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greensalad
Posts: 2,530 Forumite


I've just moved house and have purged the entirety of my questionable freezer lot from the previous property. I had been terrible at labelling stuff and could not remember what half the stuff was let alone when I put it in there. After a questionable dinner of what we thought was leftover spag bol turned out to be curry, I decided to start afresh.
I know you guys here on Old Style are often hailed as masters of reducing food budgets. I could really do with some help.
At present, we buy all our meals pretty much on the day, or only a few days in advance. For example on Monday I hurried home from the station and popped in M&S where I picked up 3 items for £10 (fish cakes and a rice dish) and some veg to go with it. Very expensive way of doing things.
I want to try and make things I can prepare in advance to defrost. For example, cooking a big batch of spag bol in one go and then freezing portions up. Or curries, pre-chopped soup ingredients to go in the slow cooker etc.
We do love slow cooker meals. We have an intellichef, so we can braise meat beforehand etc and then leave it to slow cook.
We don't often have chicken dinners so I don't usually have chicken broth which means I use stock cubes.
Leftovers are always good for my partner to take to work (I get free healthy meals at work so no need). It's only the two of us. We both work in London and it's a tiring day and the last thing I want to be doing is thinking about cooking! But I'm more than happy to take something out of the freezer the night before so I can cook it up with some pasta the following day
What are your favourite quick and easy freezer meals?
I know you guys here on Old Style are often hailed as masters of reducing food budgets. I could really do with some help.
At present, we buy all our meals pretty much on the day, or only a few days in advance. For example on Monday I hurried home from the station and popped in M&S where I picked up 3 items for £10 (fish cakes and a rice dish) and some veg to go with it. Very expensive way of doing things.
I want to try and make things I can prepare in advance to defrost. For example, cooking a big batch of spag bol in one go and then freezing portions up. Or curries, pre-chopped soup ingredients to go in the slow cooker etc.
We do love slow cooker meals. We have an intellichef, so we can braise meat beforehand etc and then leave it to slow cook.
We don't often have chicken dinners so I don't usually have chicken broth which means I use stock cubes.
Leftovers are always good for my partner to take to work (I get free healthy meals at work so no need). It's only the two of us. We both work in London and it's a tiring day and the last thing I want to be doing is thinking about cooking! But I'm more than happy to take something out of the freezer the night before so I can cook it up with some pasta the following day

What are your favourite quick and easy freezer meals?
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Comments
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we always make extra spag bol and freeze in portions. Some can become chilli at a later date.
Soup is another good one for batch cooking.
I have a huge beef curry in the SC at the moment as beef was on offer at Tesco. OH would rather have a takeaway but if it is there and portioned up he copes every now and then. I also made a batch of dhal in the slow cooker and that provided about 15 portions (as a side).
Lamb massaman is popular here - again SC when I spot a leg of lamb half price.I’m a Senior Forum Ambassador and I support the Forum Team on the Pensions, Annuities & Retirement Planning, Loans
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All views are my own and not the official line of MoneySavingExpert.0 -
Dhal sounds like a good idea.
I've worked out that if I make a huge batch of ragu and a huge batch of bechamel, I can combine those sauces into: spaghetti + meatballs, lasagne, macaroni cheese and bechamel veg bake. I'm also thinking it will help reduce our portions sizes because there are just two of us. We often end up going oevrboard and cooking for more like 4 people and then eating it anyway!0 -
the trick with portions is to pot the rest up into containers straight away so it immediately starts to cool and then you are less tempted to go back for seconds. We find that the small Chinese takeaway pots do 1 person and the large ones (from noodles/fried rice) do 2.
Because I am a bit anal I like to make all the portions for freezing equal and that dictates what gets left to be eaten immediately.I’m a Senior Forum Ambassador and I support the Forum Team on the Pensions, Annuities & Retirement Planning, Loans
& Credit Cards boards. If you need any help on these boards, do let me know. Please note that Ambassadors are not moderators. Any posts you spot in breach of the Forum Rules should be reported via the report button, or by emailing forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com.
All views are my own and not the official line of MoneySavingExpert.0 -
If you like fish, there's always good old fashioned fish pie or try the curried fish pie on the recipe index. Again with mince, there's cottage pie or lasagne. Like many I batch cook - so mince with tomato sauces become spag bol, chilli and lasagne. Or poach bits of fish and make the variations of fish pie above.
I found that if I did one big batch every weekend of something different, I was soon able to ring the changes.
The other thing is to buy a slow cooker and put all the ingredients in the cooker in the morning and arrive home to a meal all ready for you. All you have to do then is cook some rice/pasta or prepare a salad. One other tip is to do jacket potatoes the night before and then reheat in microwave the following night and add your favourite toppings.
It does require a bit of planning - meal plan and shop at weekends, a bit of prep the night before for the following day but it makes life so much easier.
Oh, and save any margarine/ice cream tubs/boxes you may have to put the portions in, or invest in some plastic boxes with lids.Books - the original virtual reality.
