freezer cooking | BargainBriana

Easy Ratatouille

by Briana Carter on April 22, 2013

Ratatouille. This is impossible for me to say properly. My kids on the other hand know all about ratatouille from some kids movie so they love to school me on the proper pronunciation. Anyway, ratatouille is a delicious meatless dish that is a great with pasta or rice or just by itself!

Easy Ratatouille

Ingredients

1/4 cup olive oil
1 onion, chopped
tablespoon garlic, chopped
1 red pepper, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
2 zucchini, sliced into half moons
1 eggplant, peeled and cubed
8 ounce mushroom, sliced
2 cans of petite diced tomatoes (14.5 ounce)
1 1/2 teaspoon of herbes de provence
1 teaspoon salt

Instructions

Heat oil in large pot. Add onion and garlic. Cook thoroughly until soft.
Add peppers, zucchini, eggplant, and mushroom.
Cook for 5 minutes.
Add tomatoes, herbes de provence, and salt. Cook for about 30 minutes, stirring often.

http://bargainbriana.com/easy-ratatouille/

This recipe was adapted from the Not Your Mother’s Make Ahead & Freeze Cookbook cookbook! It is a freezer friendly recipe, which can be divided and split into plastic containers or freezer bags. Thaw and warm up to serve.

View the Recipe Index for a complete list of recipes. For the most recent vegetarian recipes posted on the blog, go here. To view all the recipes post on the blog, go here.

{ 0 comments }

Homemade Cinnamon Banana Bread Recipe | Freezer Friendly

by Briana Carter on April 20, 2013

This Cinnamon Banana Bread recipe is one that I made on my Freezer Cooking Day. I have adapted it slightly from Not Your Mother’s Make Ahead & Freeze Cookbook. Make ahead and freeze after cooking and cooling or use some ripe bananas! Makes a great breakfast, snack, or a dessert.

The instructions I’m providing is for one batch. If you want to double, triple, or quadruple for baking day, you can use this FREE online recipe conversion calculator.

Cinnamon Banana Bread

Ingredients

1-1/2 bananas
1/3 cup + 2 teaspoons half and half
1 egg
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1/2 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup all purpose flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/3 teaspoon baking soda
1/3 teaspoon salt
1/3 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Instructions

Combine bananas, half & half, egg, and oil in bowl until smooth. I like to use my KitchenAid mixer for this type of job. Stir in brown sugar.
In a separate bowl, combine all purpose flour, whole wheat flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. Slowly add the dry ingredient mixture to the wet ingredient mixture.
Pour into a greased loaf pan.
Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 1 hour.
Cool completely.

Freezer Option: Wrap in plastic wrap after completely cooled and store in freezer. I like to use freezer bags for these jobs to save time!

http://bargainbriana.com/homemade-cinnamon-banana-bread-recipe-freezer-friendly/

View the Recipe Index for a complete list of recipes. For the most recent vegetarian recipes posted on the blog, go here. To view all the recipes post on the blog, go here.

{ 0 comments }

Pecan-Crusted Chicken Tenders Recipe | Freezer Friendly

by Briana Carter on March 13, 2013

This recipe was a hit at our household with the picky eaters! A few weeks ago, I picked up several packages of chicken breasts at nearly rock bottom price at $1.79/lb. I found a recipe from the Fix, Freeze, Feast cookbook that I modified for our family’s needs and what we had in the pantry. This is super simple, easy, and delicious according to my people!

I’m loving these mini-freezer sessions I’ve been having to fill our freezer with healthy meals that my family will love. It is looking like we are going to have a crazy busy Spring and Summer schedule so I’m trying to get prepared.

I used my favorite appliance – my Ninja Prep to finely ground my pecans but you can use any food processor.

