cold climates wouldn't put chocolate in the fridge. TIL
- The reverse is also true sometimes. Coconut "oil" for example is always a solid where I grew up, and it caught me by surprise seeing it actually being sold as a liquid in normal oil bottles.
- yea if you live outside I guess
I’m here for crunchy chocolate. Also really depends on what season for Canada definitely can get toasty.
I know i'm not the only one prefering chocolate refrigerated (and some variants frozen). Not the creamy type for me.
Lindt with nuts is way crunchier in the freezer.
- I keep Reese's peanut butter cup minis in the freezer when family sends them (not for sale in Japan currently). My wife likes Alfort which are chocolate + biscuit cookies and turned me on to putting those in the freezer. Somehow, it's much better that way; I didn't expect the biscuit to be changed or, if so, certainly not better, but it is.

Mine refuse to refrigerate cheese (other than cream-cheese) and butter. Infuriates me as it gets super oily and rancid real fast.

One of my wife's friends got persistently sick last year. She just could not get better. Sometimes she'd be fine for a week or two, but then she'd get sick again. Eventually it came down to her needing to document everything she did each day - and they discovered she was getting sick from warm butter.
Turns out her mom had come over at some point and saw that she refrigerated butter and said "you don't need to do that, it's so much easier to use when warm and it doesn't go bad." Yeah, that's the case if you eat a stick of butter in a few short days. But you can't leave it out for more than that or it starts getting filled with all sorts of germs.
- Was it unsalted butter? Salted butter can be left out for a while, certainly more than a few days without concern, but unsalted needs to be refrigerated.
- For the last few years, I've been using butter I leave out in a covered butter dish on the counter since I learned that's fine. It's always been a stick of salted butter which I typically finish within 2-3 weeks and that's never caused any problems. I wonder if it being unsalted would really change things that much...
- did she just leave it out uncovered? one of those ceramic dish things with a cover seems to keep it out fine.
I've been made fun of for thinking butter tastes/feels off after sitting out on the counter, but it absolutely does. If you want soft butter, take it out like an hour before or soften it with heat and whip it back into a homogeneous mixture. I usually cut a pad and melt it on top of whatever I'm making before spreading it. Anything but leaving it on the counter to go bad...
Cheese is a weird one though. Definitely refrigerate cheese.
- They claim cheese needs to "breathe" and apparently that is indeed a thing for some French cheese, but not have it sit unrefrigerated for a few days 😒
- Someone tried to convince me to get a heated butter knife. I think I'm seeing their point on it
- My SO is a counter butter er. I've told her it's grow but she won't listen. She gets her own butter now.
My SO does leave butter in a butter dish but only a small amount.
- We got a butter bell, which is the best of both worlds. Room temperature butter kept airtight. Lasts 10-14 days, I'd estimate.
Yeah, butter changes color too. Something happens if it turns soft.
I do this with Colby cheese. mmmm, greasy cheese

If I don't put my bread in the fridge, it's moldy within a week. It's all meant to be toasted anyway.

Clean your cupboards. Mold spores can remain on surfaces for months. Give everything a good wipe-down with some cleaning spray or vinegar solution and then leave the cabinets open to dry out well. And do it again anytime food gets moldy.
Packaged bread should last more than a week, but fresh bread is meant to be eaten within a few days, if not the same day.
- I used to live in a desert and bread easily lasted for weeks. Once I moved to what is essentially a rain forest, it doesn't last more than 5 days. I have to refrigerate it.
- Greatly depends on your country. Dutch bread is very fresh when bought with little to no preservatives. So we freeze our bread, like 90%of us, cuz it will mold in the fridge after like 4 or 5 days if not sooner.
- I'm guessing you don't live somewhere with high heat & humidity, or if you do you run your AC a lot. We keep bread on the counter and in the fridge but not all bread is equally resistant to mold, even some packaged bread. In the winter it's a lot more forgiving. Also we just open the windows and run fans quite a bit in the summer.
- Naw, I'm too lazy for that.
I've gotten some bread with no preservatives and it went in a couple days
If i bake bread i will eat it within 2 days
- *2 hours
  This is why I don't bake bread.

Mine didn't refrigerate bread when I was growing up, but I do now. There are less people in the house so the bread stays around longer.

