***Give Away Alert! I will be giving away four copies of my freezer cooking cookbooks The What’s for Dinner Solution A winner everyday Tuesday through Friday. PLUS – a Freezer Cooking Prize Pack including The What’s for Dinner Solution and $25 Amazon Gift Card to buy all the Ziploc bags and 8×8 pans you need to get started! Just leave a comment on the blog sometime this week and I will pick four book winners and one grand prize winner – the more comments, the more chances to win! (One comment per person, per day, please!) ***
All this week, I will be giving you step by step instructions on how to have great, tasty meals for you and your family, every night. To make sure you don’t miss a post, subscribe to the blog!
Shopping for Your Cooking Day
My shopping system is pretty easy. I triple my recipes, make a list of ingredients and quantities needed, and buy the biggest containers I can to satisfy those need. If I am doing marinades (and I am always doing marinades) I will buy the big Costco-sized bags of boneless, skinless chicken breasts, divide those into Ziploc gallon bags with five breasts each (because that is usually how many people I am feeding – less breasts for smaller kids who will share,)and then pour marinade in the bags with the frozen breasts. Super, super easy. I also do this with those giant pork roasts at Costco – just cut them down into your family-sized portions and you are good to go.
When I got to advanced freezer cooking, I did an Excel spread sheet with my basic menu already tripled – that way I just had to see what I was out of and buy that at Costco and Safeway. My kids are never bored with my cooking and it makes my life SO much easier.
A couple of shopping tips that make things easier:
- Shop at Costco first. I love Costco, but the marinade that was there last month may no longer exist. I tend to buy most of what I can at Costco, and then the remainders at Safeway.
- Know what you have. There is nothing more frustrating than picking up 10 pounds of brow rice, only to discover you had another 10 pound bag hanging out in your pantry. Take an inventory of everything you already have, and then shop from there. (Plus, if you are inventorying everything far enough in advance, you might be able to shape some of your menu around the items you already have.)
- Have a system for “saving” your food. If you live with a pack of hungry teenage boys, those two Costco roasted chickens might prove too great a temptation. I put blue painter’s tape on any food I’m “saving” for cooking that they might want. (The dried egg noodles are safe.)
- Bring the kids. (OK – if they’re old enough to help.) By the time my kids were 12, they were Costco experts. I would send them on “runs” together to go get items we needed. I would say it cut our shopping time by 1/3. The trick is to have a good list and raise your kids on Costco.
- Leave smaller kids with a friend. The trade off? Pick up her food at Costco for her. Just put everything you are buying for her on the conveyer belt first, have them subtotal it, and then add in your stuff.
- Have a spice inventory in addition to your pantry and freezer inventory. You will thank me later!
- Bring a clipboard and pen with you when you are shopping. You may even want to have one of your kids be in charge of the list.
Things you will need besides ingredients
Here are some basic supplies that will make your Freezer Cooking Adventure easier:
- Ziploc gallon bags
- Sharpie Markers
- Clear packing take
- White labels
- Pam or some other non-stick cooking spray
- 8×8 foil pans (if you will be doing casseroles)
- Aluminum foil
- Plenty of kitchen towels to clean up as you go
- Dish washing liquid to clean posts and pans as you go
Tomorrow, we will get cooking!
For today’s free download, go to my Facebook Page this week (through September 1. 2013) and get our new Pantry Inventory Sheet.
Tell me below – do you have a favorite freezer trick? You could win a copy of The What’s for Dinner Solution or the grand prize of The What’s for Dinner Solution and a $25 Amazon Gift Card.
Want more freezer recipes? Did you know you can get a free ecopy of Six Chicks Freeze and Fix: How to Start a Freezer Meal Co-op just by liking my Facebook Page. Once you hit “Like” just go to the tabs and download the booklet. It’s that easy. Over 20 great family-pleasing recipes!
We’ll have a free freezer download every day this week. Stay tuned!
Thanks! More great tips! 🙂
When I do freezer meals I like to prepare with a friend. We split the list for shopping. One person does Costco, the other a regular grocery store.
No kids for me. LOL It’s just easier!!
Would love this cookbook!
