Meatloaf Patties

A while back I wrote about the possibility  of making meatloaf patties instead of the traditional loaf shape.  I finally got around to it, and it's way, way better than the loaf shape.  

Reasons patties are more convenient than a loaf:

1. No thawing - When I made meatloaf in a loaf form the loaf needed to thaw for 48 hours before cooking.  Patties can be taken from the freezer and go directly in the pan.
2. Cook faster - The loaf shape takes at least an hour to cook.  These were done in less than 30 minutes.
3. No oven - These are cooked in frying pan.  The oven doesn't need to be turned on, which is especially nice in the summer.
4. Easy portion control - A full sized meatloaf is enough food for my family for two meals, and we'll still have leftovers.  With individual patties it is easy to make as much as we will eat in one night.  

Microwave Side Dishes

I am not a great microwave cook.  Until recently I only considered the microwave good for melting and reheating, not for cooking.  That attitude is gradually changing.  While the microwave may not be great for baking, it can be a useful tool in making easy side dishes to go with freezer meals.  Plus grocery store have started selling rice or pasta pouches that are already cooked and can be reheated in the microwave.  I haven't tried the pasta pouches, but I have tried a couple of the rice ones and found them useful.  I don't plan to use them all the time since they're more expensive, but having a few in the pantry would be handy as a back up.

For making my own microwave sides, I started with the obvious, potatoes.  I have been microwaving potatoes and sweet potatoes to serve as a side since long before I started making freezer meals.  When I started doing freezer meals I sometimes needed a vegetable side for a meal.  This lead me to using the ready-to-microwave bags of green beans or broccoli that are found in the supermarket produce section.  It took me a while to get over not prepping my own veggies, but these are convenient and tasty with a little butter, salt and pepper.

Mashed Potatoes

So... I... uh... this post is supposed to a recipe for freezer mashed potatoes to accompany my meatloaf post.  I made a large batch of mashed potatoes and froze it in dinner-sized portions and apparently neglected to write down the proportions of the ingredients I used.  It's a simple dish though that most of you likely know how to make.  If you don't, this recipe looks similar to what I do.

Really the point of this post more than giving you a recipe is to let you know that creamy mashed potatoes do freeze well and make a great side to have in the freezer for a number of dishes.  Next time I make them I will write down the recipe.  Sorry.

Meatloaf and mashed potatoes

I would have never though of meatloaf as a budget meal until I was shopping for the ingredients to make meatloaf and found a 10 lb package of ground beef for about $20.  Considering that 10 lbs of meat will make 5 batches of meatloaf and that each meatloaf will feed my family for 2 meals with some leftover and that the cost of the other ingredients is low, that means that a meatloaf meal costs less than $3 for my entire family, not including the sides. And meatloaf sides can be inexpensive too.  I always need to have mashed potatoes with my meatloaf, which are cheap.  Add a vegetable side from whatever is on sale and you've got a whole meal.

This inexpensive beef was 80/20 (80% meat, 20% fat).  I usually go for 93/7 so I have less fat cooking out of my meat.  When buying a small amount the 93/7 is not too much more expensive than the 80/20, but when buying in bulk, the 93/7 was almost twice as much.  For that price difference I will deal with the extra fat!  I didn't want super greasy meatloaf, so I cooked my meatloaf on an oven-safe rack inside a sheet pan.  All the grease drained into the pan.

Bahn Mi

Shortly after I had smoked and frozen pork butt for the first time a friend described to me a Vietnamese sandwich called a Bahn Mi.  It sounded absolutely delicious, and I knew I had to try it with my frozen pork.  Unfortunately we blew through our frozen pork, and I ran out before I got a chance to make this.  The desire to try bahn mi definitely contributed to me making a second batch of smoked pork so soon after I had made the first.  I usually wait a while before I get around to making a freezer meal again.  This was worth it though.  It was delicious and we definitely be having it again.

There are a lot of parts here, but they are all easy and can be made in advance.

Adapted from: Epicurious

Difficulty: Easy

BBQ Pulled Pork

I wrote previously about cooking, shredding and freezing pork butt.  One of our easiest and most classic ways to use it is to serve pulled pork with BBQ sauce.  We sometimes have this as a sandwich and sometimes by itself.  Either way I always serve it with coleslaw.  I love fresh coleslaw on BBQ pork, and it's easy to make if you get a bag of pre-shredded cabbage from the produce aisle.  I really like this coleslaw, but sometimes I'm not in the mood to measure stuff.  In that case I just take a bag of the shredded cabbage, add a dash of apple cider vinegar, a squeeze of mustard, a spoonful of mayonnaise and salt, pepper and celery seed to taste.  It's fast, easy and delicious.

