Make ahead meals for freezing

[Denise]

Has anyone ever made any make ahead meals. I did a few last spring but would like to do at least two weeks worth before school starts and I have to go back to work. I am working my regular job at school and then going to work at an after school program and don't get home until about 6:15. I know the first couple weeks will kick my butt after being off for the summer. Any suggestions??

[Stella]

Re: Make ahead meals for freezing

yeppers.
i do it all the time.

check out this web site, www.30daygourmet.com

i actually just recently finished a session. chicken breast was on sale for 2 a pound, so i loaded up, and i got some ground meat for 99 cents a pound.

it isn't as overwhelming as you may think. start off small. try cooking for 2 weeks at first instead of a whole month and see how it works for you.

But i tell you what, when we first started out with this 5 years ago, i did a 2 week session first, on the third night we were hooked. clean up was a breeze, full blown dinner on the table in 20 minutes. more time with family.

I have talked about this with so many people over the years and many people do not like the idea. but you will never know it was previously frozen. and some people say " but i like to cook" well yea so do i, but i don't like to spend an hour or more in the kitchen every night. and if i want to eat out then don't take nothing out of the freezer, and if i feel like making a huge pot of spaghetti sauce from total scratch *no ragu doctored up bizness here* then i can.

But freezer cooking has saved me hundreds of dollars a month on my grocery bill.
how often to you go to the grocery store for dinner, for that night? how much does it cost you to get out of the store? i know for me it's anywhere from 25 to 50 dollars.

when i freezer cook, i am at the store maybe once a week, and that's for bread, milk, or shampoo.

PM me your email and i'll forward you a 10 foot email i have written breaking down a cooking session. all the tips and pointers i have, i'll send it to you.

[Stella]

Re: Make ahead meals for freezing

oh for dinner tonight is swiss steak.

it'll cook for about 30 minutes in the oven. i have the mashed potatos in the freezer as well. ( i do not usually do that, but i had left over potatoes from my loaded baked potato soup, so i mashed them up, and froze it, whalla, nothing was thrown out)

so i have my cubed steak in a bag defrosting in the fridge right now and my sauce in a seperate bag. defrosting as well. mashed potatoes. i'll put the meat in a 9x13 pour the sauce on top bake it, and while that's baking i'll heat up the potatoes, and open up a vegetable, haven't decided on that yet, i have come cans of veggies and some frozen as well as some greenbeans that are canned... ta da. dinner.

[Rubelishous]

Re: Make ahead meals for freezing

You can also double favorite meals and freeze one for later use. I've done mass cooking when I get a good deal on ground beef. Then I make a large pot of tomato sauce and pair it with meatballs, meatloaf, stuffed peppers, stuffed cabbage, hamburgers, etc.

[Ginger]

Re: Make ahead meals for freezing

I often make up a couple of pounds of meatballs (I prefer mine to the prefab store ones because mine are made with extra lean meat), cook them and freeze. I almost always make too much tomato sauce for pasta, so the extra goes into the freezer. Same with lasagne--make 2, eat 1 and either put the other into the freezer unbaked, or bake, cool and split into single servings. I love the Gladware and Ziplock containers because the stack very nicely in the freezer.

And this year, I found cherries on the discount table--nothing wrong with them that I could see. Took them home, spent about 2 hours pitting them, and froze 4 packages for cherry crisp in the winter.

[Joanne]

Re: Make ahead meals for freezing

When we were both working, I frequently cooked on weekends for "warm-up" meals the following week. Would make batch of soup, meatloaf, casseroles, swiss steak,burgers patted out and seasoned ready to pop on grill. I would portion out what we would eat for the week and freeze rest for using later.

Not that we are both retired, I do not cook as far in advance. Our meals are simple, grilled steak, chicken, fish, burgers, pork chops and salads with a veggie if we want.