Pecan-Crusted Chicken Tenders (Freezer Friendly)

Rating: 51

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 45 minutes

Pecan-Crusted Chicken Tenders (Freezer Friendly)

Ingredients

6 pounds chicken breasts, boneless and skinless
2 cups honey
1 cup spicy brown mustard
3/4 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon pepper
3 cups panko
8 ounces pecans, finely ground
6 gallon freezer bags
3 one quart freezer bags

Instructions

Cut chicken into thin strips. Divide chicken into three of the gallon freezer bags.
Mix honey, mustard, oil, salt, garlic, and pepper in a bowl. Divide evenly over chicken in freezer bags.
Combine 1 cup panko and 1/2 cup pecans into a quart bag.
Place chicken bag and crust bag into another gallon bag.
Seal, label, and freeze.
To Cook:
Thaw in refrigerator.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Roll chicken in the crumbs and place on a greased cooking sheet.
Bake for 30 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink.

http://bargainbriana.com/pecan-crusted-chicken-tenders-recipe-freezer-friendly/

I picked up several packages of this chicken at the nearly rock bottom price. I also have an order for pick up in April for just $1.79/lb with Zaycon Chicken. Check out Zaycon to see if they are coming to a city near you! It’s a great price for bulk meat purchases!

View the Recipe Index for a complete list of recipes. For the most recent vegetarian recipes posted on the blog, go here. To view all the recipes post on the blog, go here.

{ 0 comments }

Freezer Garlic Mashed Potatoes

by Briana Carter on February 27, 2013

A few Fridays ago, which seem like forever ago, I did some freezer meal cooking to help start us to get prepared for a very busy Spring, which also seems far off but will be here before we know it. Now we are going to have 8 different sports and activities that the kids are involved with in the Spring and Summer so I want to be prepared with meals in the freezer so we have no excuse to not eat at home.

Often times when we get super busy like this, it is so much easier to stop and get fast food or take out. This is not good for our budget and we are not eating the most healthy meals either. I’ve started doing mini-freezer sessions to get our freezer full.

The week I did my freezer cooking, ALDI had russet potatoes for just $1.99 for a ten pound bag. When I normally buy a ten pound bag, I use about half the bag and then forget about it and the potatoes go bad. Cooking up ten pounds of potatoes at once not only helped get my freezer full but it also saved me money by eliminating produce waste. Awesome, right?

I know many of you probably hate to peel potatoes as much as I do. I dread it. I have this OXO Good Grips Pro Y-Peeler, which is awesome for the job. Amazon also tells me I purchased it back in 2009, which is nice to know that it has lasted that long. Compared to a traditional peeler, this OXO Good Grips Pro Y-Peeler is the peeler I always reach for as it takes less swipes to remove all of your peel.

As for the peel debate – leave it on or take it off, IF my kids weren’t so picky about potato peels, I would just skip the step of removing the peels and cook it with the peel as I like it that way and it saves time. Since I do want them to eat it and I don’t really want the fight, I spend the extra time peeling the potatoes.

In the instructions below, you will notice that I used my KitchenAid Stand Mixer to mash the potatoes. This is one kitchen appliance, I wish I would have purchased a long time ago. I use this pretty much whenever I cook or bake as much as possible. I’m probably losing muscle strength in my arms, though, since I’m not manually mixing, stirring, and mashing now.

To freeze these potatoes is quite easy. Freeze directly in the pans you are going to cook the potatoes in or freeze flat in gallon freezer bags. If you freeze in gallon freezer bags, you will need to unthaw the potatoes in the refrigerator by placing the bag in the refrigerator the morning of or the night before you want to cook. Then transfer to your cooking dish. This will save space and money as well since you will not be buying foil pans if you don’t have enough Pyrex. Plus, freezing in pans take up so much space in the freezer.

I love that this freezer meal as I’m only making the potato mess one time yet we are able to enjoy delicious home cooked, real potatoes mashed potatoes. We’ve already unthawed and cooked one pan. Let’s just say there were no leftovers! One pan (1/4 of the recipe) was perfect size for our family of six. Everyone ate them and had plenty and we only had a spoonful left in the pan.

Garlic Mashed Potatoes

Rating: 51

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Cook Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Garlic Mashed Potatoes

This dish is a great make ahead dish for your freezer! Freeze in 8"x8" aluminum pans for an easy side dish on weeknights. Delicious!

