Friday, January 18, 2008

Per your request

I've had lots of requests for my freezer dinner ideas. Just so you all know, I freeze any recipe I want. I stock up on the aluminum foil casserole type pans and cover with a double layer of foil - this makes it easy to use a sharpie to write directions on each dish. Then, before eating I let thaw and heat in the oven at 350 degrees until warm. The recipes I made and froze last week included sweet & sour meatballs, hearty western casserole, homemade kid chicken tenders, barbecue (homemade sloppy joe mix), Rachael Ray chicken and broccoli cheese cavatapi/macaroni, chicken stuffing casserole, chicken roll-ups, tator tot casserole, white chicken chili, plus a few others I can't remember (and it's way too cold outside for me to hoof it to the freezer in the garage to check - sorry). It's also very easy to freeze soup in freezer ziploc bags. Then, let thaw in bowl of hot water. The same method works well for sauces and gravies. If you lay flat to freeze you will save space. It's also super easy to freeze homemade rolls - I do this all the time. This way we don't overeat them at one meal - we have a couple at lots of meals. Another timesaver I've discovered is to simply cook several bags/several lbs. of chicken breasts and ground beef at one time. Then, freeze in dinner size portions so that you can quickly throw them in whatever your recipe is that night. I like to boil and shred my chicken ,and season my ground beef with salt, pepper, and dried onions. I find this pretty adaptable to all of my recipes. Anyway, I hope this helps. I'm always up for kitchen tips - I would love to hear some of yours.

4 comments:

Rachel said...

Hey, I kind of do the freezer thing too. I freeze soups, frito pie (just the sauce), pinto beans, cooked ground beef, biscuits, burritos, zucchini/banana bread and cookies (they freeze great and it keeps me from eating them all in one week :)

How's it going? Haven't heard from you in a while. Did you see my comments from last week about the summer vacation trip?

Anonymous said...

Okay, great post... but I need the recipes! Would you be interested in our recipe blog???? PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

Stacy, I think you should write a book! I'm not even kidding! I swear you know everything about anything! I don't know how to do it. I think you definatly deserve the award of Super Mom!

Becky T said...

Awesome, awesome tips. Thank you so much! Some day, really seriously some day, I want to start doing this when I have some freezer room to use. These are great suggestions. Thanks!