Why You Should Never Store Food On Top Of The Fridge

Anyone who's cooked will tell you that space is a valuable commodity in a kitchen. There simply is never enough room to store things, is there? The cupboards fill up quick, and the countertops will inevitably get eaten up by various appliances — and if you have a pet, you must always be careful what you leave lying around. How lucky, then, that we have our good friend the refrigerator.

Not only can it keep things cold on the inside, you can also put anything you want to keep hidden on top of the fridge, well out of reach of sticky-fingered kids or snooping pooches. Right? Well, no: refrigerators are great to store things inside, but not so great to store things atop. Refrigerators might be a modern convenience that would be indistinguishable from magic to, say, a medieval peasant, but they don't run on magic.



They run on electricity, and that electricity generates a lot of heat which has to go somewhere. The coils that release said heat are sometimes on the top of the fridge, sometimes on the bottom, and sometimes on the back — but in any case, the top of the fridge will probably be decently warm. That's not a good thing if you're trying to store food, which is best stored someplace cool and dry.

That loaf of bread or tin of cookies will go stale in no time flat. Where should you store your food instead? As a society, we tend to place a premium on outside-the-box thinking, valorizing "disruption" and going crazy for any number of . But in some cases, it's best to adhere to common knowledge.

. That not only keeps things at the right temperature, but limits moisture so that nasty mold doesn't grow. That means someplace like your pantry or your cupboard is generally a good idea for your nonperishables — and if you put dry goods in jars or baggies for neater storage, so much the better.

Depending on what you're storing, it might be a good idea to keep it someplace dark. Potatoes, for instance, will want to be stored in a dark place, as otherwise they will go green. Onions also thrive in the dark, although .

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