For the BBQ sauce you can, of course, use a store bought sauce.  I like the Stubb's brand personally.  For pulled pork though, I prefer to make my own mustard sauce.  My favorite is this recipe from Amazing Ribs, although I like to run it through the blender after making because I prefer it smooth.  I make a large batch of sauce when I make the pulled pork.  Then I divide it into containers and freeze as well. It's ready to go when I serve the pork.  You can serve the pork by heating the sauce, adding the pork and gently simmering until the meat is heated through.  If you would like to serve the sauce on the side, gently heat the pork in the microwave.

Freezer Meal Component: Smoked Pork

I posted previously about how I smoke, shred and freeze chickens to use in a variety of summer meals.  Another meat I love to cook in my smoker is pulled pork.  However, I didn't make pulled pork to freeze because I thought it wouldn't be as versatile as the chicken.  And maybe it's not as versatile as chicken, after all I wouldn't throw pulled pork on any old salad like I do with the chicken.  It was mistake to put off freezing pulled pork.  I have been missing out on deliciousness and what turned out to be some of my favorite meals.

We had guests for the Fourth of July and smoked two pork butts and served them with barbecue sauce and coleslaw.  Two pork butts make a lot.  I made so much with the intention of freezing it, thinking that we would have plenty for the freezer.  I did freeze a lot of pulled pork, but it did not last nearly as long as I had hoped.  A week later we had more guests over and served pork noodle bowls.  We enjoyed the pork so much we kept serving it every time we had guests over, and before I knew it, it was all gone.  I hadn't done everything I wanted with the frozen pulled pork, so a scant two months after freezing pork for the first time, I had to make another big batch.

Cooking the pork:

Pork butt is a very budget-friendly meat.  It is a tough cut though, so you will need to cook it in such a way to make it tender and delicious, generally either low and slow roasting or by braising.  Use your favorite method.  I have a Pit Barrel Cooker that I use to smoke my meats and I love it.  I highly recommend it if you are in the market for a smoker.  It's easy to use, affordable and makes delicious meat.

If you don't have or want a smoker, Amazing Ribs has excellent instructions about smoking meat in a gas or charcoal grill.  It's a super informative website for smoking meats.  Before I bought my smoker I used a gas grill to smoke pork butts using Amazing Ribs instructions with great success.  It is a project though and takes all day.  So if you want to do something easier, you can use a crockpot or roast in the oven.  I haven't tried either of those links, but they look promising (although I would leave out the liquid smoke).  Or if you have a favorite tried and true way to cook pork butt, use that.

Freezing the pork

After your pork is cooked, shred it and divide it into dinner sized portions.  The main difficulty with freezing cooked meat is that it gets freezer burn easily.  If this is something you do regularly, I recommend getting a vacuum sealer.  If you're not ready for that, then I recommend putting the meat in freezer Ziploc bags and squeezing out as much air as you can.

Serving the pork

Thaw the pork in the fridge overnight.  If you are serving the meat in a sauce, bring that sauce to a simmer and add the meat.  Simmer gently until the meat is heated through.  Otherwise you can reheat in the microwave.  Spread the meat out on a microwave-safe plate.  Reheat in two minute bursts at 60 to 70% power until heated through.  Don't overheat.  That will make the pork tough.

Pork spread out on a plate for heating in the microwave.

Ways to use the pork:

 Pork Noodle Bowls - One of my all time favorite meals!

 Bahn Mi - A delicious Vietnamese sandwich.

Pork Tacos - Another personal favorite.  And super fast and easy to boot.

 BBQ Pulled Pork with coleslaw - Classic and delicious.

Burritos - Fast and easy.

Beans and Sausage

This recipe is fairly inexpensive.  It is also hardy, easy and tasty.  And it's fast and easy to reheat, so it's generally a freezer meal win.

Difficulty: Easy
Category: Heat and Eat
Recipe Column: DP

Chicken Soup Three Ways

These chicken soups are warm and comforting on a cold day  They would be particularly nice to have when sick.  I plan to keep one batch in my freezer on a regular basis just to have for that reason. It's nice to make a very large batch of this that can be divided into meal-sized portions.  Then we can have it with dumplings, noodles or matzo balls depending on which we want that day or how much time we have.