One of my favorite tips is to flash freeze items. If you get berries on sale, after washing and drying, lay them on a baking tray and let them freeze. Once frozen, put them in the bag and you can grab/measure exactly what you need. I do this with lost of things, cookie dough, chicken strips, cinnamon rolls, and even stuffed pasta shells.
Would love to be this organized, to help save time in daycare meals as well as family meals.
just learning and trying to get it all together. frustrated sighing while blowing her hair out of her face.
I like to put together things like waffle ingredients (dry only) and put them in a zip lock bag and have a few stored in the freezer. So all I have to do is add milk and eggs maybe a little vanilla and presto change-waffles!
Another quick meal make a double batch of pancakes and freeze the extras in a zip lock bag. Simply extract a few place them on a plate cover with a moistened paper towel and reheat and you have a breakfast as fast as cereal. Waffles can be popped into the toaster. This is a GREAT way to get the kids to eat breakfast!
I brown hamburger in 5 lb increments and freeze what I don’t use. So lets say tonight we have spaghetti so I prepare all five pounds and use just one. Then I package 2 cups hamburger in plastic bags or bowls whatever is available. Then I can pull out one pound (ish) and make tacos a night or two later. It makes hamburger helper a snap!!!!
My freezer tip would be to freeze meat like chicken or pork chops individually so you can take out how much you need without having to thaw more than you need.
Nancy
Thank you for the comprehensive lists. What a blessing!
Love the idea for marking food items to keep them safe! I am totally going to start this ASAP as my food is NOT safe from my husband, lol! I told him to just assume everything is planned for, but that didn’t work.
My favorite freezer cooking tip is to freeze meals flat in freezer bags. This allows me to fit more meals in my small freezer. But I’ve gotten out of the routine of freezer cooking. I’m hoping to win your book and be inspired to start again!
Kathi, this is really helpful, thanks! I always wait for someone to invite me to their freezer meal party, but I think with all your info, I just may host one myself!
My favorite freezer meal trick is that because my family hates leftovers (GRR), when I make meals that have a lot of leftovers, I immediately freeze the leftovers (and sometimes make them in a regular pan and a freezer pan), so that I have a meal for another day and they don’t realize I’m serving leftovers!
Love freezer cooking! Thanks for all your helpful tips! 🙂
I always forget what I’ve frozen. Need to do a better job of labeling and eat my food before it is freezer burned.
My favorite freezer trick is buying several turkeys when they are on sale around Thanksgiving. Then we can have turkey all year round.
I have a deep freeze as well as the regular refrigerator/freezer. I make a point to keep smaller side items and smaller leftover portions (and of course, ice) in the refrigerator/freezer and save the deep freeze for bigger meals.
When freezer cooking, I like to write the cooking/baking instructions right with the name so that I don’t have to hunt the recipe after choosing a freezer meal on a night we need a quick supper.
Love to freeze fresh berries for winter.
Hi, I have been doing bulk shopping for years. sometimes I cook up the meat the same day and package it up for the freezer all cooked which really is convenient when making dinner on a work day. just pull out the meat and leave in fridge until dinner or if hamburger crumbles defrost in microwave just before adding to spaghetti sauce etc. This has saved mealot of time and money. Joyce
I don’t know that it’s necessarily a trick, but I am just glad to have our freezer to take advantage of sales and my garden harvest. With just my hubs and I it’s nice to be able to put things away, or cook extra for a future meal.
I have only done breakfast items for freezer cooking, I have a small freezer and can’t fit much in it. This is helpful!
My favorite “freezer technique” at this time of the year is freezing my favorite garden herbs in ice cube trays (either in a little bit of oil or water). This winter, when I am longing for nice fresh (cheap) herbs for my casseroles and soups, I will have plenty on hand.
Whenever I’m chopping onions or peppers, I do more than I need. Often a recipe calls for half an onion or a small/medium onion. I mainly buy larger onions and freeze what I don’t use in the recipe. Having a Ziploc of chopped onions/sliced and chopped peppers in my freezer has cut my meal prep time down on more than one occasion because I’d done some of the work in advance.
SUPER IDEA!!! I usually leave mine in the frig but why not freeze them?