Secrets in the Kitchen

I have recently discovered something about myself, a little secret about me: I have a hoarding problem.  Phew, got that off my chest.  Okay, perhaps I'm not an actual compulsive hoarder, I don't have junk stacked around my home threatening to topple over trapping me forever - I think I've been watching too much of TLC's Hoarding: Buried Alive.  Last week after becoming inspired to stock my freezer with pre-made meals, I went poking around to see what I had to work with that was immediately available.  That's when the sinking feeling set in, I pretty much skipped denial and went straight to acceptance - I've hoarded and I've procrastinated.  As I was looking through the freezer I realized that I had quite the stock pile of chicken and beef.  Let me explain, I shop for deals, mark-downs, and coupon steals.  When I find something that blows the lid off on the regular price, I grab a few - okay, I grab lots.  So naturally, tucked within the confines of the freezer's frosty interior was pack after pack of chicken, cooked italian sausage, loads of ground beef... alright, I'll stop there - after all, this isn't confession time.  I had bought most of these items with every intention of using them right away or using them to make freezer meals for later.  However, that is not exactly what happened - clearly.

I did not let the overwhelming amount of food get to me, I went right away to collecting recipes and developing a plan.  In my search for recipes that can be easily frozen and then (and this is the key) pleasantly thawed and GOOD to eat, I realized how few healthy recipes there are floating around out there.  Nearly everything called for Cream of this or loads of cheese.  So I selected a few of those and then came up with my own substitutions and ideas.  

In my search, one of the most favorable ideas I found was the concept of taking a crock pot meal, assembling everything in a ziplock back, and then freezing it.  So I took a couple of recipes that I knew my family would love and fixed two of each of them.

  

Something that my family really enjoys is calzones.  Now, normally we enjoy making them on a Friday night, everyone selecting their own combination of stuffing mix and creating their own tasty calzone.  But I found this idea on the internet and thought it sounded good.  I took pizza dough and laid out several small rounds inside of a muffin pan, stuffed, sealed, and froze them.  I'm still not sure how it will work on the baking end of things, but I suppose if I let them thaw properly they might turn out alright. 

 Another easy and yummy idea for a quick meal and one that you can tailor in size is stuffed Italian pasta shells.  I made two versions, some with meat and some without.  I made up several bags of these, mostly because I boiled an entire box of jumbo pasta shells and wanted to fill them all.  And also as a personal decision, I have determined to simply use all of an ingredient instead of leaving a bag of shredded cheese 1/4 of the way full or a container with 1/3 of a cup of ricotta cheese - all of which is likely to just get lost in my fridge and eventually tossed out... aka, money wasted, not food saved for a later use.  

 Tomato, Garlic, Cheese, Basil Stuffed Shells

 Hannah Helping Me Prepare - Such A Great Helper

 5 Cheese Stuffed Shells with Fresh Basil

 Beware: when allowing your children to help, they will eat, and eat, and eat... 

Best to have a little extra on hand for this reason.

After a couple of days of worth of cooking, assembling, and freezing everything I possibly could out of my stock pile of frozen foods, I'm pretty tired.  I will warn you, this much preparation will make your brain feel a little like it's been sitting in a crock pot all day - mush.  So I did something pretty stupid, I decided to use a great, big, heavy jar of mayonnaise to crush two garlic bulbs.  Normally this wouldn't be an issue, however when one does decide to beat the day lights out of the garlic with an OPEN jar of Mayo, the end result is not pretty. 

Wishing I had thought this through just a little bit more.

The end result:
5 bags cooked ground beef (for spaghetti, tacos, nachos, soups, etc)
2 Quiches
2 Pineapple BBQ Chicken Crock Pot Meals
2 French Onion and Swiss Cheese Chicken Crock Pot Meals
1 Mexi-chicken Crock Pot Meal
1 South of the Boarder Mac 'n Cheese Crock Pot Meal (meatless)
1 Poppy Seed Chicken Casserole
2 Chicken and Wild Rice Casseroles
1 Chicken and Broccoli Casserole
3 Bags Stuffed Shells
11 Mini Calzones


I sincerely hope you're not reading this and thinking that I'm having a little 'bragging session.'  This is definitely a small victory for me.  I strive to be organized, but life isn't always that simple and order isn't nearly as attainable as I would like it to be.  But when I saw what other women had done from the web sites I visited, I was inspired.  I hope this perhaps will inspire someone else.  I should mention that I did not do all these meals in one day - just shoot me!  I was able to do this over a few days and I had help from my mom who watched my kids.  I know next time I will do some things differently.  But it is my hope that all the prepared food I have put away will be in essence like a deposit in the bank of time.  The less time I'm in my kitchen, the more time I can pour into my family. 

Here are some links to some of the places that I found inspiration for this attempt to make a bunch of meals a head of time:

http://aturtleslifeforme.blogspot.com/2011/06/freezer-meals-on-cheap.html

http://annies-eats.net/2011/03/28/stocking-the-freezer-make-ahead-meals/

http://erinkristine.blogspot.com/2010/01/freezer-meals.html

As well as a website to get labels from (if you're really organized):

http://www.onceamonthmom.com/wp-content/uploads/BlanksNEW.pdf

Happy Cooking!