Batch Cooking- What freezes well?

ftsolk

I'm trying to get into some better habits by cooking multiple servings of food at a time, and portioning them out for meals throughout the week. This week, I'm making Chicken Lettuce Wraps (ground chicken, ginger, salt, pepper, broccoli slaw, and Frank's Sweet Chili sauce served in butter lettuce leaves), Turkey roll-ups (Sprouted grain tortillas, cream cheese/cranberry sauce), deli turkey, swiss cheese, spinach), and a Frittata (Eggs, sweet potato, sweet Italian chicken sausage, swiss chard, onion).

I know the frittata should freeze well, but I don't know about the lettuce wrap mixture or the turkey roll-ups. I'm just not sure what kinds of food will freeze and thaw without "ruining" them.

Any advice? I've done pasta dishes and soups before with no issue, and I know the meat and tortillas in the roll-ups should freeze just fine (the tortillas are kept in the freezer at the grocery store), but I don't know how the cream cheese/cranberry sauce mixture factors in there.

What about Hellman's Mayonnaise chicken? (Chicken topped with mayo, parmesan cheese, and bread crumbs) Roasted vegetables and sausage?

Kalikel

Here's a decent link. It's not perfect, but it's a good kick-off place. http://www.favoritefreezerfoods.com/foods-that-can-freeze-well.html

Lettuce does not freeze well. Don't freeze lettuce.

Grapes freeze like they were created to frozen and frozen grapes are a nice treat on a hot days n

macgurlnet

From what I've seen, green veggies that are cooked and then frozen don't always survive well. I made a pasta dish with spinach and the spinach has to get tossed when I reheat it. So from now on I'll just skip the spinach in that dish and add it to each portion as needed. Same goes for the broccoli in my potato soup - it ends up blah and limp so that's another veggie that I'll end up steaming separately if I'm gonna freeze any of it.

I personally wouldn't bother freezing roasted veggies - if you have fresh stuff that needs to get frozen, freeze it & take it out the night before or so and let it thaw, then roast the next day. Sausage freezes fine from what I've done (I buy chicken sausages and freeze them, then put them in a pot with water I'm gonna use for pasta and let it warm up in that water. They turn out fine).

Lentils and beans freeze nicely - though I would again recommend letting them thaw completely in the fridge before trying to reheat.

If you like pizza, you can make your own using things like flatbread and freeze them, too

A google search will yield tons and tons of ideas - I'm sure someone has a Pinterest board with ideas too, lol! I'm only cooking for me so I haven't tried too much yet, other than pasta dishes, my soup, and lentil & black bean chili.

@Kalikel I did not know this about grapes so I'm totally going to give that a try!

~Lyssa

KateTii

I need to have meals prepped in advance as due to working 2 jobs with changing start/finish times, I never have time to make lunch. I freeze everything except for high-water content fruits and veg (lettuce, cucumber, tomatoes). Depending on the price of vegetables, I either buy fresh broccoli/beans/asparagus etc. cook & freeze (cook only lightly, microwaving will finish that off for you) or I buy frozen veg, portion it out and freeze (microwaving cooks it enough for me).

Queenmunchy

The frittata will be fine as well as the filling for your lettuce wraps.

MarziPanda95

ftsolk wrote: »

What about Hellman's Mayonnaise chicken? (Chicken topped with mayo, parmesan cheese, and bread crumbs) Roasted vegetables and sausage?

Like others have said, lettuce doesn't freeze well. Sadly, mayo separates in the freezer, so your mayo chicken isn't a good idea.

sheermomentum

any fresh vegetables will lose crispness when you freeze them. The chicken for the lettuce wraps will do fine, but the broccoli slaw will soften. The cream cheese/cranberry mixture should be ok, but the spinach will wilt as though it were cooked. This may be ok; depends on what you want. If you freeze fresh veggies they'll also leak a little water, so keep that in mind. I imagine you can freeze the mayonnaise chicken, but the breadcrumbs will be soggy when defrosted. Again, matter of taste.

999tigger

As a matter of interest if you arent calorie counting then how will you know what the calories of each portion is? I hope youve found a method which gives you some method of estimating.

ashypashy7

I wouldn't freeze lettuce or spinach, I would add that when your ready to eat it. I find often times anything with a bread like coating will get soggy.

I do my freezer meals half way. I cook the meat ect and freeze, take it out in the AM and by the PM all I have to do is get the side items ready. Then everything is still fresh and crisp with min effort

WBB55

Think about the things you can buy frozen. Pizza, raw veggies, lasagna... That's a good starting point. Can you buy a frozen spinach salad? No. Can you buy frozen o'brian potatoes? Yes! Chicken catchetori? Yes. Raw apples? No.

KimiSteinbach

Thanks for your ideas, I would like to meal plan ahead too.

ftsolk

999tigger wrote: »

As a matter of interest if you arent calorie counting then how will you know what the calories of each portion is? I hope youve found a method which gives you some method of estimating.

I'm not paying attention to the calories. I'm following some loose guidelines. For example, the little container in my lunchbox only holds so much food, so that's instant portion control for the lettuce wrap filling (the broccoli slaw and chicken are cooked together, by the way). The frittata will be divided into quarters- again, portion control. I figure, if I stick to some basic rules, it'll help give me some control:

1. Include fruits and/or vegetables with most meals (usually vegetables, but I'm not going to stress over that)
2. Eat meals sitting down- using a bowl, plate, or lunchbox containers (no grazing while walking around). At church, that means filling my plate, and sitting down to eat- not walking around with a plate in my hand grazing- even if it is on grapes and cheese.
3. Lunches are packed in my Laptop Lunches container for instant portion control UNLESS packing a salad.
4. Meals are logged with what was eaten (occasionally with portion sizes), and the time I sat down to eat the meal.

sheermomentum wrote: »

any fresh vegetables will lose crispness when you freeze them. The chicken for the lettuce wraps will do fine, but the broccoli slaw will soften. The cream cheese/cranberry mixture should be ok, but the spinach will wilt as though it were cooked. This may be ok; depends on what you want. If you freeze fresh veggies they'll also leak a little water, so keep that in mind. I imagine you can freeze the mayonnaise chicken, but the breadcrumbs will be soggy when defrosted. Again, matter of taste.

Honestly, the breadcrumbs will probably be somewhat soggy anyway seeing as the dish will likely be reheated in a microwave (from refrigerated, if not frozen). You do have a good point about the roll-ups. Perhaps, it'll be wise to skip any vegetation on them, and include it in a side-salad.

I definitely don't plan on pre-cooking EVERYTHING, but if I can at least batch-cook some things (say, the filling for lettuce wraps, or a chicken dish), I can quickly toss some fruits, vegetables, and other quick side-dish items into my lunchbox to round out the meal. Then, instead of cooking in smaller batches, I can put some frozen lettuce wrap mixture into one container, rip some butter lettuce leaves off the plant on the counter for another container, and toss some grapes and sugar snap peas in the other smaller containers and be done with lunch packing.