Freezer Cooking
We just got an extra freezer, and I am excited to start stocking it with homemade prepared meals so we'll have something to eat on those nights when my husband and I don't feel like cooking. So, I'm curious - what recipes/foods have you found that freeze well (from cookbooks, here on VegWeb, or elsewhere)? On the flip side, what have you found that really does *not* work well frozen? Do you follow a "once a month cooking" plan? Any other tips to share?
I've found a few older threads on this topic - links here:
Batch cooking
Official "Freezes well" thread
Other links that seem helpful:
Vegan Once a Month Cooking - with two menus, and links to recipes for those menus
Vegetarian freezer cooking e-book - e-book for purchase, which supposedly contains about half vegan recipes and many more veganizable. I haven't bought it yet, but it looks sort of interesting.
BTW, I found several places that call preparing and freezing meals "freezer cooking," but I find it sort of funny.. You can't cook with a freezer, silly! ;)
I try to cook something to freeze on Saturdays and Sundays. I have a Seal-a-Meal machine and getting all the air out of the packages works wonders. I've made, frozen and reheated the following recipes from the Vegan Once a Month Cooking site:
Mexican Gumbo; Best Vegan Mac & Cheese Recipe Ever (yes!); Cheezy Lasagna (Daiya mozarella on the top even though it didn't call for it); Unbeef Stew; Tortilla Black Bean Casserole (Daiya cheddar for the vegan cheese); Delicious Pakistani Dal; African Peanut-Potato Stew; Caribbean Beans & Quinoa.
From Veganomicon I've made and froze the Tempeh Shepherdess Pie and the Almost All American Pot Pie. They both turned out great re-heated.
From the fat free vegan site, I made the Black-Eye and Vegetable Chili. It's really good.
I was just looking through Vegan Planet today picking out some more recipes that I'm going to try: Tempeh and Red Bean Jambalaya with Chipotle Chiles (p. 311); Linguine Tetrazzini (I've made traditional tetrazzini back pre-veg*n and it froze well so this should too); and Hot Tamale Vegetable Pie
From (correction) about.com's veg*n pages: Easy Thai vegetable curry with tofu and Vegetarian Portabella Mushroom Enchiladas.
This should give you plenty of ideas. ;D
I don't like to freeze meals so much as I like to freeze ingredients for quick weeknight meals. I make huge batches of different types of rice & beans. I put them in the gallon storage bags flattened out. Then I can break off what I need. Great for burritos - which I pretty much eat every day as of late.
I also freeze sauces like pesto, tomato, marinades, etc. in little glass jelly jars. Also, fillings like cashew/tofu ricotta, homemade seitan, or sauteed mushrooms. You could also freeze a starter dough or baked breads & don't forget dessert. I have not done it yet (I will) - but you could prepare a homemade pizza & freeze it instead of baking it.
Now I'm hungry!
Most of my frozen dishes become lunch at work. My DH said he might take some to work for his lunch. He teaches high school math and only has 15 minutes for lunch. He commutes an hour and a half each way to work. I've usually eaten my dinner long before he gets home so I also want to have some things he will eat that I can nuke quickly for him. I used to eat a lot of Amy's but both grocery stores (one's a Walmart) have stopped carrying most of them. There's only one Amy's available that's vegan and I'm sick to death of it! :D
I don't bake bread but my DH is good at it. I may see if he'd like to make some whole wheat rolls to stash in the freezer. I'm going to make some cornbread and freeze that too.
Thanks so much for the ideas, both of you! Keep them coming, if you think of anything else.
TinTexas - Glad to hear you like so many of those vegan once a month cooking recipes - I might have to give some of those a try. A lot of my frozen stuff will probably end up as lunches too. I bring a lunch most days, and it would be so convenient to just grab an individual serving of something and maybe a piece of fruit or soy yogurt. Do you thaw the individual servings the night before or anything? Whenever I've brought frozen soups or anything, it seems to take so long to thaw in the microwave - it seems like it would be better to thaw it in the fridge overnight.
So, tell me more about this Seal-a-Meal thing - what kinds of foods are good to vacuum seal? Do you reuse the bags? I've been thinking about a vacuum sealer, but I would feel better if the bags were reusable - the website says they are, but I wonder if it's a pain to clean them, or if they don't really work well after the first use? I don't normally reuse plastic bags, but if I'm freezing stuff in them I would imagine I'll go through a lot more of them than usual.
purpledancer - Freezing rice and beans is a great idea - do you freeze them mixed together, or separately? I love rice and we have a nice rice cooker, but we are always stuck with a little bit leftover each time. It would probably make sense to make extra and freeze it. I haven't had great luck yet cooking dried beans (I think I had some old beans - they were both crunchy and mushy in the same batch!), but we eat canned beans pretty regularly so I think I'll have to give it another try. I'm definitely going to be freezing some sauces. What kind of marinades do you freeze?
i made vegweb's cheesy bean and cheese enchiladas and they froze well... sorry that's all i have to add. i usually just cook on the weekends and eat unfrozen leftovers
purpledancer - Freezing rice and beans is a great idea - do you freeze them mixed together, or separately? I love rice and we have a nice rice cooker, but we are always stuck with a little bit leftover each time. It would probably make sense to make extra and freeze it. I haven't had great luck yet cooking dried beans (I think I had some old beans - they were both crunchy and mushy in the same batch!), but we eat canned beans pretty regularly so I think I'll have to give it another try. I'm definitely going to be freezing some sauces. What kind of marinades do you freeze?