This recipe turned into quite the project.  My initial plan was simply to create a freezer meal for chicken and dumplings, which we have always enjoyed and eaten regularly.  The chicken and dumplings freezer meal turned out well.  It consisted of two parts, the chicken soup and the dumpling dough that were frozen separately.  I realized the chicken soup part could be used to make other kinds of chicken soup like chicken noodle soup and matzo ball soup.  I decided to wait on posting the chicken and dumplings until I could post all three variations of the soup together.  This took a while as I needed to try all the variations and we didn't want to be eating chicken soup all the time.  There is often a long development process in creating freezer meals.

White Bean Soup

When I was a kid my family went to a restaurant that served a bottomless pot of bean soup that I really liked.  I went to the bathroom before I finished my bowl and when I returned my bowl and the pot of soup had been removed.  I was so disappointed.  Since then I have looked for a good, basic white bean soup.  This one is pretty close.  The smoked ham hock is the key.

Difficulty: Easy
Column: CS
Category: Heat and Eat

Get the recipe here.

I made the soup pretty much as described except once I sauteed the onions and garlic I transferred them to a crockpot with the rest of the ingredients.  Then I cooked the soup on low all day until the beans were tender.  I also took a potato masher to the soup to break up the beans some and make a creamier soup.

To freeze:
Divide the cooled soup into containers or bags and freeze.

To serve:
Thaw the soup in the refrigerator overnight.  Reheat on the stove or in the microwave.  This soup gets pretty thick when frozen.  You may need to add water or chicken stock to loosen it.  If you do, add salt and pepper to taste to compensate for the added liquid.

Carrot Miso Soup

Soups are the workhorse of my winter freezer meals.  They are endlessly variable, one-pot meals that are easy to freeze and reheat.

Carrot Miso Soup
Difficulty: Easy
Column: DH

This healthy soup is very cheap to make.  It's also a great way to use up a lot of miso, which I find handy since I sometimes have trouble getting through a package.  Look for miso in the refrigerator section of your local Asian market.  This is very easy to make if you have a food processor to slice the carrots.  I don't even bother peeling the carrots.  I just wash them well, cut off the ends and thinly slice them in the food processor.  Without the food processor, this soup will be more time consuming.  This soup becomes even easier with an immersion blender.

Serve with a drizzle of sesame oil and sliced green onions.  We also like to have it with naan from the grocery store.

Meatballs and Gravy

I think of meatballs, gravy  and mashed potatoes as basic American, comfort food.  There's nothing fancy about this dish, but it is delicious.  It is also fairly inexpensive, especially if you can find the meat on sale, and it freezes well.  It doesn't have to be served with just mashed potatoes though.  We had it with mashed cauliflower which was just as tasty.

Falafel

These tasty falafels are very easy if you have a large enough food processor.  They are also inexpensive and they are very convenient as they can go straight from the freezer to the pan.

Difficulty: Easy
Category: Freezer to Pan
Recipe Column: AA

Get the recipe here. Form the falafels, but do not cook them.

To freeze:
Freeze the uncooked falafels on a sheet tray lined with parchment paper.  You can do up to two layers of falafel on the same pan.  Separate the layers with parchment paper.  Once the falafels are frozen, transfer them to a bag or container for storage.

To serve:
Heat a thin layer of olive oil in a large frying pan.  When the oil is hot, add the frozen falafels in a single layer.  Do not overcrowd the pan.  Cook until brown on both sides.  You may cover the pan at the beginning to help the falafels heat through.  Remove the lid towards the end of cooking to give the falafel a chance to crisp before serving.  Serve with tzatziki or other sauce and a salad.

Tzatziki Sauce
1/2 cucumber
1 cup Greek yogurt
pinch of garlic powder (optional)
dash of lemon juice
sprinkle of dry dill

1. Coarsely grate the cucumber.  Gather up the grated cucumber and gently squeeze excess moisture out of the cucumber before transferring it to a small mixing bowl.
2. Combine all the ingredients and season to taste with salt and pepper.

Pupusas

I uploaded an updated spreadsheet.  Go here to download it.

I enjoyed eating pupusas regularly when I lived in New York.  Unfortunately, I've had trouble find good ones anywhere else, and I have missed them.  Finally I have learned how to make them.   It took some experimenting because none of the recipes I found online tasted like the ones I had in New York.  All of those recipes called for the dough to be made with only instant masa and water.  This resulted in a dry, tough exterior not the soft exterior of the pupusas I remember.

Some internet research led me to believe that the difference is made by using instant masa instead of fresh masa.  I don't know of a place to purchase fresh masa and I don't have the equipment or inclination to make it myself.  After some experiments in adding butter and baking power to the dough with the instant masa I got very close to the soft pupusas I enjoyed so much in New York.  I realize this may not be an authentic way to make them, but they taste pretty authentic and delicious!

