Except for a couple of big bags of Turkey Sausage that I made and froze recently, my freezer holds nothing of convenience. (Unless you count a few packages of soy free chocolate chips convenient. I could conveniently eat chocolate chips for lunch sometime.)
If you’ve been reading here long, you know that I love creating healthy convenience foods for my freezer so that when I’m facing a busy day, my family still has healthy food to eat. You can scroll through this series of posts entitled Make Ahead Meals to learn more about how I make food ahead for the freezer! I can’t say enough about how wonderful it is to take the time every once in a while to work ahead in the kitchen.
Because my frozen Turkey Sausage (and chocolate chips) are lonely, and because I’ve been working on a big project for Heavenly Homemakers which is taking a lot of my time (yes, I’m going to leave you hanging on this one for now), I’m anxious to spend a few hours this week putting some extra food in the freezer.
This time for my freezer cooking endeavors, I am very excited to be teaming up with Tricia from Once a Month Mom. Have you been to the Once a Month Mom site? If you’re interested in doing some cooking and baking ahead for your freezer, you MUST take advantage of all the free and wonderful information you’ll find at Once a Month Mom. Her site is full of great tips and recipes that are perfect for making food ahead and freezing it for future convenience.
Once a Month Mom has great menu plans each month all laid out and ready for you, complete with recipes, grocery lists and freezer instructions. You’ll find a plan for Whole Foods Cooking, Gluten Free/Dairy Free Cooking, even a menu for Baby Food Freezer Cooking.
I have had a lovely time clicking through all of the recipes on the Once a Month Mom site, picking some new and fun recipes to try for my family for my freezer cooking plans this week. Here are the recipes I chose this time:
- Baked Chicken and Artichoke Penne with Sundried Tomatoes
- Tacos in a Sleeping Bag (using my yogurt pizza dough instead of the crescent dough called for in the recipe)
- Ham Broccoli and Cheddar Roll (again using my yogurt pizza dough)
- Homemade Cheesy Rice
- Strawberry Orange Smoothie
I can’t wait to start playing with these new recipes (yes, because for me, trying new recipes is like playing with new toys!!). I was hoping maybe you’d all like to “come over and play” along with me this week. Want to?! (Yes, you do. You want to. Say yes.)
For those of you who are new to freezer cooking, or for any who might just need a little motivation to get some extra food in the freezer, I thought I’d extend a little challenge of sorts. Here’s how it will work:
- Pick a recipe (or more) from Once a Month Mom or from here at Heavenly Homemakers.
- Find some time this week to make the recipe(s) for your freezer.
- Blog about your cooking experience, if you have a blog, so that you can come link up with us here on Friday when we’ll all report back to share how our freezer cooking went. If you don’t have a blog, you’ll be given the opportunity to share about your freezer cooking in the comments section of our round up post on Friday, so please join the fun whether you have a blog or not!
- Each person who links up or leaves a comment on the Friday Freezer Cooking Round Up post will be eligible to win a free recipe ebook of choice ($7.95 or less) from the Heavenly Homemakers Shop.
- The more recipes you make and share with us, the more chances you have to win! (But don’t over-do…we would like to keep this fun. Please, we don’t want any reports that women across the world fainted from Freezer Cooking Exhaustion.)
Okay…so who’s in?! Look around at Once a Month Mom and at all of our Make Ahead Meals to get some new recipe ideas. Get your Freezer Cooking game on and join us for our fun cooking challenge this week!
What recipes are sounding good to try?? Which ebook might you pick from our Heavenly Homemakers Shop if you win?!
April says
I’ve wanted to try my hand at freezer cooking for the longest, but have yet to do it. I’m in! :)
Fiddlesticks says
My freezer is looking kind of empty so I will join you!
Candi says
Sounds like fun!
Jeni says
I’ve followed Tricia at OAMM for the past couple years. Our little guy has been growing up on her baby and toddler food recipes his whole 2 years! Originally, I followed her monthly cooking days to the letter. Over time, we’ve found favorite recipes that can always be found in our freezer. Lately, I’ve scoured the grocery ads to find the best meat deal and cooked for the freezer based on the ads. Every week, I can go through the freezer inventory and make a meal plan based on what we already have on hand. We ate completely from our freezer for 2 months while we waited to close on our house! Now that we’re moved in, our freezer is empty and it’s time to start cooking, again!
