Freezer Cooking in Baby Steps
On one of my recent grocery trips I scored a too-good-to-pass up manager’s special on ground meat. As is the nature with manager’s specials, the meat needed to be cooked or frozen right away but when returning from the store, I didn’t have the time to dedicate to preparing freezer meals.
Maybe you’ve found yourself in a similar situation. Or maybe your schedule just doesn’t allow for a full freezer cooking day. Freezer cooking can be done with a little or a lot of time, and taking just a few minutes to do a little prep saves a lot later on.
In my case with the manager’s special meat, I decided to take a few minutes to precook and portion it. Now that the prep is done, even on the busiest days I can easily add cooked hamburger to a jar of spaghetti sauce, make a salad, and have dinner ready in the time it would take to pick up a pizza.
{cooked ground turkey, ready for the freezer}
What are some of your best freezer cooking tips? What would you tell a newbie OAMMer who is intimidated to cook a full menu? We’d love to hear all about it in the comment section!
Find a meal that you love, and cook it twice, once :) If you love tacos..make up a double/triple batch of taco meat and freeze the extra portions for down the road. In the time it took to cook one meal – you now have 2 or 3 or 4 !
Sometimes I precook boneless chicken. I freeze some of it plain and some of it with taco seasoning. It allows you to pull dinner together in almost no time. It can be a pain to do, but it is so worth it when you don’t want to cook.
When I don’t have a ton of time, I just pick a couple meals from the menu and make those. Even just 2 or 3 stocked up meals saves me on those hectic days. I also find spreading the cooking over a few days is more manageable. Do breakfasts one day, lunches another day, and so on. Eventually the freezer gets stocked!
On the topic of tacos, my sister in law started buying pot roasts on sale and cooking in a crock pot with taco seasoning. Now you’ve got SHREDDED meat for tacos, burritos, taco salad or whatever. Super yum!
I also like to make double or triple batches of waffles or pancakes. Now I’ve got my own Eggos, microwave or toaster ready!
When making a casserole to freeze, I line the dish with foil, put in the meal, then cover with foil, label and freeze. Once it’s solid, I just remove from my dish, cinch the foil together, and freeze. This saves me when I’ve only got the one or two 9×13 pan.
Instead of being overwhelmed by a month, I do a week at a time. Cook a day and have meals for two weeks!
When I bring home managers specials or meat on sale – I pre-portion it and season some of it with some of our fav. recipes – like lemon pepper pork chops, chicken souvlaki, taco meat, and steak or chicken stir fry. As the meat thaws it also marinates. I also do the cook once eat twich theory – when making chili, spaghetti sauce, lasagna or a casserole I always double up and freeze one for later use : )
I’m also big on making double bathes. Most of the meals I make are freezer friendly. So, depending on meal, I make enough for 3 or 4 meals. That includes the meal that we are eating that day.
If I’m doing a full day or even a half day, I pick recipes that have a lot of the same ingredients.
How do you prevent your freezer meals from getting freezer burn? I live in an apartment, so I’m stuck with the freezer provided. I don’t have any option to change the temperature on it either. It seems like most things I put in the freezer get freezer burn pretty quick. So I’m not sure if I’m using the wrong containers/bags, leaving them in the freezer too long, or what. Any thoughts?
Scratch that last comment. I just saw your other post all about freezer burn!
Good sleuthing :). That’s exactly where I would have pointed you. Always feel free to ask questions!
How to you cook ground beef in the crock pot? Do you add water? What temp?
Check out this post – http://onceamonthmom.com/sliced-diced-ground-beef/