Sorry it has been a few days, I thought I would let you think for a little while of how you would like to begin. Now to give you some ideas of what we do for freezer meals.
lasagna
enchiladas
burritos
any type of casseroles
soups
egg rolls
sauces
bbq pulled pork
sloppy joe mix
taco mix
pizza
mashed potatoes
baby food
cheese - must grate first
breakfast sandwiches
breakfast burritos
meatloaf
meatballs
hamburgers
stroganoff
This is just a few ideas of what you can do. To help you save time and money, buy meat in bulk. Cook up hamburger a couple lbs at a time with onion, then divide it out to make a couple meals of sloppy joes, a couple meals of tacos, use some to make a casserole. Get creative with your meals. Get some chicken pieces to cook and shred, then make chicken enchiladas (you can make completely to pull out and just cook or just freezer the filling and thaw to make fresh enchiladas), chicken burritos with beans and cheese, or any type of chicken casserole. One of our favorite meals is sweet pork burritos from Cafe Rio. We were able to get a knockoff recipe from a friend, so I will get a couple of pork roasts when they are on sale, put them in my crockpot with all ingredients and cook. There is always a lot left over so I will divide it out between a few 1 qt. freezer bags and freeze to use another time. Don't forget to label all of your freezer bags, otherwise you will forget what you have in the freezer and it will go bad before you use it.
If your family, like mine, goes through a lot of cheese, you know how pricey that can get. Buy cheese when it is on sale only! Cheese freezes very nicely but only when it is grated. If you can buy it for good prices already grated, that is great, just through it in your freezer. If you buy block cheese, just grate it first and put in 1 qt freezer bags to freeze.
If you made something for dinner and there is too much but not enough for another meal and you don't think you will use it with in a week, put it in your freezer to add to it later or make a new meal. For example, I made biscuits and gravy one night (we love breakfast for dinner) and I had some gravy left over. It wasn't enough to use for another meal for my family, but it was enough to make a breakfast pizza. I put it in a container and stuck it in the freezer and a couple weeks later we made breakfast pizzas.
I also will freeze sauces. We will make up a huge pot of spaghetti sauce and then divide it out and freeze in quart containers. We also have a knockoff Olive Garden alfredo that is very yummy that we make in bulk and then freeze. Another thing that is really good is to mix the two sauces together and make pink sauce, oh so good.
I hope I have given you some ideas of what to freeze. I will continue to post freezer meal recipes. So stay tuned for more.
Friday, January 14, 2011
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Freezer Meals
I am going to talk about freezer meals. It is kind of intense, so just take it one thing at a time. First off, you need to decide how much you want to cook.
Do you want to make enough meals for one week, two weeks, a whole month?
Do you want to cook all in one day or split it up over a few cooking sessions?
Do you want to cook alone, with your spouse, or with friends/family and split the cost?
Think of how you want to do it, then decide what your family will eat. Gather any recipes that you love and you know your family will eat. You can freeze pretty much any meal there are just a few rules for some things:
Meat: freeze raw to use later. We have a grocery store up the street from us that I love to buy ground beef from. They usually have the cheapest prices and they come precut in about 1 lb. squares, so I just bring them home, put them in a sandwhich bag and then I can fit four squares in a one gallon freezer bag. When buying ground beef, I never buy less than 85/15 (fat content). This is usually the one that is on sale the most often. I will just cook it and drain it and then run water over it to get out as much of the fat as possible.
Chicken I won't buy unless it is less than $1.79/lb. Lately chicken breasts have been huge so I will cut them into quarters to make it easier to bag and use later, then I put them into 1 qt. freezer bags. I will also buy legs, thighs and quarters when they are on sale and put them in my crockpot to cook, then the meat comes off so easy and you can shred and freezer that for burritos or chicken soup. You can do the same with turkey, ham or roasts. And don't forget to save the stock to use in cooking or as a base for soups.
Meat you can also cook and freeze. Or if you have meat that is raw that has been frozen that you need to use, you can cook it and refreeze, but don't refreeze raw meat, it will not be good later.
Pastas: Do not cook pasta thoroughly when freezing it. You only have to cook it half the time because once it is in a dish and freezing and thawed, it will absorb more moisture as if it has been cooked the full time. If you thoroughly cook pasta before freezing it turns into mush when you thaw and cook it.
Veggies: Save money and freeze your own fresh veggies (especially ones out of your own garden). Just know how to blanch them so they freeze well. There are some veggies that don't need to be blanched, they can just be frozen: mushrooms, onions, peppers are a few. I always save some pumpkins at halloween (that we haven't carved) and cut them up, cook, puree and freeze then I always have pumpkin for cookies, cakes or bread that I didn't have pay much for.
Fruits: Most fruits you can just peel and throw in the freezer, in a freezer bag, of course. Use these in fruit cocktail, jello, smoothies or just to thaw and eat.
If you have food in your fridge getting old or bad, use the proper method and freeze it to use later, then you won't waste a lot of food.
Also, anything you see frozen in the store you can do yourself.
Try to plan your freezer meals around sales, you won't spend as much. I also love shopping at Smith's because they always mark down meat when it is a couple days from the sell by date. I am very choosy when I do this and only buy meat that looks good that I myself would eat. Then I will just bring them home and put in the freezer or cook immediately and then freeze. Also buy totillas and bread when on sale or clearance and freeze. We have a Sara Lee outlet here where I buy bread for 60 cents to a $1 so I will buy about 10 at a time and double bag and freeze them, then I always have bread on hand and don't have to pay over $2 a loaf and run to the store for just that, and end up buying more.