My suggestion would be to freeze half a loaf and pull it out when needed. Bread thaws quite well and it doesn't get stale that way.
- I didn’t learn this til recently. My bread use to spoil after a week. Now I just keep it in the freezer and toast it when I want to use it. Comes out perfect every time.
- I haven't had a problem with the last pieces being stale. Either that or I'm just not very picky about how stale bread is.
- Exactly what I do. I can actually buy a bunch of bread now because most of it stays frozen and there's only half a loaf on the counter at a time. It's kind of miraculous how well it dethaws.
- That's what I do. buy baguettes for the entire week at once, then freeze most of it, thawing what's needed every day.
- Slice it first and you can then fetch a slice from the freezer and pop it into the toaster, easy peasy hot bread in the morning.
- It’s weird how common this claim is. Growing up, my Mom always frozen bread to keep it longer, but it always tasted bad and was the wrong texture
Refrigerated bread goes stale faster.
- But not moldy, which is dangerous as opposed to inconvenient.
  Can always throw the bread in the microwave for 10-15 seconds to give it some life anyways.
- I would rather have a sandwich with slightly sub par bread than wasting food and money because I have to keep throwing out 1/2 loaves because they molded before I ate them.
- It goes stale faster, but molds slower. If it molds before you can use it, then staleness isn’t the issue.
- That hasn’t been true in my experience. If anything leaving it out on the counter makes it get stale (and worse, moldy) much faster, whereas i can leave a loaf in the fridge for a month or two and it will be perfectly fine.
- I don't eat it fast enough to not get mold.
- It's worked fine for me so far.
As a german this is heresy.
- What Americans call "bread" doesn't qualify as bread to Germans anyway. Kinda like beer.
I didn't used to refrigerate bread but living in Seattle bread here can mold in like 2 days. It all lives in the fridge now to give it a fighting chance

Bread outside the fridge spoils fast. Bread in the fridge lasts longer but is less fluffy. In this household we refrigerate our bread and then toast it lightly if we're going to eat it straight. Most of the sandwiches I make are toasted anyway.

I basically just go by whether or not it was refrigerated in the supermarket. However, once it's opened I mostly throw everything in there except for dry stuff.

Good general rule. Only exception I can think of is there are a few fruits they'll refrigerate in the back and then often display at room temp, since a few hours at room temp doesn't hurt them much. Apples, oranges, stuff like that.
- You don't need to refrigerate apples and oranges? Just leave them in the counter for easy snacking.
- lol what supermarket is moving apples and oranges in and out of the refrigerator every day for display purposes?
products with any sort of packaging also say how they should be stores pre and post-opening, e.g. canned goods are generally fine to keep in a cupboard until opened where they then need to be in the fridge.

Living in the tropics, it's rather common to refrigerate bread, else you run the risk of mould overnight.

Freezing bread is much more effective and it comes right back to life after a bit of heating. Refrigerating it just dries it out imo.
- Put it in a container...lol no one just throws a loaf in the fridge.
Thats why you buy wonderbread.
That shit wont mold if left in a swamp for 3 months on a mossy rock.
- That makes me wonder why I should put it in my body. 😬
- There is no possible reason anyone should ever buy Wonderbread. Except perhaps to use as a pillow in emergencies.

I've lived on my own for a while and I freeze everything I can. Nothing lasts long enough unless it's frozen or shelf safe.

This does mean I get a lot of my fruits in smoothie form.

I'm lucky most vegan things last longer than the non-vegan things I grew up with.

I'm vegan too, and God bless how long our food lasts.
- You can dry-age beef for up to 4 months. Some people go even longer. Of course, you could also can it like fruits and vegetables, but I've never been a fan.
  Then there's mastodon meat dug out of the tundra that dogs would still eat...
- I just now for the first realize that my food waste has gone to almost 0 since i'm vegan.
- I'm so confused right now. We aren't completely vegan but we mostly cook vegan at home. But like, that's the majority of the stuff that goes bad? All the fresh vegetables and fruit? Vegan spreads, milks and yogurts go bad just as fast as dairy ones. I have the feeling oat milk goes bad faster than homogenized cow milk. Eggs never go bad. I hardly remember ever tossing a piece of meat or fish, but hell whenever I have to buy a 2 kg sack of carrots because it is just so much cheaper than 700g of carrots and 1/2 of it goes bad (and it's still cheaper) or I buy a perfect bell pepper just to open it to find mold or that brown stuff in avocado or I buy organic lemons and they are 2/3 moldy the next day I can't even... I have a special storage thing for potatoes and they still go bad occasionally. Yesterday garlic from the store was half rotten. Or when you didn't notice a tomato got a hit in your bag and that injury proceeds to mold... Or when your kid tossed the apples on the floor and they all develop bruises faster than you can eat them all and they just aren't that tasty anymore... We are trying our best to go to the store for fresh stuff daily but I feel like it is still a fight against nature.
  So for real, what are you guys talking about? Absolutely no offense, I am genuinely curious why our experiences differ so vastly.
Fruits from warm climates on the other hand, take cold damage and go bad sooner in 4°C.

