Prepare food ahead of time
Cook up ground beef and chicken ahead of time in
mass quantities. I would only do this for ground beef and shredding or
chunking chicken. Do it by the pound, that way its easier to separate.
~I buy the 5 pound loafs of beef, cook it
all at once (with seasoning), then using measuring cups, separate it into 5
ziplock baggies, then stick it in the freezer.
~Same goes for the chicken. Poach it,
yes poach, don't boil (I'll attach a link for that), shred it, then separate
and freeze. You can bake, grill, or fry breast, then slice it and
separate it, but I wouldn't suggest freezing a whole breast. The
reheating process would take too long to get to the center of the cut and it
would ultimately leave you with very dry chicken breasts.
~Don't forget the seasoning with the
cooking. Once meat is cooked without the seasoning, you can't get that
deep flavor. I've made the mistake before and it really made a difference
in the food.
GARLIC
If you like garlic with your food, buy the big tub
of minced or chopped garlic! It's cheaper than garlic cloves, lasts for a
long time, and taste just a good as fresh garlic and is way better than the
dried stuff! Plus you will save time with not having to prep garlic.
I'll admit there are times when it doesn't fit what I'm doing.
Sometimes I like garlic slivers or you may want to roast some garlic for
bread. And I completely understand. But for the most part, I've
found that the pre-done stuff is wonderful.
Slow Cooker do aheads
So I'm all about preparing meals for the slow
cooker ahead of time, then grabbing them when needed. It's a great idea,
but there are a few things I've learned with doing this. Potatoes and
carrots DO NOT freeze well. I would almost teeter on them ruining the
meal. I'm not sure about celery though. I don't use it because its
a waste of money in my house. My suggestion is to do the other stuff,
then get the unfreezables fresh when you make the dish. Carrots aren't
such an issue if you buy the baby carrots in the bag, but I know potatoes can
be time consuming. My suggestion there is to buy the small red potatoes,
just wash them and cut them up. They are great with the skin!
Onions
If you know my taste in food, you know I don't like
onions. Well, I can't really say I don't like onions. I actually
happen to love the flavor of onions. I just hate biting into them.
No clue where that came from, but it's possibly one the worst things in
the world to me. My solutions, mince them! Yep, I mince onion for
any dish I ever have to have it. But that can be a frustrating process
when I want a quick meal, so I mince up several onions at a time then freeze
them. This can actually be a fairly hefty process because it's really
helpful to get a good portion of the water out before freezing. It's no
fun, but makes it worth while for me. Now to finally get to my point.
You can do this with however you prefer your onions. Slice, chop,
or mince! They really freeze great. Plus you only deal with tears once!
~On a side note, when chopping or mincing, it will
be very beneficial to separate into servings. when the onions freeze,
they become a rock solid mass and it can really damage the flavor reheating the
onion to get portions out over and over. If you separate it ahead of
time, you only have to use what you want without ruining the whole batch.
(I learned this from experience) I'm still experimenting with ways
to accomplish this and I've found that ice cube trays work best. Once
they (minced, not sure about chopped) freeze, I just throw them into a ziplock
baggie and haven't had any issues with them getting mixed up.
Poaching Chicken directions:
No comments:
Post a Comment