Amie says
Here’s my recipe for gluten free wafffles/panckes–my trick for the freezer is–as I am measuring out my dry ingredients I have 2 or 3 freezer zip style bags on the counter and as I measure out the ingredients I also measure out into those bags for later convenient “pre-made pancake mix”. Here is my recipe: 1/4c. flaxseed meal 1c. buckwheat flour 1c. brown rice flour 1/2c. tapioca flour 2 tsp. baking powder 1 tsp. baking soda 1/4 tsp. salt this is the time to zip up those bags, label them, and throw then in the freezer for later! On the cooking day just dump in a bowl and add 3c. buttermilk 2 eggs (or flax eggs) 1/4c. olive oil I have recently discovered Bouchard Family Farms Acadian buckwheat flour. It is so mild flavored and very light in color–nothing like regular buckwheat (I really don’t like regular buckwheat at all–but love the Acadian and it’s whole grain just like regular buckwheat)This recipe is loved by all the gluten-full people as well! Just mix the dry and wet ingredients together and fry like pancakes or make waffles–our favorite!
heather shelton says
i just made the strawberry/orange slushies, instead of milk I used coconut milk(only because I did not for some reason have milk) an dit was so yummo!=) thanks… i am so new to your blog and look forward to it each day.
Maura says
Where do you get organic ham from for the Ham n’ Cheese pocket?
Laura says
I get it every once in a while from our meat farmers that we get our beef and chickens from.
Brooke says
I was just looking at my empty freezer and thinking that I need to fill it up with some yummy freezer meals too :). I have used some of the recipes from OAMM. Yummy :). I”m up for the challenge…. if only my 3 little ones are too :)-
Amy@LifeAsAMomma says
I’m in!…although I don’t know if my freezer can fit anymore freezer meals!
Victoria says
http://frugalmomofmutilplekids.blogspot.com/2011/05/heavenly-homemades-cooking-challenge.html (Introduction to the challenge)
Jana C2 says
I just coordinated freezer cooking with two vegetarian friends today. We made a breakfast (waffles & homemade syrup), pumpkin soup, black bean/corn stew and slice and bake cookies. It went so well (even with 4 children under the age of 3 under foot) that we are excited to do it again!
downhomemama@mywholeworld says
My freezer has been looking bare this past month. I was just thinking that now we’re done with school maybe I should tackle the emptiness in my freezer. I’ll try? :)
Courtney Wagner says
I am so in! I have been wanting to do some freezer cooking for a while now. This is a great reason to try it! I love the recipe for Strawberry Chocolate Scones over at OAMM. Yum!
Blessings,
Courtney
Leanne says
Perfect timing! I am expecting my third child in just a few weeks and have just started searching for some freezer recipes. Thank you so much!!!
Amy@TwoBGardening says
I’m in!! My freezer is looking pretty empty also. Now the challenge is to pick a recipe.
Victoria says
http://frugalmomofmutilplekids.blogspot.com/2011/05/heavenly-homemades-cooking-challenge-pt.html (How my cooking and freezing went)
Colleen says
Hi Laura!
I am definitely in! I have made your poptarts several times (a big hit), but in my family’s opinion using the dough for pizza rolls is the best use of all! Quick question: do you think I can make the pizza rolls ahead of time and freeze them? Have you ever tried this? Thanks!
Laura says
Yes, I do this often and it works great!!
Adrienne says
For the last four weeks we have run out of stuff to send in with hubby and our first grader for lunch just before payday… I think they’re getting tired of PB&J and turkey sandwiches anyway. I’d like to make the ham and cheese rolls for the freezer, but I want to put the filling inside of a bun rather than sliced up- kind of like a kolache or Hot pocket’s new sub type rolls. How do you think I would go about doing that?
Laura says
I would use this recipe and stuff the pockets with all kinds of yummy goodies!
amy@twobgardening says
I’m running out of time and blogger.com is down. Nnnnooooo!!!
I made the pizza dough from Once A Month Mom and it is yummy. Hopefully blogger will work it out and I’ll be able to post tomorrow with you guys. I’ll drop by anyway to say Hi.
Crystal says
I made a triple patch of pancakes when I was making breakfast yesterday so now we’ve got a stash for another time. I’ve got too much going on this week, but next week I plan to do at least a full morning of OAMM meals. I’m looking forward to it! I used to buy my hamburger in bulk and cook it with onion and garlic or taco seasoning then freeze that to make dinners easier. It was really helpful. I don’t know why I stopped!