Putting boiling water in the freezer is so useful, like you can cook it once and freeze it, then get it out when you need it and just reheat it a little.

My parents didn't just refrigerate bread. They stuck excess bread in the fucking freezer.

Edit: guess I've been sleeping on the freezer bread thing. Y'all seem pretty sold on the concept.

I used to live in the tropics.
This is standard. Half the bread goes in the freezer immediately.
When you finish the first half, move the frozen bread into the fridge.
Refrigerated bread is good once you get used to it.
- Juuust skip that fridge step. Take slices out the freezer when you wake up. Slices thaw by the time your morning ritual is done and you're ready for brekky. If toasting anyways, don't even really need to wait for thaw. No stale fridge taste you need to get used to.
  This thread kills me, so many people eating stale-ass bread. :c
That works well for toast that you only ever plan to eat toasted.
Been freezing bread for years as I don't eat it fast enough.
Quick 30s zap in the microwave and it's warm and soft and ready for sandwiches
The freezer does keep bread fresher longer (as long as you aren’t storing it in a self defrosting freezer long enough to get freezer burn). It literally freezes the staling process. And fridging bread actually accelerates staling. Something to do with water molecules getting squeezed out of starch molecules or something; I don’t remember the details.
I love hitting these threads a few hours late
"The sickos were FREEZING bread! UPDATE: I have since seen the error of my ways and apologized to my parents and thrown all bread I own into the freezer, and discarded any notion of leaving bread out"
When I bake bread I usually freeze half but thaw it when I need it because fresh bread goes bad fast.
My grandparents do that. I leave it on the counter, but always say I'm going to freeze it, especially if I get it at costco, which sells you 2 loafs at a time. The only problem is I never have enough room to shove an entire loaf of bread in there. Freezer for bread is fine. If you pull out a few slices, it basically defrosts in like 10 min or use microwave for 10 seconds, and if you wanted toast, just toast it.
I just threw out an entire loaf because it was on my counter for 5 days and saw mold... must be the type of bread as well since it normally lasts weeks just fine. Since I'm always buying what's near the cheapest that's on sale I am always buying different brands.
We do that with sandwich bread because it is cheaper to buy a double loaf pack and the freezer keeps it fresh until the second one is needed with zero noticeable difference in taste and texture.
Fresh baked bread without a ton of preservatives only lasts four or five days if you don't freeze it.
I'm kinda intimidated by this whole thread. I'm scared to mention that I really hate thawed bread (I tried room temp, microwave, oven and toaster). (I even tried different freezers.) If I buy bread, then it's either the very smallest amount at the bakery when I really feel like good bread, or just a bun, or supermarket bread with preservatives. But mostly I just live a bread free life.
My parents didn’t just refrigerate bread. They stuck excess bread in the fucking freezer.
My parents did that too, and they're the reason why I don't do that, because I grew up despising thawed bread.

Bread absolutely lasts longer when refrigerated

Americans: Eggs
Europeans: WTF?

That's because in America we're so concerned about contaminants on shells that we clean all the protection off the outside, making the shells porous enough for bacteria to get through. Store-bought eggs in the US so have to be refrigerated.
- I'm aware. I have raised chickens. I was trying to make a funny, but seem to have missed the mark
- America also doesn’t vaccinate their chickens.
- Imagine being so concerned about bacteria outside that you punch holes in the "packaging" lol
This is because of a difference in food safety standards. When eggs are laid, they’re covered in something called bloom. It’s a slimy coating which the chicken produces. It’s full of good bacteria, and it protects the eggs and prevents them from spoiling. So Europeans buy eggs with the bloom on them, and don’t need to refrigerate their eggs.
But in America, the Food and Drug Administration has strict regulations regarding animal poop near food. Namely, you can’t have animal poop near your food. Full stop, with very few exceptions. And since chickens poop out of the same hole they lay eggs from, part of the bloom is, in fact, chicken poop. So eggs in America have to be washed, to remove that chicken poop before they can be sold. But this also removes the bloom, meaning the eggs are unprotected and need to be refrigerated.
- Bloom it up! Local farm stands have a good bet of being unwashed eggs. Can't say I blame the FDA on this, given the awful state of dairy and chicken farms that we get these eggs from...
- From Europe, never had a slimy coating on my eggs.
it's perfectly standard to keep eggs in the fridge here in sweden, no reason not to since it just makes them last forever.
- They last 3-4 weeks anyway (with that bloom thing).
I don't eat eggs but my spouse does store them on the counter. Fresh farm eggs don't need refrigerators.
- Eggs that have been washed (i.e. had the cuticle remove) should generally be stored in the fridge or used very quickly. Eggs in either case shouldn't generally be moved from refrigerated storage to the counter unless they're going to be used very quickly because the condensation can do bad things.
I was told that they last the longest if kept out of the fridge the first week or so and afterwards you should put them in a fridge. And for some reason if they are already refrigerated they need to stay refrigerated no matter how old. No idea if there is a scientific basis to it, but it sounds at least plausible that there is.
- And for some reason if they are already refrigerated they need to stay refrigerated no matter how old.
  It has to do with washing. Eggs, fresh from a chicken's poophole, have a protective layer around them that allows you to store them at room temperature. If you wash them though, the protective layer disappears and the egg shell becomes porous, and as a result you need to refrigerate them. If you buy eggs that are already refrigerated, they are likely refrigerated because they have been washed, so you should keep them refrigerated as well.
I am American but I buy my eggs from a local farm, where they do not do more than a light wash with water. No fridge for those.

