If you know me well or have read this blog a few times, then you know how much I love having a meal plan and that I'm completely in love with freezer cooking. It's a great way to save money, save time, and eat healthier. If you're interested in doing this but feel a little overwhelmed at the thought or need some motivation, participate in Stephanie's event at Keeper of the Home. She breaks down the process into several weeks so that her readers can walk through it with her. The end result will not necessarily be once a month cooking, but you will have many prepared meals and meal components.
The main reason I love freezer cooking is because I want home cooked meals every night for dinner, but I don't actually want to cook every night! Call me lazy if you want. It can be just too hectic to cook a meal from start to finish every night of the week. And there are often unforeseen events that make a scratch meal impossible to prepare some days (remember my four days with no plumbing?). By having prepared meals in the freezer, we can completely avoid ordering pizza and fast food, which of course saves money.
An added benefit is that it's healthier. A great way to blow a perfectly good diet is by eating out. I know restaurants and fast food joints all have healthy options, but overall, it can be incredibly unhealthy to eat out often. At home, you know exactly what is going into your dinner and can balance out the fatty foods with the lean. It's also unhealthy to eat too many prepackaged meals, whether those are in boxes or in the freezer section. By cooking in bulk and freezing, you end up with the best possible scenario--all the benefits of convenience food with none of the drawbacks.
At Keeper of the Home, Stephanie focuses a lot on cooking more whole foods. I love this idea too, even though it's only something I've started exploring more recently, specifically after I borrowed a friend's cookbook, Whole Foods for the Whole Family (La Leche League, International).
I don't think I'll ever completely stay away from canned and processed foods, but it's not too hard to cut down on them once you start doing more freezer cooking. I don't even bother with canned chicken broth anymore, choosing instead to make my own stock and freeze it. Homemakers have perfected these skills for ages, but my generation of women has gotten away from scratch cooking, and I think our kids will be the ones to pay for it one day, if not our own budgets and our own health.
My method for freezer cooking is a lot less disciplined than most people's approach, primarily because with only one child at home, I can afford to be more relaxed with it. I go with the cook one, freeze two idea. I refuse to make one lasagna, one hashbrown casserole, one chicken spaghetti, one chili, one gumbo, or one red beans and rice. I'd much rather make three (or five, or seven) instead. It takes almost the same amount of time to make three of something as it does to make one. I usually do this about once a week or so. This week I made red beans and rice, but next week, it'll be chicken spaghetti.
The added bonus is that I often have food on hand for when a friend has a baby or is ill. In the past, others have blessed me with meals, and I find it to be a total joy to do the same. One of the best gifts I ever received from a sweet friend was a stack of meals to go in my freezer after Isabelle was born. In those early days of troubleshooting nursing and trying to find time to sleep, it was wonderful to have four homecooked meals ready to go when I needed them (and boy, did I need them!). While I've only been able to do this same thing for one friend, I have often been able to bring meals to many other moms. It's really nice when I can just pull something from the freezer, add a salad and dessert, and have a complete meal for a family.
Have I made a convert out of you yet? So who's in??
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