Freezer cooking through the week

Finally, a week with a little bit of wiggle room.  I'm taking advantage of those couple of calendar days that are ahhh, ahhh! (angels singing) EMPTY. 

Don't you just love it when you look at your planner and see a day with NOTHING written on it?  I had a couple of those this week.  Although, there is still the usual daily stuff...meetings, lessons, etc., but otherwise free.  That just looks like some prime time to get ahead for the month.  It's especially important this month...with hosting Thanksgiving and all the holiday stuff starting to ramp up, I'm giving myself the gift of a few nights off kitchen duty. 

Here's the plan: 

Day 1:  Chicken day.   I started out the day with shopping trips.  I bought 6 lb ground beef, 4 lb stew meat, 6 lbs chicken breasts and 4 lbs chicken thighs.  My word that's a lot of meat!  Bought it at our local butcher shop, and paid $94.00 for everything.  Then I bought all the other items I didn't already have at home to complete my recipes. 

With not much time left in the day I came home and made all the breast meat into breaded chicken strips (using this GF recipe).  Then I had enough time to trim up the thighs, which had a TON of extra fat on them, and add the other ingredients into the bag for a big crock pot of Lime Salsa Chicken. 

So by the end of the day I had last night's dinner, 2 more chicken strip meals (at least!), and at least 2 meals of lime salsa chicken into the freezer.

Before bed I started 3 lb of walnuts and 2 lb of pecans soaking....

Day 2:    Beef day.  I drained and rinsed the nuts this morning right after making breakfast and lunch and sending everyone packing.  Tossed them (the nuts, not the family!) onto the dehydrator trays, set the timer, and now I don't really have to think about those again til tomorrow when I will simply bag 'em and freeze 'em for holiday baking and snacks.

After two cups of coffee and goofing off on the internet for 30 minutes (yes, I have to set a timer...) I started in on the beef stew.  With 4 lbs of meat I was able to make 2, 6 qt. crocks full.  So one crock is bubbling right now on each side of my kitchen island.  (An excellent example of why in the world I would need TWO 6 qt crock pots!).  One pot will be tonight's dinner and the other bagged up and frozen for two more dinners later. 

I think red wine and mushrooms totally MAKE a beef stew, don't you agree?

Clean up round 1.  Then on to that 6 lb of ground beef.  I used my 12" stainless skillet to brown 3 lbs at a time.  Made taco meat out of 3, and Italian Beef for Italian Sloppy Joes out of the other 3. That didn't take long and there was ONE skillet to clean.  Let me repeat that: ONE.  Six dinners, one skillet to clean...that makes me a happy girl.

I'm about to attempt filling my other dehydrator up with apples before I have to be in town to drive for pick up and piano lessons...we'll see if it gets done in time.

Day 3:  I only have one more free day and that's Friday.  Here's the plan for that day:  Fish and Turkey.  I'm going to make 4 lb of fish sticks, and 2 lb of turkey meatballs and 2 lb of turkey burgers. Cost for fish will be about $20. and turkey $30.

So here's the breakdown:  By Friday night I will have banked about 16 meals, not to mention all the meals we're eating as we go.  Total cost = $144. in meat.  Including meals we ate along the way that breaks down to $6.85 per meal in meat, roughly--give or take leftovers for lunch the following days.  That is for 28 lbs of meat, I'm figuring about 1 1/3 lb per meal.  So calculate how much meat you use per meal for your family and that could be more or less...if there are just two of you this menu could go a lot further, not as far if you have a bigger family, or large eaters.

Tomorrow my oven should be fixed so I'm going to try to slip in a couple dozen zucchini muffins, as those are so nice to toss in the lunch, or eat for afternoon snacks. 

So by Friday I should have banked in the freezer :

3 taco meals
3 Italian beef meals
2 lime salsa chicken meals
2 (at least) chicken strip meals
2 (at least ) fishstick meals
2 (at least ) turkey burger meals
a dehydrator load of apple chips
2 lb of pecans, ready to use
3 lb walnuts, ready to use, and
2 dozen (at least) muffins!!!

Can I get a whoop, whoop!??  Score, friends!  I'm so excited.  Can you tell?  That's 14 meals I won't have to cook.  Now I'm really rolling, and these three days are not even full-on freezer cooking days, but just a few hours extra cooking, not the entire day-- just about double what I would normally be doing anyway, just making dinner...but it pays off WAY more than double.

Here's a very important tip regarding freezer cooking:  when you finish making your food get it into the fridge right away so it can start cooling down as quickly as possible.  Do not try to bag up hot food for the freezer.  Wait until it cools completely.  Otherwise you will get more icy crystals in your food as it freezes which just doesn't do the quality of your food any good at all.

Sunday I'll be making my next freezer cooking plan:  4 chicken, 4 beef, 4 fish and 4 turkey, plus baking.  Hoping next time around I will have whole days to devote and this will only take 2 days to do over 2 weeks worth of cooking.

What are your favorite things to make for the freezer?  Let the commentary begin!