"Only white people put ketchup in the fridge." - my Mexican roommate

non refrigerated ketchup always tastes funky unless it's the kind that's packed with a large enough buttload of preservatives that they no longer have to put "refrigerate after opening" on the bottle.
- I just realized ketchup in restaurants stay out at room temperature.
Personally, I refrigerate anything that says Refrigerate after opening. Even if it's preceded by For best results. Ketchup falls into that category.
Ketchup belongs in the fridge, to cut the heat. Otherwise it's too spicy.
- There’s two very distinct brands of white people: The “I like boiled meats because browning it makes it too spicy” brand, and the “if it’s not making me cry and shit bloody fire, it’s too bland” brand. There is no in between.
- FWIW Mexicans don't know what spicy is, either. They think Tapatío is spicy.
  source: I'm half Mexican.
- Wat. Tomatoes are spicy?
- I'm laughing way too hard at this thank you
I always had ketchup in the fridge because it gives the mustard company.
Ketchup is for kids. Fight me
- I'll fight you on this. Gatekeeper anything by saying it should or shouldn't be used by a demographic will limit the amount of positive interactions you'll have in your life.
- Ketchup is pretty meh to me and my opinion is that, for the most part, anything you put ketchup on is just going to taste like ketchup. So my rule of thumb is that if its dry as fuck or tastes worse that ketchup, add ketchup. Otherwise don't cause it's just going to make it taste worse.
  Gatekeeping is dumb though, but I appreciate your desire for a pointless argument.
- It has its uses but they are rare. Hamburgers and fries is really about it. Maybe chicken nuggets. I don’t even bother keeping any in the house it’s so rare I use it.
- That's why I dip my fries in tomato soup
The best before date is based on it being refrigerated and the reason why we do it is to slow bacteria multiplication to a crawl
Growing up, our ketchup came in plastic bottles with that little aluminum seal between the nozzle and the bottle. Our rule was it stayed in the pantry until the seal came off, then it went in the fridge.
To your roommate's credit, we are "my brother got sunburns in winter" white.

I have an slightly odd one that I do myself: Carrots in a water filled container (in the fridge). That way they last really long and you don't get that limpy half-dried version after a while that is hard to remove the peel off. They basically stay as if fresh from the store or garden.

I don't know why but I feel like anything in water would spoil faster....but I have no evidence or even a theory as to why this might be. Perhaps you, keeper of the water carrots, could enlighten me as to why they keep longer?
- I think the water itself just keeps them from drying out and the fridge is what keeps them from spoiling (water or not). But usually the carrots become too dried out long before they spoil in a fridge. But maybe the typical mold that would grow on carrots also doesn't like being submerged.
Works even better for celery.
My mom recently taught my wife something similar. Now we keep them in a plastic container with paper towels between each carrot. The paper towels are moist, but I'm not sure if she wet them or if they collected it from the carrots. But the carrots are really fresh even after a couple of weeks in the fridge.
I assumed it would be enough if the container was just 1/4-1/3 full, when I have space I also do that, I'll try a full on water container next time. Btw that's also a great way if you have chopped carrot sticks, they stay fresh for the next day(s). I think this works with all root vegetables since, well, it's roots that are meant to take in water and transport it
I don't know whether this works in a horizontal position actually, I always assumed smth smth gravity, but on the other hand, when you fully immerse them then gravity can probably go out the window.
- Yes, horizontal works. My family always stored in water vertically, but my in-laws did that horizontally. Aside from joke wars, it was the same
You don’t need water.. keeping them horizontal (as they would grow) in a container of sand also keeps them fresh longer
- Ya but then my carrots have sand on them
- FYI, carrots grow vertically, not horizontally.
I have never had that issue with my carrots and they last for months in the fridge.
- Mine start to wilt within three days for some reason (in the fridge). I wonder what I am doing wrong. I always see those bags of carrots in the grocery stores and never buy them because I think to myself no one eats that many carrots within such a short amount of time, except maybe if they are doing a carrot cake or smoothie or something else very carrot-centric.

