Small extra fridge
November 26, 2005 1:34 PM Subscribe
Please help me choose a secondary fridge (in the UK) - for an upcoming party and perhaps to keep after that.
We're living in a small one-bedroom flat with a galley kitchen, and we have a 90cm side-by-side fridge-freezer something like this one. We're having a party in early Jan and we were thinking of borrowing, renting or buying another fridge or drinks cooler to put in the living room. But it occured to me that a compact one might be useful as a permanent fixture, since we're always bemoaning our lack of fridge space. It would be great to shop for fresh food twice a week instead of almost every day.
We probably have enough space in the living room for a standard under-counter one, and certainly a compact one, although we'd probably prefer one or two smalller ones (mini-bar size) which could be hidden in a cabinet eventually.
My two main concerns are:
Noise (are there different types of fridge, some noisier than others?)
Food safety (are drinks coolers or hotel mini-bar-style fridges less safe for things like meat?)
Ebay has some 30 litre (1 cu ft) ex-hotel mini-bar fridges on sale for £50 including postage which, the seller boasts, are pretty much noiseless. That would be great in our living room/office. I travel a lot and I don't remember ever being woken up by a loud mini-bar clicking on and off in any hotel room, but are they really consistently quieter than a normal kitchen fridge? And do they have decent temperature regulation?
We're living in a small one-bedroom flat with a galley kitchen, and we have a 90cm side-by-side fridge-freezer something like this one. We're having a party in early Jan and we were thinking of borrowing, renting or buying another fridge or drinks cooler to put in the living room. But it occured to me that a compact one might be useful as a permanent fixture, since we're always bemoaning our lack of fridge space. It would be great to shop for fresh food twice a week instead of almost every day.
We probably have enough space in the living room for a standard under-counter one, and certainly a compact one, although we'd probably prefer one or two smalller ones (mini-bar size) which could be hidden in a cabinet eventually.
My two main concerns are:
Noise (are there different types of fridge, some noisier than others?)
Food safety (are drinks coolers or hotel mini-bar-style fridges less safe for things like meat?)
Ebay has some 30 litre (1 cu ft) ex-hotel mini-bar fridges on sale for £50 including postage which, the seller boasts, are pretty much noiseless. That would be great in our living room/office. I travel a lot and I don't remember ever being woken up by a loud mini-bar clicking on and off in any hotel room, but are they really consistently quieter than a normal kitchen fridge? And do they have decent temperature regulation?
Response by poster: Thanks for this (and sorry it's belated). You're right about the temperatures. So we've decided to just buy a small, cheap, average-noise fridge to stick in the corner of the living room, and if we can't stand if afterwards we'll sell it or give it away.
posted by suleikacasilda at 12:48 PM on December 11, 2005
posted by suleikacasilda at 12:48 PM on December 11, 2005
This thread is closed to new comments.
If you look at consumer fridges designed for drinks, like this one, you'll see that they have a temperature range from 4 °C to about 15 °C. Refrigerated food, on the other hand, should be kept below 4 °C.
If you're going to be putting food in it, I'd make sure you get a fridge that's designed for that purpose.
From my experience with mini-fridges, some of them have substantial gubbins hanging out the back, while others seem to put a lot of it (including the compressor/pump stuff) actually inside the plastic case. The latter kind are quieter, for obvious reasons. However, this does make the inside of the fridge weirdly shaped, since there'll be a big lump sticking in where the gubbins lives (if you see what I mean), rather than just having a big rectangular space.
posted by chrismear at 3:09 PM on November 26, 2005