I know this is a little overwhelming, it is to me to sometimes. So maybe start out by just making a few meals at a time or if you make dinner every night just double it or triple it and put one or two meals away for another day. I do this a lot and mainly with lasagna. It's just as easy to make two or three at the same time as you are making one.
Do you want to make enough meals for one week, two weeks, a whole month?
Do you want to cook all in one day or split it up over a few cooking sessions?
Do you want to cook alone, with your spouse, or with friends/family and split the cost?
Think of how you want to do it, then decide what your family will eat. Gather any recipes that you love and you know your family will eat. You can freeze pretty much any meal there are just a few rules for some things:
Meat: freeze raw to use later. We have a grocery store up the street from us that I love to buy ground beef from. They usually have the cheapest prices and they come precut in about 1 lb. squares, so I just bring them home, put them in a sandwhich bag and then I can fit four squares in a one gallon freezer bag. When buying ground beef, I never buy less than 85/15 (fat content). This is usually the one that is on sale the most often. I will just cook it and drain it and then run water over it to get out as much of the fat as possible.
Chicken I won't buy unless it is less than $1.79/lb. Lately chicken breasts have been huge so I will cut them into quarters to make it easier to bag and use later, then I put them into 1 qt. freezer bags. I will also buy legs, thighs and quarters when they are on sale and put them in my crockpot to cook, then the meat comes off so easy and you can shred and freezer that for burritos or chicken soup. You can do the same with turkey, ham or roasts. And don't forget to save the stock to use in cooking or as a base for soups.
Meat you can also cook and freeze. Or if you have meat that is raw that has been frozen that you need to use, you can cook it and refreeze, but don't refreeze raw meat, it will not be good later.
Pastas: Do not cook pasta thoroughly when freezing it. You only have to cook it half the time because once it is in a dish and freezing and thawed, it will absorb more moisture as if it has been cooked the full time. If you thoroughly cook pasta before freezing it turns into mush when you thaw and cook it.
Veggies: Save money and freeze your own fresh veggies (especially ones out of your own garden). Just know how to blanch them so they freeze well. There are some veggies that don't need to be blanched, they can just be frozen: mushrooms, onions, peppers are a few. I always save some pumpkins at halloween (that we haven't carved) and cut them up, cook, puree and freeze then I always have pumpkin for cookies, cakes or bread that I didn't have pay much for.
Fruits: Most fruits you can just peel and throw in the freezer, in a freezer bag, of course. Use these in fruit cocktail, jello, smoothies or just to thaw and eat.
If you have food in your fridge getting old or bad, use the proper method and freeze it to use later, then you won't waste a lot of food.
Also, anything you see frozen in the store you can do yourself.
Try to plan your freezer meals around sales, you won't spend as much. I also love shopping at Smith's because they always mark down meat when it is a couple days from the sell by date. I am very choosy when I do this and only buy meat that looks good that I myself would eat. Then I will just bring them home and put in the freezer or cook immediately and then freeze. Also buy totillas and bread when on sale or clearance and freeze. We have a Sara Lee outlet here where I buy bread for 60 cents to a $1 so I will buy about 10 at a time and double bag and freeze them, then I always have bread on hand and don't have to pay over $2 a loaf and run to the store for just that, and end up buying more.
I know this is a little overwhelming, it is to me to sometimes. So maybe start out by just making a few meals at a time or if you make dinner every night just double it or triple it and put one or two meals away for another day. I do this a lot and mainly with lasagna. It's just as easy to make two or three at the same time as you are making one.
Monday, January 10, 2011
I will also post my awesome shopping trips, maybe this will get you excited to want to shop with coupons. It's a lot of fun and I enjoy it. So today I went to two different Rite Aid's to get all this stuff, but it was worth it. I paid out of pocket $23.42 and got back $25.00 in +up rewards (to learn more about +up rewards go to riteaid.com).
I have about $7 in +ups from a trip last week, but I had some good coupons. I bought 8 boxes Special K, 4 Tylenol Pricise patches, 2 bottles Clorox2, 20 Hormel Compleats, 4 bags pistashios, 2 Kraft marshmallows. I mainly paid tax on the majority of these, but definitely stuff we will use. If I would have done things a little differently when checking out I probably would have paid a lot less, but I do have $25 to spend on my next trip to get more things free.
So a very dear friend of mine is interested in freezer meals, so I am going to focus on that this week. To start I received a sack of carrots at Christmas from my parents that 
came from their garden. yum. Their outside fridge freezes everything so they had partially frozen, which is fine, I just steam and puree them and freeze to use in future meals. I was only able to use about half of what they gave me, the other half was mushy. I cleaned, peeled, and steamed. Then I stuck them in my food processor to puree. I got about 2 cups of puree that I will use in spaghetti sauce or something and also give to my little 8 month old which she loves, plus it saves me money. I love to cook with purees, it gives my kids extra veggies. Look for Jessica Seinfeld's cookbooks to learn more about cooking with purees.
came from their garden. yum. Their outside fridge freezes everything so they had partially frozen, which is fine, I just steam and puree them and freeze to use in future meals. I was only able to use about half of what they gave me, the other half was mushy. I cleaned, peeled, and steamed. Then I stuck them in my food processor to puree. I got about 2 cups of puree that I will use in spaghetti sauce or something and also give to my little 8 month old which she loves, plus it saves me money. I love to cook with purees, it gives my kids extra veggies. Look for Jessica Seinfeld's cookbooks to learn more about cooking with purees.
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