Freezer cooking saves time, money and waste By Janel Atlas Gannett
Once-a-month cooking. Batch cooking. Cooking ahead. Stocking your freezer. Whatever you choose to call it, preparing meals (or parts of meals) ahead of time and storing them in the freezer until you need them can be a major time, money and sanity saver. When someone says they’re a big fan of freezer cooking, they can get one of two reactions: perplexed admiration or dismissive horror. After all, isn’t the freezer a space for piling things like chicken nuggets, fries, ice cream and meats you will probably forget about until they expire? Those who express admiration but doubt about the whole proposition ask about recipes, how often to cook, how to keep track of meals and how to get started.
Benefits
» It saves time. It barely takes any longer to cook 3 pounds of ground beef on the stove top than it does to cook 1 pound. When doing batch cooking (making double or triple recipes of several meals) instead of a one-day marathon cooking session (in which the cook prepares all the meals for a much longer period of time and of greater variety), there is a little bit of extra work each time you prepare a recipe, but there are big payoffs in the form of three meals instead of just one. » It maximizes savings on sales. Know how your grocery store typically has one really good sale on meat (or veggies, or a certain type of canned good)? That’s what gets most shoppers in the door, but then they buy other things, because, let’s face it, even if you love chicken, you don’t want to serve it seven nights a week. This is where freezer cooking comes in. Because the deals rotate (beef one week, turkey the next, etc.), you can focus on prepping meals using that low-priced item, and flesh out the week with things you’ve already put in your freezer. » It helps families avoid the oh-noit’s-4:30-and-I-have-nothing-to-make-fordinner scenario.
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