Corn Crepes

We finished off the last of these tasty corn crepes a couple nights ago.  In fact the freezer is starting to look a little sparse.  I'm gearing up do my once a month cooking over the next couple days.  The grocery shopping is done and I will be doing the chopping, shredding and mincing this afternoon.  I'm looking forward to having some new variety in our meal rotation.

Difficulty: Moderate
Category: Simple Side
Recipe Column: AF

Get the recipe at Smitten Kitchen.

To freeze:
Cool the crepes and divide into dinner-sized stacks.  I generally plan on two to three crepes per person.  Wrap each stack tightly in plastic wrap or place in freezer bags and freeze.

To serve:
Thaw the crepes overnight in the refrigerator.  Remove from the plastic wrap or bag and place on a plate.  Sprinkle 3 tablespoons of water on a clean kitchen towel and cover the crepes.  Microwave in 2 minute bursts at 70% power until hot.  The recipe linked above has a few serving suggestions.  I initially tried the crepe cake with the mayo and queso fresco because I love Mexican corn.  I found the mayo and cheese overpowered the delicate corn flavor of the crepes.  My preferred serving method is just to fold them up and serve with a little sprinkle of queso fresco.  We had it with avocado cucumber salad.  I also think it would be good with a fresh tomato salad.

Component: Smoked Chicken

At the beginning of the summer I watched my grocery store flyers until whole chickens went on sale.  I then went out and bought seven chickens, smoked them, shredded them, bagged them in dinner-sized portions, and froze them.  I ended up with fifteen meals worth of chicken and now spend the summer coming up with ways to use them.

I generally prefer to make freezer meals that require little work on the day of to serve.  I find they're more likely to be used this way.  Plain shredded chicken requires that I do something more with it than take it out of the freezer and sticking it in the oven.  It is more work to serve than many of the other freezer meals I make, but it has advantages too.  Precooked chicken allows me to make a large variety of meals with less effort than having to cook everything the day of and makes for tasty and easy summer meals.  I prefer lighter food during the summer and a lot of  heat and eat freezer meals are heavier and more suitable for winter.  Plus this allows me to take advantage of the wonderful fresh produce available during the summer to round out the chicken out into a full meal.

Black Bean Salad

As I have been posting recipes to this blog I have noticed that we really like black beans and avocados.  Already I have a few recipes with featuring these two ingredients in different configurations and there's probably more to come.  Black beans and avocados are both tasty and nutritious.  Plus beans are a cheap source of protein, so we'll probably keep finding different ways to eat this delicious combination.

Black bean salad is the latest of these recipes.  It's really easy to put this in a crockpot and let it simmer away while you work on your other freezer meals.  It's nice to have a low maintenance dish in the rotation as making freezer meals can be a big process.

Potato Chorizo Tacos with Avocado Salsa

This has been one of my favorite meals for years, so imagine how happy I was to discover that both the filling and the salsa freeze well.  It's an easy meal, but it's all the easier to just thaw and reheat.  It's also nice that it's inexpensive.  If you have any leftovers, the filling is absolutely delicious scrambled with some eggs for breakfast.

When I lived in Colorado, several brands of chorizo sausage was readily available at every supermarket.  Now that I live in the South, it is not so easy to find. If you also live in an area where it is not commonly found, don't give up hope.  I eventually found a local butcher shop that sells chorizo, or you can check out Mexican grocery stores.  There is a chorizo sausage that is frequently sold in grocery stores that comes in a long, thin tube.  Cacique is one such brand, but there may be others.  Do not buy the long, thin tube chorizo sausage.  It's not very good

Pierogi

These potato pierogi were a staple for us last summer.  They were my first freezer to pan meal.  Last summer when I was tired or forgot to thaw something for dinner, I would throw a few of these in a pan and have a quick and easy dinner.  They are time consuming to make, but they're cheap and super convenient once they are made.  I think these could also be tasty with up to half the potatoes replaced by cauliflower.  I was going to give it a try last time I made them, but the cauliflower was looking pretty sad when I went to the store.

Difficulty: Moderate
Category: Freezer to Pan
Recipe Column: AK

Black Bean Burgers

These black bean burgers are inexpensive and tasty.  Plus they can be cooked straight from the freezer, making them very convenient as well.

From: Veganomicon
Difficulty: Easy
Category: Freezer to Pan
Recipe Column: BR