Batteries.

I read that in the 90s and having burned through thousands of batteries to power my Gameboy, i would have done anything to get more juice.
You could have literally told me that kissing the battery before you tuck it into the Gameboy slot gave 3% more juice and I would have did it.
and rolls of film
- This one makes sense if the parents are old enough to have used silver nitrate film. Really old film can, and will, just catch fire on on its own if it's even moderately hot and dry.
- Thats actually the correct way to store film
Cooling down batteries literally saps their charge. Because there's less energy in the battery. You can gently warm up batteries to give them some extra charge.
- The internet says that's not true (edit: at least for alkaline batteries, but for LiPo batteries I think you're right). It sounds like condensation is the main issue, so theoretically you might get a slight improvement if you put them in the fridge inside a plastic bag along with some desiccant.
- Got it, to the microwave we must march lads!
This reminded me of another one that probably nobody does anymore: photographic film rolls.

I refrigerate bread. It's much better and more effective than a bread box. My parents did not refrigerate bread because they live in a different part of the country where it would not mold over as quickly.

I honestly freeze almost all my bread. I don't go through a loaf nearly fast enough to finish it off before the remaining slices start going fuzzy.
In the freezer I can take out slices as and when needed.
But if my tiny freezer box is full, the fridge will also buy me several days.

My mother, for years, has frozen bread and then defrosted it two pieces at a time in the microwave.

If you've ever seen the Albert Brooks movie Mother, that's her. She even said it was her when she saw it. She's even started writing novels in her old age after wanting to be a writer when she was a kid.

Freeze bread to keep it from going bad and thaw it as needed either at room temp or low heat in a toaster oven. Bread in the fridge just dries out.
We always freeze all our bread, we don't eat it fast enough for it to not go bad (is this a weird take??).
But yeah thawing bread in the microwave is roughhhh, we either use a toaster or just let it thaw at room temperature.
- Same, I eat bread really slowly so it usually takes me a few weeks to finish a loaf. Don't really mind defrosting it, takes maybe twenty seconds in the microwave.
- I fry my frozen bread in about a tablespoon of butter. Makes every sandwich delicious
- Oh I eat it fast enough. One day, one loaf. That is my reason for freezing it. SLOW THE BRED INTAKE BITCH like omg.
To be fair I bake my own bread, and I usually freeze half the loaf because without preservatives it goes bad fast, but thawing at room temp is fine. But store bread no.
- Yeah, we're talking store bread and thawing it in the nuker and immediately making a sandwich with it even though it's all soggy. It's so gross.
- Huh, when I bake bread, it normally doesn’t last the night. A bunch of hungry teenagers smelling bread baking a couple hours will do that
- Never had problem thawing store bought bread before.
  You have to put the bread in an airtight bag before freezing and let it completely thaw out in the bag before opening. This way the total moisture content within the bag will remain the same.
that is the way
I freeze all my bread and put it in the toaster to thaw. I don't want to eat fresh bread for two days and then the rest of the week the rest of the stale loaf.
- The toaster makes a hell of a lot more sense than the microwave. She's eaten soggy sandwiches for decades.
I had family that did this as well.
You can put saltine crackers in the freezer and they won't freeze. They'll just stay crispy.

Peanut butter does NOT go in the fridge. 🤬

Try living with a French room mate and find out what doesn't go in the fridge. Hint: everything.

I put hot sauce in the fridge. I know I don't need to, but it just feels right.

Chocolate is much better refrigerated

Not parents but I have a half gallon of milk that expired in 2015. It came with me when I moved from an apartment to my house in 2018.

Never been opened.. yet.

Yeah because you should refrigerate bread

I’m more annoyed my mom keeps the oat milk out of the fridge for most of the day and wonders why it goes bad so quick. I usually bring my own when I visit.

What that's crazy.
Although once I left bean dip in my purse overnight and still ate it the next day. It was fine.
- You carry bean dip in your purse? Wanna be friends?
- Some things can be left outside for a bit no problem.

