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The Best Butter Dishes and Food Containers to Organize Your Fridge

The Best Butter Dishes and Food Containers to Organize Your Fridge
The Best Butter Dishes and Food Containers to Organize Your Fridge


With its unboxing videos and detailed daily skincare routines, TikTok has taken us deep within the mundanities of everyday life, which recently included a deep interest is our fridges — as in, making them more organized, tidy, and beautiful. Called fridgescaping, it turned a household necessity into an opportunity to showcase your personal style, and as KC Hysmith and I reported, it has also faced no shortage of backlash. But in truth, fridgescaping can be relatively simple, with clear plastic bins separating everyday ingredients, or it can be more fanciful, as is the case with Lynzi Judish, who designs her fridge interiors around different whimsical themes. She’s decked out her fridge like an enchanted forest, and she’s planted lace doilies and bouquets of herbs and flowers in her fridge for “fridgerton,” an homage to the Regency-era stylings of the Netflix show Bridgerton.

My own fridge is usually a hodgepodge of leftover-filled deli containers, your standard milk and eggs, and what anyone would consider an excessive amount of mustard. But, after talking to Judish, I started to understand the appeal of the practice. She explained how organizing her food and having perishables on display helps her make use of what’s in the fridge, thus reducing food waste.

“There are certain ways that you can make your refrigerator aesthetically pleasing without doing every little thing that I’m doing,” says Judish. “Things that can be stored in water are easy wins. Things like herbs or parsley or asparagus are supposed to be stored that way anyway, so by throwing them in a vase, they’ll look absolutely beautiful in your refrigerator and they’re going to last a long time.” Even for people who don’t want elaborate themes for their fridge, fridgescaping can be a satisfying way to beautify a space you look at multiple times a day. To get going, I looked at TikTok for inspiration and found a treasure trove of products for fridgescaping success, including reusable food wraps, a breathable crate for fresh berries, and sleek ceramic containers for leftovers.

Butter Dishes

Hedgehog butter dish



Potter’s Studio hedgehog butter dish

Prices taken at time of publishing.

The Queen of Fridgescaping, Lynzi Judish, has displayed this particular non-Sonic ceramic hedgehog in several of her themed fridges, including her designs inspired by The Hobbit and the Starz historical drama, Outlander. It’s ideal for her maximalist, royalty-in-the-woods themed fridgescapes, but just look at it: With a cute little mushroom as a handle, this butter dish would be charming on its own, too. Maybe you never knew you wanted to store your butter inside a winsome little hedgehog, but just imagine telling guests who want butter: “It’s in the mushroom-topped hedgehog!” 


Tiled butter dish.



Bistro Tile Butter Dish

Prices taken at time of publishing.

If a cutesy cottagecore butter dish isn’t exactly your vibe, perhaps a French Art Deco look will be more your thing. This chic dish features a graphic black, white, and gold color palette that would complement a variety of kitchen colorways. I’m imagining a Great Gatsby-inspired fridge stocked with several bottles of Champagne and this stylish butter vessel.


Other food containers and organizers

Patterned bee’s wrap around an onion.



Assorted 3 Pack of Bee’s Wrap

Prices taken at time of publishing.

Nothing mars a tranquil fridgescape faster than a leftover sandwich, hastily re-wrapped in deli paper and shoved in the corner. Beeswax wraps are a sustainable way to pack up (and spruce up) leftovers. These patterned wraps are made of fabric that’s been coated in a layer of beeswax and tree resin. The heat of your hands makes them pliable and tacky enough to mold to containers and bits of food, kind of like plastic wrap but without the single-use plastic. This set includes three sizes and is available in nine different colorful patterns, such as royal blue “Bees and Bears” and “Full Bloom” with vibrant poppies.




Weck Wood Lid Jars, Set of 3

Prices taken at time of publishing.

I find Weck jars inexplicably sexy; their strong lines and wide mouths make them both pleasing to look at and functional. But I don’t always love fussing with their little metal tabs or rubber gaskets, so I’m a big fan of these acacia wood lids. They’re easy to open and have the added benefit of bringing in a hint of the natural world to keep your fridge from feeling overly sterile. These are great for storing pickled goodies as well as salad dressings, sauces, and soups.


berry colander.



Mint Berry Box Colander

Prices taken at time of publishing.

