Cooking for the Freezer..

Olliebeak

Another useful thing to do - buy up quantities of vegetables on whoopsie. Prep them as soon as you get them home and freeze in bags (marked with the date) for future use. I've just come home with 3lbs of leeks for 75p - will be cut up into white bits (for serving as a veg or soup making) and green bits (for soups/stews etc), 2 caulis for £1 white florets (for serving as a veg) and green stalks (soups/stews). Last week I got lots of cheap parsnips and carrots - all are frozen for future use.

Even whoopsied bread and rolls come in useful - stops you from going out just for a loaf and then spending £20 on things you don't need. Same goes for freezing some emergency milk supply (plastic bottles NOT glass).

hopefulshell07

Olliebeak wrote: »

Another useful thing to do - buy up quantities of vegetables on whoopsie. Prep them as soon as you get them home and freeze in bags (marked with the date) for future use. I've just come home with 3lbs of leeks for 75p - will be cut up into white bits (for serving as a veg or soup making) and green bits (for soups/stews etc), 2 caulis for £1 white florets (for serving as a veg) and green stalks (soups/stews). Last week I got lots of cheap parsnips and carrots - all are frozen for future use.

Even whoopsied bread and rolls come in useful - stops you from going out just for a loaf and then spending £20 on things you don't need. Same goes for freezing some emergency milk supply (plastic bottles NOT glass).

Hi just a quick question do you blanch any of the veg before freezing it? I got two bags of whoopsie carrots 1kg each for 10p each in Mr T's the day before yesterday and am not sure what to do with them

Olliebeak

I tend to blanche things if there's a chance that they'll be in the freezer for more than a month. Otherwise, I don't bother.

foxgloves

You don't see as many books around now about cooking for the freezer as you did in the 70s when people were just getting into owning them. You do often find them at charity shops though. I got a little paperback pamphletty thing for 50p and it lists foods alphabetically with instructions for freezing. It doesn't look much but has been really useful for things like gluts of chillies, pears, herbs, etc. I find there's very little, really, which can't be frozen. I make double of everything, as well as sometimes extra individual containers of dishes that can easily be microwaved. We don't have a microwave at home but my partner sometimes takes one of these in to work for a long shift so it feels like a 'free' hot dinner. I think the freezer is a great moneysaving tool, as we find we can sometimes have a month eating up what is already in there, only having to buy fresh stuff, milk, etc. I wouldn't be without one.

shaz_mum_of__2

http://www.recipezaar.com/recipes.php?s_type=%2Frecipes.php&q=OAMC&Search=Search&Searcht=Search

some good recipes on here if a bit americanised the pizza pop 'ems are nice

brighthair

Living on my own, I am finding it much easier to batch cook things, portion and freeze them - my workmates are looking rather envious when I take out my HM food for lunch

So far I have done braising steak with potatoes and veg, corned beef hash,and chicken and sweetcorn soup

If I do cottage pie - could I top it with a mixture of mashed carrot and potato? I am rubbish at eating veg, so I try to stick as much possible in the recipe so I was going to put peas, sweetcron, onion and carrot in with the mince

and how long is food safe to eat for in the freezer? I have found some covent garden soup and pasta sauce (use by march 2009 :eek:) and also some lasagne - which I cannot remember making :rotfl:

BitterAndTwisted

Yes you can put mashed carrots in with your mashed potato. Actually, it sounds rather good. It's quite trendy these days for restaurants to serve all kinds of fancy mash theses days. Spring onions are good as well.

The length of time food can safely be kept in your freezer depends on the star-rating thingy for the most part. I've never kept soup or pasta-sauce for that long so I can't advise, sorry but I'd defrost it and see if it smells OK. If it did, I'd eat it.

elf06

at a guess i would say that the soup would be fine although may not look its best (wouldnt bother me how it looks). As suggested above i would defrost and take it from there!

Mands

BitterAndTwisted wrote: »

Yes you can put mashed carrots in with your mashed potato.

And butternut squash. It ups the veg count, is hardly any more work and makes the mash a lovely orange colour.

If you had spare freezer space you could make a big batch of the mash and freeze portions separately to go with other meals.

Mands

thriftlady_2

brighthair wrote: »

and how long is food safe to eat for in the freezer? I have found some covent garden soup and pasta sauce (use by march 2009 :eek:) and also some lasagne - which I cannot remember making :rotfl:

Food cannot go off in the freezer. See this thread for more info