Wait you guys don't refrigerate your bread?

I put bread in the freezer because ot goes moldy fast in this climate

Not my Patents but my grandparents, batteries.

That sounds like a great way to make stale bread…

Things we refrigerated that I’ve seen others not refrigerate:

jelly(US)
ketchup
mustard

Things we didn’t refrigerate that I’ve seen others do:

peanut butter
honey
oil
soy sauce
oyster sauce

Edit: Just to clarify this is what my parents did and doesn’t reflect my adult opinions.

My soy and fish/oyster all say to refrigerate right on the label.
Since they already made the shit I'm ingesting, I'm taking their word for it.
- High salt/vinegar content condiments are perfectly fine at room temp for a weeks to months in dry to mostly dry moderate temp climates. That is why air conditioned restaurants which have consistent temps and low humidity leave them out on the tables.
  The label is there so someone in Florida doesn't have it go bad in a couple months on their counter. Plus refrigeration extends the time it can go without spoiling, which is great for condiments that are rarely used.
Some soy sauce recommends refrigeration on the bottle. Some don't. I don't know why.
- Probably based how much salt is actually in the sauce. High enough salinity will basically kill any potential nasties.
I like my ketchup refrigerated, not because it has to be, but because I like the contrast between cold ketchup and hot food.
…the reason jelly/jam/preserves are canned is because they are not shelf stable otherwise. I just threw out a jar because it molded in the fridge…
Peanut butter is shelf stable, but we usually get the stuff that’s just peanuts and salt, so it separates at room temp.
Mustard, ketchup, & soy/fish sauce… sometimes it’s just convenient to keep most of my bottles and jars together in the fridge door.
I’m hypersensitive to rancid oil. Also the healthy parts of olive oil & fish oil degrade with time, heat, sun and oxygen exposure. The fridge slows this down. That said, I keep my cooking oil under the counter.
Omigod honey.
- Ours always crystallized and needed to be microwaved or soaked in hot water anyway so it’s kind of a 6 of one; 1/2 dozen of the other situation in my experience.
If I put oil in the fridge it gets solid
Same for honey, as cold accelerate the crystallization process.
Peanut butter is basically oil already, but putting it in the fridge might help keeping it less oily. I eat organic 100% peanut butter and it is often oily when I open it. I think that’s why some have palm oil in it.
Soy sauce should be salty enough to store out the fridge but I prefer to keep it in the fridge for some reason.
Oyster sauce contains sea food, so straight in the fridge!
- I used to buy a lot of """"natural"""" peanut butter. The kind in glass jars that separates after a while, so you have to stir the jar every time you use it. After a while, I started keeping it in the refrigerator because that stopped it from separating at all. Just stir once when opening the jar for the first time, then into the refrigerator it goes, and it never needs stirring again.
- I'd be remiss if I didn't post this every time someone mentions palm oil.
- Oyster sauce contains sea food, so straight in the fridge!
  You'll be horrified to learn where the ปลาร้า(fermented fish)lives in my own house as an adult 😂
- Oyster sauce should be kept in the fridge, it helps it oxidize slower.
If it's in a sealed plastic bag it doesn't go stale until long after it would have molded on the counter. I refrigerate mine because I buy Costco sized sliced bread and it takes me 2 months to go through it. If you toast your bread, the staleness is unnoticeable
A lot of these things only need to be refrigerated to preserve flavor, not to stop spoilage. If you go through a bottle of ketchup in 3 months there is little benefit to refrigerating it, if it takes 3 years for you to finish it, it should probably stay in the fridge.
Some peanut butter brands require refrigeration to prevent mould. Others recommend it because it stops the oils from separating. Brands like Kraft don't require any refrigeration at all
Refrigerating oil will stop it from going rancid, but I've only ever needed to do this with used deep frier oil
Honey is just a hell no in the fridge
- The Costco bagels are notorious for molding before you even get home…
I'm with you, but the first three only after they've been opened.
- The unrefrigerated jelly is the only one that bugs me.
  I actually switched my peanut butter stance as an adult, but only because I switched to real peanut butter and it separates slower in the fridge.
Honey depends on the quality. Real honey will basically never turn bad (they found containers with thousand year old still edible honey), but the cheap stuff is sometimes mixed with sugar syrup etc. and then it needs refrigeration.
- Sugar is also a preservative though.
  The refrigeration is either to extend flavor or to prevent spoilage in hot and humid locations where mold can build on the parts of the container that dry out if it isn't used often.
peanut butter
This one absolutely turns on what kind of peanut butter you have. Jif/Skippy etc. shouldn't go into the fridge. It was engineered, for better or worse, to be shelf stable and turns into silly putty if it's cold. Most "Real" peanut butter separates like a mofo if it's in the pantry, requiring frequent stirring, and many recipes will never quite be solid enough to spread well. In the fridge, they are much easier to deal with, though my latchkey Xennial ass still prefers the wondrous combination of peanut-inspired substances and mid-century food science.

