Molded Foods in Your Fridge

You do not normally think of mold as a part of your diet and you probably should not, but the fact is that foods have been made with mold in them for millennia. Most of the time, though, molded food in your refrigerator does not work in your favor and ingesting it can very well make you sick. This usually comes from outdated items or fruits and vegetables and most of the time, you will have to throw these things away.

Molded bread needs to be thrown out, because it is a porous food and any mold that grows on one piece will contaminate the next one to it. You cannot be sure how far the mold has embedded itself into the loaf, so it is best to just throw away the whole loaf.

Jellies and jams in the refrigerator are also notorious for mold growth. We tend to forget about old jars of grape jelly stuffed into the back of the fridge behind everything else and they mold after a while. Throw these out. These contain a large amount of moisture and cannot be saved. If you notice that this happens every time you purchase a certain kind of jelly, jam, or other item in your fridge, try to buy things that you know your family will eat before they become moldy. This will help with the problem.

Other items like sour cream and mayonnaise, like the jams and jellies that we mentioned earlier, cannot be saved. You can use outdated sour cream for a while, since sour cream is already sour, but molded sour cream should be thrown out as soon as it is discovered.

Some items in your fridge that become molded can be saved, though, if you know what to do with them. Items like hard salami and blocks of cheese can be salvaged if you cut around the molded spot and throw it away. Cut off at least an inch around and under these areas and do not touch the knife to the mold itself and then touch another part of the food. Cross contamination is a real problem here.

You can cut down on the amount of molded foods in your fridge by making sure that your family eats the leftovers that get stored there and by purchasing smaller containers of foods that you find are becoming molded the most often. You will save time and the money necessary to replace the molded food.

Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
Texas Residential Water Damage Restoration Contractors and
Water Damage Restoration companies across the united states.

Killing Mold While Going Green

While there are a large number of commercial chemicals that are on the market and advertised to kill mold, there are not too many options for those of us who are interested in “going green”. Many people are jumping onto the going green band wagon recently, exchanging the chemical cleaners and pesticide treated foods for something more natural and un-tampered with. There are natural ways to kill mold, though, that will not harm human beings, even if they are few and far between. You can find these in health food stores or even just your local grocery store, but be prepared to pay more than you would for the chemical alternatives.

The first one is the least expensive of the three ways, but you may not be pleased with the way your house smells immediately after you treat it. This calls for distilled white vinegar for a number of reasons. It is colorless and will not stain anything that you put it on and it will kill somewhere around 82 percent of molds that can live in your house. Even though it does not kill all kinds of mold, it will kill most that grows indoors. Pour the vinegar into a spray bottle, spray it on the mold and do not rinse. The smell will go away in a while and the mold should be dead.

Another way that you can kill mold is to use tea tree oil. This is a little bit expensive, but if you are bent on going green, this is one of the only 3 known ways to go. It will kill more types of mold than vinegar and leaves no odor. Take about two teaspoons of tea tree oil and mix it with two cups of water. Put this in a spray bottle, mix the two by shaking it up, and spray areas of mold with it. Again, do not rinse. This has an indefinite shelf life.

Grapefruit seed extract works in a similar way and you need to mix around 20 drops of this with two cups of water in the same way that you mixed up the tea tree oil. Spray it on molded areas and like the other two methods, do not rinse it off.

None of these methods should pose any health threat to you or the people in your home, unless you or they have an allergy to one of these items.

Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
Miami Residential Water Damage Restoration Contractors and
Orlando water Damage companies.

Contractors

When it comes to remodeling or building a home, many homeowners (or potential homeowners) will often go into the process with the misconception that hiring a contractor is the simplest of tasks, and can be done by anyone. However, hiring a contractor is one of the most, if not the most important tasks to accomplish when constructing or remodeling a home. It is probably a very bad idea to choose the first contractor you see in the phone book or see on TV. Instead, you should ask around and get references from various people you know who have hired contractors before so you can choose one that knows what he or she is doing.

The first thing you should do is to find around three contractors that you think may be best suited for the job. As previously stated, it is a very good idea to ask around, specifically relatives and friends and neighbors who have hired contractors for information on the contractors they have used and find out the praise and criticisms of each one. You should find out whether or not the contractors did a good job with the handling of specific jobs. Some of the most important jobs to ask about are dealing with water damage, any mold growth, or possibly fire damage. Water damage from a bad plumbing job is one of the most serious problems and causes of mold damage. Mold damage can be one thing that can kill the building of your home.

It is a very good idea that you show the building plans to the three contractors you have narrowed your search down to. This way you can help you get the individual perspective you like best. This can also help you evaluate each individual idea.

One of the most important things to do is do find out whether or not there are any lawsuits being filed against the potential contractors that they may be trying to hide. The contractor that you choose should either supply you with or should tell you where to obtain copies of all insurance policies for your own records. And speaking of insurance, it is important that you make sure that the contractor you choose has insurance.

It is very important that you outline everything that you expect the contractor to do during the job in the contract that you have them sign. It should include information such as the starting date, and end date. It’s also a good idea to offer a bonus for early, but careful, completion of the job as an incentive.

Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
Houston Fire Damage Water Restoration Contractor companies and
Los Angeles Water Damage and Restoration Services.