The holidays are here, and we all know what that means — food! It also means National Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day, celebrated every year on November 15th, has arrived!

Okay, so maybe you don't "celebrate" it or necessarily clean your fridge on that day, but it is an annual reminder that the time has come.

Cleaning out the refrigerator beforehand makes sense with families gathering, countless dishes being served, and lots of leftovers. All of that means it's time to make room in the refrigerator and clean up one of the germiest places in your house in preparation, the kitchen!

Gulf Coast residents are acutely aware of how packed refrigerators typically are every time the power goes out from a hurricane or strong storm. Due to hectic and busy lives, cleaning the refrigerator often gets neglected and that can cause compounding issues. Older items tend to be pushed back and forgotten as new food is put in. Along with that, the longer things remain inside the more likely they will leak, mold, smell, multiply germs, and become growing problems, no pun intended.

Check your drawers

According to a study by the National Sanitation Foundation, Microbiologists swabbed items from 14 kitchens and found that vegetable and meat compartments in the fridge were a hotbed for Salmonella, Listeria, yeast, and mold. Salmonella is one of the most common causes of food poisoning in the U.S., according to FoodSafety.gov, and can cause diarrhea, fever, and vomiting. If you don't want to risk food poisoning, you should highly consider cleaning your fridge more often than most people do, which is almost never.

For National Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day, it's important to recognize that there is a balance to maintaining your icebox. If you do it too often, you'll tend to waste food unless you fully understand food labels and the meanings behind “sell by” and “best by” dates.

Reader's Digest reports, "Nearly half (40%) of all food produced in the United States goes to waste annually, and a big part of that is due to confusion over date labels. A large majority of Americans (a whopping 85%) report that they throw away food after its use-by or sell-by date, believing that consuming it after the date will make them sick."

However, if you go too long between cleanings, you risk losing items to spoilage, getting sick, and being forced to deal with revolting sights and/or smells.

How often should you clean your refrigerator?

There is plenty of advice out there on the frequency of fridge cleaning. But according to Good Housekeeping, you should be doing a 10-minute once-over every month and a 30-minute deep dive every season. If you are too busy to do that, at the absolute bare minimum, you should make National Clean Out Your Refrigerator Day an annual event in your home.

A good rule of thumb is to clean the fridge before you go grocery shopping. This habit not only makes room for new groceries but prevents you from overshopping. While you’re disposing of items and determining what will remain -- for now -- take a hot soapy rag and wipe down the shelves and doors.

Cleaning suggestions

After making my groceries at the supermarket, I head back home, back into my driveway to make bringing into the house easier, and round up any troops that are home to come and help lug everything into the house.

Once inside I start with all the cold food and frozen food, organizing and finding space for everything. Then I put up all my drinks and pantry food. For every grocery trip, I routinely do a quick clean out and clean of the fridge and shelves, loading my dishwasher with leftover Tupperware and disposing of anything that is dated or spoiled. To avoid funky orders I keep a small box of baking soda on the shelf. 

Deep cleaning the fridge is a bit bigger of a task, but if you routinely maintain it on grocery trip days, it is much more manageable over the year.

When deeper cleaning, wash all your shelves and walls down. Pull drawers and cubbies out and wash in the kitchen sink, filling up that hot soapy water sink comes in handy to tackle this job. Honestly, Dawn and water get the job done with the right scrub pads and rags. Sol-U-Mel is a great natural product to use in addition, it kills mold and mildew and is made from tea tree oil. Put everything back together and place all your items back in their places and in the end, everything is left clean and ready to go into the holiday season!

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