Freezing Meals

li'l_p

I want to start cooking meals or part meals to freeze and use during the week. However, I just don't know what the 'rules' are, especially with regards to re-heating after freezing. I've never done it but really want to because most times during the week I don't have time to stand and cook from fresh and I would prefer to have our own 'ready meals'.

An example is we've just had our tea which was egg tagliatelle in a carbonara sauce, with bacon bits, chopped muchrooms & peppers. Typically there is a fair bit left over and I hate to see it go to waste.

Would this be ok to freeze? How would I go about heating it when I wanted it - and would I need to defrost first or could it be cooked from frozen?

Any advice would be much appreciated? And does anyone have any suggestions for freezer friendly meals, etc?

pollyanna24

I try not to waste anything. There doesn't seem to anything in that which can't be frozen, so give it a go, and see what it takes like. Ways of heating I usually use are on hob (cos bf doesn't like microwave).

I freeze loads of stuff, and I certainly don't consider myself an expert.

I buy loads of mince and stewing/braising steak on 1st of the month, and if I can't be bothered to cook it straightaway and freeze it, I divide it into enough portions for two of us for a meal and freeze it.

Then I take it out of the freezer the night before I want to cook it and make whatever I want.

You can freeze it raw once, and then again once it's cooked. This is the way I do it with mince anyhows.

ChocClare

I'm like Pollyanna and freeze everything - either cook double and freeze half or else save leftover portions: for example this week, we had one portion of shepherd's pie left over - could have stuck it in the fridge (and thrown it away later) or given it to the dog, but instead stuck it in the freezer labelled "one portion of shepherd's pie" so I've got an instant meal for next time OH is out and I can't be bothered to cook!

As for your carbonara, it depends how you made it. I make it the old fashioned way: fry an onion and garlic, add bacon, then cooked pasta. Break an egg or two and some cream on the top with some parmesan and let the heat of the pasta cook the egg. This probably WOULDN'T freeze very well as cooked egg just doesn't. However, if you made more of a white sauce (which lots of people do) then that would freeze very successfully.

Things you can freeze include macaroni cheese, bolognese, lasagne, shepherd's pie - in fact, just make up the ragu (meat sauce) and freeze that, then you can decide which of the previous three you're going to eat that night, they're all based on the same thing! Other things which freeze well are soups and casseroles, fish cakes, quiches and pies - in fact, most "made" dishes. You can cook most things from frozen, but I usually let anything with chicken in it defrost thoroughly first - better safe than sorry!

I would definitely advocate the "cook double quantity and freeze half" way of doing things rather than batch cooking, as I find you end up totally exhausted with the latter. The only exception would be if, for example (like me the other day) you were given a load of apples or something. I zhuzhed up triple quantity of crumble mix in the food processor, sliced and cored the apples straight into foil dishes I'd bought from the discount shop, sprinkled on some sugar and stuck the crumble on the top. Labelled them and stuck them in the freezer for ready-made winter comfort puddings. Yum! Of course you could just make up the crumble mix so you've got something in the freezer ready to pour over the top of whatever fruit you're trying to use up on a particular day!

It is mainly "made" dishes that are worth doing, but you could sort yourself out some ready-marinated chicken - check out this website http://oamc.8m.com/index.html for some good ideas. It saves having to think of what to do with those boring-looking chicken breasts once you get them out of the freezer!

Best of luck with it anyway - let us know how you get on.