Tilly Tidying:0 -
Batch cooking is the way to go.
A large batch of slow cooked mince can be portioned up for spag bol, with a topping of mashed potato for cottage pie, as a topping for jacket potatoes or whatever your heart desires.
Slow cook a huge lot of diced beef with onions, carrots and such. This can be a casserole, with dumplings, a scone topping (cobbler), a frozen puff pastry lid (steak pie). You get the idea?
Cook some chicken. Hot with rosaries and a sausage or two - sorry, I'm really not proposing that you serve chicken with rosaries, my tablets translation of ROASTIES -. To continue. Cold chicken chunks heated VERY well in a sauce or tin of condensed chicken soup with any old accompaniment. Add a pinch of curry powder and a spoonful of mango chutney for a sort of mock coronation chicken, delicious on jackets.
Your OH will fall in love with you all over again and your housekeeping purse will remain comfortingly weighty.
Good luck.
xI believe that friends are quiet angels
Who lift us to our feet when our wings
Have trouble remembering how to fly.0 -
greensalad wrote: »We do love slow cooker meals. We have an intellichef, so we can braise meat beforehand etc and then leave it to slow cook.
I put raw meat in my slow-cooker with vegetables and it cooks perfectly well.
I do big batches of:
chilli
bolognaise
Indian curries (various, some using mince)
Dhal
Brinal bhaji (aubergine)
Home made burgers - lamb. beef, pork, all with different herbs and flavourings like Dijon mustard, horseradish etc.
I also do various different 'shepherd's pie' - lamb, chicken, pork, turkey. I freeze the bases separately to the mashed potato as it's quicker to reheat as you can stir the separate components before putting together.
I also have mashed potato in my freezer (home-cooked) and usually mashed swede, mashed cauliflower etc to add to the mash.
Sausage & bean casserole, with a range of beans - baked, red kidney, haricot - and chopped tomato, mushroom & peppers.
Beef mince casserole with carrots, turnip & onion in a base of oxtail soup. Very hearty.
I cook meat & potato pie, sometimes adding mushroom, in the slow cooker, enough for the day and enough to freeze.
Soup in the slow cooker.
Like Mallygirl I use the plastic containers saved from take-aways.
I freeze in them, then take them out, the frozen slab just pops out and I bag them & label them. Minimum wasted space in the freezer and the containers are ready to wash & put away for next time.
I am meticulous about keeping a list of what's in the freezer and when it went in - with weights if it's raw.0 -
I'm going to come in from left wing here... One of my favourite slow cooker recipes is Red Beans and Rice (not a veg dish) if you like complicated spices. Google 'Deep South Dish' and 'Slow Cooker Red Beans and Rice' together.
A more summery option is wok cooking - so quick. The night before, I'll defrost a couple of chicken breasts or pork steaks, slice them fairly finely, cook in a wok in a little oil (or none if non-stick) then add ready-prepared shredded veg and finally a packet Chinese sauce or bottled same.
Bon appetit!“And all shall be well. And all shall be well. And all manner of things shall be exceeding well.”
― Julian of Norwich
In other words, Don't Panic!0 -
There's 2 of us and at the weekends I do a couple of batch cooking. It's normally mince if I buy 750g pack I divide into 3 and each 3rd will become a batch of meals. Lasagna, Chilli, Sheppherds pie, Spag Bol each meal will do at least 4 or 6 portions and anything over 2 portions go into the freezer. A large fresh chicken will do a roast at the weekend and the rest is turned into curry or pie, a pasta meal or just frozen and will be a roast meal at a later date. I also have a slow cooker and will do a kilo of stewing steak when it's cheap and this is served as stew with mash and veg and the rest is frozen in 2 portions I some times make meat and potatoe pie. I buy YS fish and this only takes a couple of mins in the microwave mix with mash for fish cakes or a cheese sauce for fish pie. You need to know what you have in your freezer and meal plan out of it. Once you've got the freezer up and running you only have to cook a couple of things per week on a rotation and you will always have HM ready meals in there. I too use the plastic take away boxes and plastic soup tubs. xWhy pay full price when you may get it YS0
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I was off work last week so shopped and cooked for freezer.
I live alone and hate waste, so bought braising steak,minced beef, chicken portion, carrots, onions, mushrooms etc.
I did 3 portions of the following, beef stew, chicken stew, bolognaise, butter chicken all bought from Aldi so 12 meals in total, problem was in the freezing as mine is quite slow to freeze...so chilled all down in fridge first.0 -
lisa110rry wrote: »I'm going to come in from left wing here... One of my favourite slow cooker recipes is Red Beans and Rice (not a veg dish) if you like complicated spices. Google 'Deep South Dish' and 'Slow Cooker Red Beans and Rice' together.
I love red kidney beans and have a part used bag in my cupboard.
Actually, the photos don't make it look like a pretty dish (and I'm not sure I'd serve it up for a dinner party:rotfl:) but I bet it tastes fab.
You've reminded me of a cassoulet recipe I used to do so I'm off to have a rummage in my recipe box.0
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