Fresh berries have a painterly quality that fridgescapers love to display, and this colander-box looks like the fruit crates you see at the farmers market. Made of glazed porcelain, they also have the durability to withstand daily use and refrigeration. Plus, the air circulation around the berries will help them avoid mold and last longer. They come in three colors, including white, a pale blue, and this mint shade.


Clear plastic egg holder.



iDesign Linus Fridge Bins Egg Holder

Prices taken at time of publishing.

There are dozens of egg holders on the market, and some are much more aesthetic than this one, but they’re typically flat and don’t have lids, which invites disaster. And there is nothing sadder than a squashed egg that never had a chance to become huevos rancheros. This model holds 14 eggs at a time, which is ample for my family of four, but if you’re a more voracious egg consumer, get two and stack them on top of each other, taking advantage of your fridge’s vertical space.


Green food storage container.



Caraway Food Storage Container

Prices taken at time of publishing.

These ceramic vessels from Caraway are a level up from your standard clear reusable containers for leftovers. They’re microwave safe and the subdued hues are beautiful to behold.  They’re also still practical. Transparent lids allow you to keep an eye on what’s inside — avoiding those unfortunate moments when you realize, too late, that your leftover mapo tofu has succumbed to nature’s cruelties.


Organizing basket on a desk.


| Ikea


Risatorp basket with compartments

Prices taken at time of publishing.

Baskets and compartments are an organizer’s best friend — and they’re essential for keeping a tidy fridge. These white, powder-coated steel baskets from Ikea are ideal for tucking in produce drawers to keep your okra from rolling into your eggplant and causing a total scene.


Small yellow wire basket.



Henry Julier Outline Baskets

Prices taken at time of publishing.

These bright yellow powder-coated iron baskets bring a little countertop charm to the inside of the fridge. I like them for storing apples and citrus and other things that tend to roll around, willy -nilly, whenever I open the produce drawer.


Drink holders

Beverage racks inside a refrigerator.



iDesign Linus Fridge Bins Wine Holder

Prices taken at time of publishing.

Big, clunky wine bottles can take up a lot of real estate inside the fridge, but storing them horizontally is a practical way to make use of your space and provide easy access to your pét nats and lambruscos. Like the egg holders I love, these are stackable, so go ahead and buy a few more bottles.


A white drink organizer.



Spring Loaded Fridge Drink Dispenser

Prices taken at time of publishing.

These spring-loaded drink can holders make my fridge feel like a well-stocked hotel mini fridge, adding a touch of luxury. Other versions of this kind of drink holder are often quite large, but you can buy this version one row at a time to suit your personal canned beverage needs.


Two glass milk bottles.



Reusable Glass Milk Bottles

Prices taken at time of publishing.

For the most part, milk comes in cardboard or plastic cartons these days, which is a shame because we can pretty much all agree that the glass milk jars of yesteryear are way more charming. Channel that bygone splendor with these quart-sized glass bottles and let yourself imagine they were delivered by a dapper milkman.


Glass jug with pink juice.



Large glass jug

Prices taken at time of publishing.

If you’re dealing with bigger volumes of liquid, this 60-ounce handled jar is the way to go. Bonus: Its vintage-style ribbed glass will fit right in with the Great Gatsby-themed fridge you designed around your Art Deco butter dish.


Interior upgrades

Refrigerator shelves lined with daisy print.



Daisy Shelf Liner

Prices taken at time of publishing.

Fridgescaping relies on maintaining a meticulously clean fridge at all times, but cleaning fridges — removing and scrubbing shelves and drawers — is laborious. These non-adhesive shelf liners, which come in patterns such as lemon or yellow flowers, make things easier and more beautiful. Just wipe them down with a damp cloth and pop them back in place to keep your fridge looking fresh as a daisy.




Oxo Lazy Suzan Turntable

Prices taken at time of publishing.

Throughout her fridgescaping experience, Judish has been compiling a list of upgraded refrigerator features she’d like to see — things like shelves with built-in lazy Susans, which were once standard. “You no longer have the lazy Susan shelves like they used to have, where you turn the whole thing out and you can reach everything,” Judish says. Who wouldn’t want to put their carafes of milk and jars of pickles on a turntable for easy retrieval? Popping this OXO turntable in my fridge gives me easy access to the ingredients I need without having to hunt for them in the back of the fridge.  


Stephanie Ganz is a writer and recipe developer whose work has appeared in BUST, Bon Appétit, The Kitchn, and Epicurious. She’s the author of the Substack newsletter But Wait, There’s More.



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