Tuesday, February 19, 2013

More Time Savers in the Kitchen

I swear I live in the kitchen. Between making lunches, meals. clean up, the kitchen can be where I spend hours a day. I am always trying to save the amount of time I have to spend in there for more enjoyable pursuits like the garden.

Whenever I make a meal that could possibly be frozen, I make enough for two meals. I am a huge fan of freezer cooking.  


Keep the pantry stocked with enough to be able to double your meals. For us that is two large meals but for smaller families that may be splitting a single pan in two.


When I am done I just cover with plastic wrap and seal with foil writing the date and meal on the foil.





You can find the Notsagna recipe on my page.

Whenever you are chopping up veggies for dinner, cut up some for lunches. I just toss them in the fridge and they are ready for me to grab in the morning when I make lunches.


I do the same with snacks for lunches. I fill several bags at once in place in a plastic bin in the snack cupboard. That way when lunches are made, we can grab one quickly.



More time savers.

11 comments:

  1. Great ideas! My mom used to portion out snacks into bags as a way of calorie control, but it is also a great time saver. I also love to freeze food whenever I can.

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  2. Great ideas! I've wanted to double recipes and freeze one but with a male teen in the house ... sigh, it takes two meals for one.

    Right now, my very small freezer is filled with on-sale meats I've stocked up on. Do you have a big freezer in addition to the refrigerator one?

    Mary

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  3. Those are some great ideas. I shall go look at Notsagna, it sounds fascinating!

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  4. We are SO much alike...hard to believe! I do the same...always have...I always used to divide grapes into little snack bags for lunches...make enough fruit salad for dinner and lunch...its different now that we're both home and cooking...but we still make casseroles to freeze...and broths out of leftover chicken and veggies. We used to make a weekly menu when the boys were home...so we would know what to take out the night before...mornings got too crazy...I love all your ideas!!

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  5. I also freeze part of my dinners for my husbands lunches. The problem I have is forgetting them. I like your ideal of a container. I need to get one for our big freezer. That way I know exactly what i have.

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  6. I did that with meat loaf a couple of weeks ago.
    When I fire up the oven... I cook as much as I can in there; freezing what we don't eat right away or making some cookies for snacks!

    I love the sorted snacks Idea too. Used to implement that when the kids were home. It was nothing for my boys to open a bag of chips and devour them when they were growing up!

    Pat

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  7. I used to do a lot more freezer cooking when my kids were home. I FINALLY learned to cook smaller batches and we do have some small meals frozen for a quick meal- Great ideas here- xo Diana

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  8. You are really organized, Elaine. I am looking into the notsagne recipe.

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  9. Another great and practical post, Elaine! Today I made a large baked chicken divan (it's in the oven right now). I made double using lots of chicken. It will provide 2 meals plus a work lunch for my husband. I had plenty of the remaining sauce mixture...marked it and put it in the freezer. Next time all I will need is the chicken, broccoli and cheese for a quick fix dinner.
    Thank you for your thoughtful words on my on my blog and for sharing.
    Blessings,
    Carolyn xoxo

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  10. I do the same thing and it is so wonderful to pull something out of the freezer and not have to cook. Great recipe too. Thanks for joining TTT. Hugs, Marty

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  11. what a great idea- the freezing one...i also feel like i am in the kitchen all the time...thanks for sharing :)

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