Jars of stuff which expired years or even decades ago. They still do.

Batteries. Paintbrushes.

Super glue

I'm the first generation that decided to keep bread in fridge. My parents used wooden box.

My parents (and grandparents, I think) used to put batteries in the fridge. I did too, until I learned that it’s not a good thing to do. Something about the humidity.

I do freeze bread. Mainly because the bread I can eat (gluten free) is expensive and not easy to get in the size I like (there are sizes!), so I buy multiple and freeze the excess. I also freeze my ground coffee (I really should start grinding my own; with the horror stories I’ve heard about pre ground…). I do refrigerate butter, jelly, ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise, and hot sauce.

¯(ツ)/¯

Batteries it depends on the chemistry.
NiCad/NiMH and some other older battery tech it can prolong shelflife, especially if you're in a hot/humid climate. Lithium batteries it doesn't really do anything.
- Meaning it's a mostly outdated tipp.
I got a cheap [electric] burr grinder a while back ($40 I think?) and it's a wonderful thing. Being able to choose your grind to your own taste is a wonderful thing.
Edit: If you're on the fence, you can get an even cheaper ($10) hand burr grinder to see if you like it. Definitely worth a try.
WhoTF is not refrigerating mayonnaise?
Ah, about ground coffee.
Summary: a fatty substance containing cafestol (raises LDL cholesterol only in humans) gets hold back by paper filters but not by French press, Turkish and boiled coffees, or coffees using mesh filters.
- This I knew. It should also be noted that when you use anything other than a paper filter (those reusable brass mesh ones), then you risk higher ldl cholesterol; not just French presses.
I'm on a keto diet right now, and while keto bread is an amazing innovation that's made it much easier than the last time I did this, I have to keep that shit in the freezer because it seems to get moldy a lot faster than normal bread, often well before the expiration date.
My grandparents would throw dying batteries in the freezer. They swore they’d get “more juice” out of them that way. No idea if it actually did anything.
- I was told to warm them up to get the last bits of juice out of them while camping. Wonder which it is?

Bananas. You shouldn't.

Refrigerating bananas pretty much stops them ripening, so if you have some fully yellow bananas you can pop then in the fridge and it will stop them from over ripening for a few days. The peel will still go brown but the flesh remains as it was when you put them in. You definitely shouldn't put green bananas in the fridge, but with yellows it buys you some time.
- I used to work at the fruits and vegetables section of a supermarket, we didnt put them in the fridge cause for some reason once you take them out of it they ripen way faster than they would if kept at room temp.
Freezing them changes the chemistry and they stop working for my fruit fly traps when fruit flies are around.
- Pretty sure I remember a recipe video for banana cream pie that b one of the steps was freezing the bananas. Also used extremely ripened ones.
- Maybe they stop working for your fruit flies because they don't have access to your fridge? Edit: oh wait you make specific banana based traps?
Makes me gag to think of.

Not my parents, me. Brown sugar goes in the freezer so it doesn't dry out and become a piece of granite.

Fruit, except for bananas

Photographic film

How long does it take you to eat the bread that mold starts to appear ??? In my house bread is pretty much gone in two days, most times less than that.

But my fridge has smells of other foods

Someone I lived with temporarily kept the processed parmesan cheese (the dusty stuff in a jar) in the cupboard instead of the fridge. It baffled me.

Paint brushes and rollers.

They lose their flavor pretty quickly if you keep them on the counter.
- LOL 😂
  One of mom’s friends kept on getting sick, turned out it was moldy paintbrushes the whole time…
- 10 seconds in the microwave brings the flavor back.

Vanilla extract.

what the fuck
- Some people just want to watch the world burn.
Hmm. That's interesting, how come?
- I make homemade ice cream and it can help to have the ingredients cold to begin with so you don't have to chill the base before you churn it. But there's not enough vanilla extract in ice cream (or probably anything) to even make a temperature difference so idk why anyone would refrigerate it.