I cook & freeze them separately. I use this method for cooking my rice. It's easy & works wonderfully & I've used it with all different types of rice. I double it and bake in a 9X13 glass baking dish.
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/baked-brown-rice-recipe/index.html
I cook my beans from scratch in a crockpot. Mostly, I just make black beans because I like them so much. I sort & rinse. Put them in the crock & cover with water to soak overnight. Next morning I rinse & dump back in crock. Cover with water, leaving about 1 " from the top of the crock. I'm not sure about the cooking time, because I never write anything down. Somewhere between 6 - 8 hours on low. When they are done I drain, rinse,drain & store. I've also simmered them on the stovetop for 2 hours & they turned out nicely. I just didn't like babysitting them for 2 hours.
I don't have a specific marinade recipe. If we are going to grill veggies or veggie burgers, we mix up a marinade of oil,vinegar, soy sauce, maybe some tomato paste & various spices then freeze whatever marinade is left so we can skip that step next time. If you are looking for marinade ideas - I just got The Saucy Vegetarian & it has tons of marinades, sauces, & dressings that require little effort. It's really a cool book.
http://www.amazon.com/Saucy-Vegetarian-Joanne-Stepaniak/dp/1570670919/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1280496797&sr=8-1
I've never been good at freezing whole meals. I have tried it, but invariably once I take it out of the freezer, it just seems unappetizing and I no longer want it. I do better freezing pre-cooked ingredients which I can use to throw something together. Examples include:
Beans:
I have a pressure cooker so I will cook up 2 lbs of beans at a time, then portion them out into 2 cup containers (equivalent to one can) and pop them in the freezer to use whenever I need them in a recipe.
Rice:
Frozen cooked rice is also good when you need rice to make fried rice or Spanish/Mexican rice, or to throw in a soup.
Roasted peppers:
In the summer I typically have an abundance of peppers - more than I can ever use before they go bad, so I will roast huge batches of them and portion them out into baggies or small containers which go into the freezer to be used the rest of the year.
Pesto:
Same thing for basil in the summer, so I will make large batches of pesto and freeze it into small portion (ice cube trays work great) to be used later in sauces. You can do this with any herb, and have "fresh" herbs year round!
There are probably more but that's all I can think of... Most ingredients can be frozen, except of course lettuce and such. However, they are not all so much a time saver as a way to preserve ingredients when you have more than you can use at one time. However, the beans and rice are particularly handy since they are something that take a long time to cook, and it's nice to have pre-cooked versions on hand when you need them in a recipe. And you have the added benefit of no BPA that you would get in canned items.
I can't recommend any recipes to freeze (other than, like, soup, in general), but if I had an extra freezer, I would freeze lots of fresh fruits while in season, and eat cheaper and more delicious smoothies all year long!
Thanks so much for the ideas, both of you! Keep them coming, if you think of anything else.
TinTexas - Glad to hear you like so many of those vegan once a month cooking recipes - I might have to give some of those a try. A lot of my frozen stuff will probably end up as lunches too. I bring a lunch most days, and it would be so convenient to just grab an individual serving of something and maybe a piece of fruit or soy yogurt. Do you thaw the individual servings the night before or anything? Whenever I've brought frozen soups or anything, it seems to take so long to thaw in the microwave - it seems like it would be better to thaw it in the fridge overnight.
So, tell me more about this Seal-a-Meal thing - what kinds of foods are good to vacuum seal? Do you reuse the bags? I've been thinking about a vacuum sealer, but I would feel better if the bags were reusable - the website says they are, but I wonder if it's a pain to clean them, or if they don't really work well after the first use? I don't normally reuse plastic bags, but if I'm freezing stuff in them I would imagine I'll go through a lot more of them than usual.
---
The bags are an expense and no, I haven't been reusing them. It would be almost impossible because you have to leave 3 inches of space between the food and the top of the bag with the machine I use and after it's sealed some of it is on the outside of the seal not leaving 3 inches free to reuse the bag unless I was to make the bags huge. It's worth the expense and trouble in my opinion because the food I have ready to pop in the microwave is so much better than any packaged vegan meal. I've been losing weight since I started this regime and have lost about 15 pounds so far. I'm happy!
Sorry it took so long to reply. I went on vacation and didn't have computer access and then I was swamped at work and exhausted when I got home!
Just a brief update - I've been freezing things a bit here and there. I made a quadruple batch of seitan and froze 3/4 of it - I just thawed the first frozen piece and it seems to be perfect! So exciting!
I also cooked a big batch of bulgur wheat in my rice cooker, mixed it with some chickpeas, tossed with olive oil and lemon juice and froze it as a base for tabouli. That way I can add whatever fresh veggies I have on hand for a quick lunch.
A while back I made a huge batch of lentil soup and froze individual or 2-serving portions. That has saved me on many a busy night! Next, I'll probably do a big batch of chili. I'd also like to do some potato soup. I'm so glad it's fall - I'll eat soup any time of year, but it seems especially appropriate in the fall. :)