Anyone out there who...

It's no biggie - if I cook too much of something, I'll freeze the rest. Tonight was a use up leftovers type meal - and there's leftovers - so that'll be tomorrow's lunch.

Yup, totally! Let me tell you that we have 2 doubledoor refridgerators and one huge deep freezer. We make a lot of our meals in bulk ahead of time and put them in jars (soups, stews and "soupy" dishes). We make our own sausage from scratch (usually around 60lbs at a time) and use the vacuum pack to pack them and store. We also make from scatch chicken breakfast patties.

There are certain things I always make in large batches and freeze for later, like stocks, soups, chilis, etc. I used to do that with cookie dough but stopped when I started watching my calories. Plan on eventually tweaking some healthy cookie recipes and starting back up (if you freeze cookie dough portioned out on baking sheets, basically oven ready, you can put them in ziplock bags and then bake off just as many as you want at a time!)

I make all my stocks from scratch with all my leftover kitchen scraps - I just keep a big ziplock bag in the freezer and put everything appropriate in it after chopping everything for dinner, another bag for chicken carcasses, and make stock whenever the bags get full. Usually get at least 4 quarts, keep one out and freeze the rest in ice cube trays/bags - tend to run out right around the time the scrap bags get full! Works well.

If food comes in my house, it gets used. All of it. Once we move out of the big city I'll start composting the little bit I do throw out. And I can't wait to have a larger freezer! I buy local antibiotic free meat whenever there's a good sale and freeze as much as I can, but I'm really limited by the space I have. I also chop up fresh in season veggies when I buy too much from the farmer's market and freeze that. For fresh herbs that I grow at home I chop them up small and freeze them in ice cube trays.

When I freeze soup/chili/etc I freeze it in 2 person portions, even if I'm the only one eating it I can use the rest for lunch the next day. Same for when I freeze meat.

We don't eat 100% home cooked, but we eat a lot that way. We go through phases when I'll cook a LOT and then eat off the bounty for a while, then there will be periods where I don't feel like cooking and we eat a lot of crap. I really think with more freezer space this would never happen as I would be able to stock up more when I feel industrious.

Yup, totally! Let me tell you that we have 2 doubledoor refridgerators and one huge deep freezer. We make a lot of our meals in bulk ahead of time and put them in jars (soups, stews and "soupy" dishes). We make our own sausage from scratch (usually around 60lbs at a time) and use the vacuum pack to pack them and store. We also make from scatch chicken breakfast patties.

I love the versatility that fresh-homemade foods brings... you can do so much! Virtually no waste, grab only what you need.

We eat about 99% clean here. The other 1% would be whatever my husband brings home to eat on his own.... Thats perfeclty fine, I dont eat junk, processed foods and refuse to - they make me very sick... fresh food rules!

Ditto!

In my house, we make ahead so that we don't rely on sodium & calorie laden convenience foods when life gets hectic during the week. One of our favorite things to do is boil & shred chicken breasts so that it's available to us all week long. It's wonderful to be able to weigh out a serving & have chicken & noodles, shepherd's pie, chicken salad, low cal burritos & so on in practically no time through the week. Another thing I do is make ahead breakfasts. I prefer to give the kids a warm, homemade breakfast each morning but I work early & there just isn't the time to bake daily. Breads, biscuits, muffins (usually dairy free, low fat, low cal so that I have no guilt about eating along with them) are all portioned out & frozen. Egg white biscuit sandwiches or breakfast burritos are usually only made a few days in advance & refrigerated.

It's important to me that we eat as a family, no my foods/his foods/their foods so everything has been adapted to my restrictions but is full of flavor & kid friendly. Based on my own childhood of convenience foods, I know that as adults we fall back on what we're used to. I want healthy, home-cooked, delicious foods to be their normal.

Ok, here's my thing: I would LOVE to do bulk cooking, but I don't have a microwave. So by the time I get the food out of the freezer, thaw it out, and cook it in the oven or whatever, I might as well have just cooked it that night instead of ahead of time.

Any ideas for me?

Boil-in-bag meals. One dish meals work best. I also pull things out of the freezer & into the fridge the night (or morning) before so that the thawing is done by the time I get home.

What works with boil-in-bag? I assume soups and sauces, but would there be anything else?

Yes I do my own gardening, canning, freezing and bulk planning for the year.

I haven't done it myself but a friend of mine swears by it. I googled & this site has a list of different types of bags you can use. http://www.trailcooking.com/trail-cooking-101/freezer-bag-cooking-101

You rock. :glasses: Thanks!

I make big batches of meatballs or pasties for the freezer. When I make chicken stock, at least half of it ends up in the freezer, too, although we do go through it pretty quickly in the winter. Same for dinner rolls. I've thought about making biscuits for the freezer to cook as the family wants them, but I think they would inhale them as soon as I made them! When I make ham or country pork ribs, we end up with lots of food in freezer bags that ends up as fried rice or other things. I had a friend blanch and freeze a huge box of tomatoes for me this summer after I broke my arm. I like to cook, so the freezer is my best friend!