I heard Australians put cereal in the fridge because of bugs

Oh yeah 😱 In some places in the tropics really only the fridge is safe from ants getting into everything otherwise. They bite their way through regular plastic bags no problem.
- God, the ants in Turks & Caicos were a nightmare, and food is crazy expensive. People who live there must have all their shit locked down or they'd be broke in a week. I always say I want to live somewhere tropical, but that had me rethinking some things.
I'm from Oz and I feel like I wasn't informed of this knowledge. Maybe I've been eating bugs this whole time.
Most cereals have a plastic bag inside to contain the contents. Maybe people don't seal it properly and it let's in little nasty creepy crawly-ses.
- Sorry had to make the Oz joke
Hmm that would also make sense.
Slightly related but there used to be things called bread boxes. I think it was to keep mice from eating your bread.
- And not just mice. If designed correctly, they would help keeping the correct humidity so the bread neither gets too dry (and solid) nor too humid (and moldy)
I'm in the US and I do this after living in some questionable apartments over the years.
I did this when I lived in a cheap apartment in Houston, Texas, USA. Cheap and sturdy, but we definitely had bugs.

Lotions and meds

We kept milk in the freezer.

LOL why?
- Lived in the middle of nowhere and the nearest grocery store was 25 miles away. Once every 4-6 weeks we'd go to town and get maybe 10-12 gallons of milk, a shit load of bread, and all the other stuff.
i mean yeah it's basically just water, why the fuck not? i do the same with margarine, so i never have to be caught with an empty packet and no backup.
- But why do you eat margarine? If it's a dietary thing I get it but butter is ten times better it's worth the extra calories.
Madness

I'm fine with refrigirating bread just to not let it try

I only do it for like the fresh bread you buy from the bakery like those long loafs of French bread. Cause if I don't and I'm not eating it immediately it gets stale very fast.
- You don't use a bread bag? :o
  The French
Fridge my bread to keep it good a week plus longer. gets a lil stale but toaster fixes that

I put my bread in the microwave as I never use it. I might as well call my microwave a bread box. However, if it gets really humid I may put the bread in the fridge for a day or two.

I love cold condiments and fruit. My dad put Pepto Bismol and eye drops in the fridge.

Eggs. Hot sauce. Ketchup. Soy sauce. Pickles. Kimchi. Mustard. Sriracha. Olives.

Ketchup needs to be refrigerated because it's a cooling fluid for boiling lava hot potatoes.
Wait people leave kimchi out of the fridge?
Putting it in the fridge slows the fermentation process to trap the right flavor. Otherwise it's a bit TOO kimchi-y and not so tasty.
Hot sauce collector here, heaps of sauces specify they need to be refrigerated after opening.
- Tell it to all South of border restaurants. Hot sauce on table, all day, every day.
  'They specify' doesn't mean it ever happened before refrigeration.
  Pickles, too, were made because there was no refrigeration (not how most are made now, but originally).
If it is not salt fermented pickles but rather those pickled in vinegar, it is good to put them in the fridge after opening the glass.
I can see it with eggs, if you don't wash eggs they're shelf stable for a couple weeks because of a natural coating. I was super confused when I went to the UK and all the eggs were on a shelf at the supermarket instead of in a cooler.
- Yep. Definitely refrigerate eggs in the U.S.

Camera film

ketchup, apparently it's weird?

Well... a lot but we live in the desert so peanutbutter isn't shelf stable otherwise

pine nuts, chinese tiger balm, batteries, ketchup/mayonnaise packs from McDonalds

Butter, so do, some don’t.

EXCUSE ME??! BUTTER?! IT'S DAIRY OH MY GOD
- Stick always in the butter dish for room temp and spreadable. Also for frying up stuff. Rest of it, in the fridge.
- Wait 'til y'all find out about butter bells.
- I live in a hot enough climate I can't do it all year, but my butter is out except for summer. I keep it in a container that I can pull a vacuum on since a lot of spoliage is basically oxidation.

My father taught me to put LSD bloaters in the fridge.

I've had roommates where we just ended up buying our own ketchup, mustard, soy sauce, fish sauce, Sriracha, and probably other things I can't remember because they were weirdos that refrigerated those things. I kept mine in the cupboard, they kept theirs in the fridge.

When I see bread in the fridge I assume the people have mice

Only ever did it for mold reasons. I don't like refrigerated bread because refrigeration sucks the moisture out. If i'm going away for the weekend though and i've got a loaf and it's gonna be a hot weekend i'm certainly going to store the bread in the fridge.
When I buy half a bread I don't put it in the freezer but sometimes I put it in the refrigerator because my apartment gets really warm.

Believe it or not: milk.

Pralines and dick

Batteries

Apparently some people refrigerate butter