Recipe Labels and Variations
The secret to a clean refrigerator is FREQUENT attention! That is, the secret is in the frequency with which you deal with said refrigerator.
A refrigerator is a lot like a toddler. It doesn’t need long, drawn out time periods from us–it just needs lots of little snatches of time! I can remember when my littles especially were toddlers and preschoolers. It was easy to get busy with the olders and not spend as much time on the littles. I made it a point each day to put in my schedule little snatches of time that I would devote to the little guys. A quick story. A little rocking. Getting out something interesting for them to play with or do. Putting Lego heads on their Lego men. Just little snippets of time—but lots of snippets throughout the week!
This is the first follow-up recipe to my post about cooking chicken to use in shredded chicken recipes. In that post, I shared that I have been compiling recipes for my two sets of newlyweds. I thought you might like to see their sweet faces (as I ALWAYS love to see their sweet faces!), so check out the pictures at the end of this post.
When the married or college kids come home for a weekend or holiday break, I always like to make things that they like, or things that are special to them. I have been scouring the internet for a couple of years to find a recipe that is similar to the Arroz Con Pollo that our newly-wed son always orders at our family’s favorite Mexican restaurant. I was unable to find anything like it. (The ones I found were large chunks of meat more in a red sauce as opposed to a shredded chicken dish in a white sauce.)
So….I combined a couple of other recipes that looked similar and came up with one that worked—and that all of the kids really liked. (And my Arroz Con Pollo son thought was a good knock off!)
Cooking day! |
When I first started using this method, I cooked two days one week (a day of preps then the next day cooking/freezing) and began using those meals immediately (about four per week). Then before those were gone, I did another cooking day and filled another freezer for the next month, etc. This book is a terrific resource for learning what freezes well and getting recipe ideas, as well as just getting an overview of freezer cooking in general.
Obviously, to do “once a month” cooking in a day (by yourself or with a partner or kids), you don’t have to follow this book. After a while of using this book, I moved on to my own style of “once a month cooking” in which I would do mostly one certain type of food (i.e. crumbled ground beef one month; shredded chicken the next). The problem with this is that if you are relying too much on your freezer meals, you end up eating the same type of meats that whole month. (See my solution below in my “six month cooking week.)
4. “Cycle cooking”–or “six month cooking week.”
The aforementioned “one type of meat per cooking day” led me to what I did for many years–a method that is not for the faint of heart! In this method, I divided my recipes into six “cycles”:
a. Shaped beef and other beef (meatloaves, meatballs, tuna balls, salmon loaves, swiss steak, Florida steak, braised beef cube mix/stroganoff)
b. Crumbled beef (spaghetti pie, sloppy joes, lasagna, taco meat, taco pie, hamburger stew, chili soup starter, etc.)
c. Shredded chicken (chicken rice soup starter, bbq shredded chicken, chicken tetrazinni, chicken spaghetti, chicken lasagna, hot chicken sandwich filling, chicken rice casserole, chicken enchiladas, etc.)
d. Chicken breasts (parmesan chicken breasts, grilled/marinated chicken breasts, chicken parmesan, oven fried chicken, chicken fajita meat, Oriental chicken, chicken cordon bleu, Monterey chicken breasts, bbq chicken breasts)
e. Sides (potato casserole, rice casserole, fried rice starter, mashed potatoes, broccoli and rice, four bean bake, green bean casserole, cauliflower au gratin)
f. Desserts (cookie dough, unbaked cakes, pies, quick breads, etc.)
In the “six month cooking week,” I started the process by shopping on Friday, preparing my bags and containers and labels on Saturday, and starting the cooking on Monday. I did about thirty entrees each day–one day shaped beef, one day crumbled beef, etc. I would fill one freezer with six months worth of freezer meals by the end of the week. It was exhausting (and at times overwhelming), but it was amazing to have that freezer full of meals.
Once that freezer was full, I just did regular freezer cooking one day a month–but I did a different cycle each time–and began filling up my other freezer. By the end of the six months, the first freezer full of meals was empty and the next one was full. It was my favorite system ever because it brought together the efficiency of freezer cooking with my super efficiency of cycle cooking–doing one type of meat at a time. (This system actually trained me to do the “ten pounds of meat a week” method I now use. Doing all of the same type of meat at one time is super efficient!)
5. “Power Hour” cooking
When I can’t have my three hour “Kitchen Session” as described above, I often opt for the “power hour” freezer cooking. In this method, my son and I (or my husband at times) go into the kitchen for one hour and do as much as we can possibly do–of all the same things. In this regard, we might make six lasagnas or ten bags of sloppy joes or ten bags of taco meat or eight bags of chicken rice soup starter. This method only works if you do it often though–otherwise, you end up eating the same thing over and over!
So what kind of freezer cook do you want to be? What would best meet your family’s needs? How do you cook–big or small? What feels right for you?
In starting out with freezer cooking, you can do whatever works for you! And you will bless your family and make your days run more smoothly in the process.