Ingredients

10 pounds Russet potatoes
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 tablespoon minced garlic
16 ounce cream cheese
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1 cup vegetable broth

Instructions

Peel and cut potatoes into large chunks. Boil in a large pot for around 9-12 minutes.
While potatoes are cooking, heat oil in a small skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and cook until soft. Remove pan from heat.
Drain potatoes and return to pot. I put mine in my KitchenAid stand mixer to mash. Add garlic with oil, cream cheese, salt, and pepper. Stir in vegetable broth. If you are not vegetarian, you can certainly use chicken broth for even more flavor.
Mash potatoes. (I used my KitchenAid stand mixer.)
Divide into four 8x8 pans.
Cover and freeze.
To Cook:
Thaw or bake straight from freezer.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Cook uncovered for 1 hour if cooking from frozen or 30 minutes if thawed or until potatoes are thoroughly hot.

http://bargainbriana.com/freezer-garlic-mashed-potatoes/

This recipe was adapted to be vegetarian friendly from the Fix, Freeze, Feast cookbook.

View the Recipe Index for a complete list of recipes. For the most recent vegetarian recipes posted on the blog, go here. To view all the recipes post on the blog, go here.

{ 0 comments }

Frugal Friday: Freezer Meal Cooking for Breakfast & Vegetarian Dinners

by Briana Carter on February 22, 2013

As part of our 2013 goals and resolutions, I’m working with cooking more at home and eating from our pantry. I decided last week would be a good week to plan a couple of mini-cooking plans for freezer meals. Our spring is about to get extremely busy and I would love to continue eating a majority of our meals at home and skipping out on fast food and convenience foods.

I’ve done freezer cooking in the past and doing an entire month’s of meals at one time does not work for me. It is exhausting and I get burnt out quickly. Plus, the last time I did this it took me two full days and I was physically exhausted and sore. I recently purchased Not Your Mother’s Make Ahead & Freeze Cookbook , which I’m absolutely loving. In the book there are 10 freezer plans to fit your needs, which include your shopping list and instructions on which order to complete your meals. I choose the 2 hour breakfast plan and the 2 hour vegetarian plan.

I also had two recipes I wanted to try from the Fix, Freeze, Feast cookbook for potato soup and mashed potatoes as well as a bulk cooking recipe for spaghetti sauce. I was extremely pleased with the one recipe I had used from the Fix, Freeze, and Feast cookbook for the Pecan Crusted Chicken tenders, which I had frozen a couple of weeks ago. This cookbook doesn’t have any freezer day plans but there are tons of suggestions on how to create your own plan in both books.I shopped and cooked on two separate days, which I highly suggest. I shopped at three different stores. I picked up a few things at Sam’s and Meijer but was able to fulfill most of my shopping at ALDI. I used Ziplist to combine all the ingredients I need into one manageable plan.

The two hour breakfast plan included the following: Individual Greek Egg Casseroles, Better Instant Oatmeal Packets, Bulk Batch Pancake Mix, Cinnamon Banana Bread, and Mix & Match Muffin Mix. This plan took me right around 2 hours and filled my freezer with 10+ meals for at least 4 people! This two hours also included 15 minutes to clean out a spot in the freezer for all my new meals. I was able to save quite a bit of time by using my KitchenAid Stand mixer for mixing and kneading. Already, we’ve sampled the oatmeal packets, cinnamon banana bread, and the muffin mix, which we made into blueberry muffins!

Next up was the vegetarian meal plan in 2 hours or less. This did take me longer than 2 hours as I had quite a bit of stuff to chop up and dice. I used my Ninja Prep quite a bit for chopping. I would guess around 3 hours. This included: Spice Mix, Pepper Jack and Chile Burritos, Stovetop Ratatouille, Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto, Pizza Kits including homemade pizza dough. Some of these recipes we can add meat to later like the Ratatouille, the pesto, and the pizzas. Otherwise, having vegetarian meals in the freezer will save me from having to make two separate meals most nights.

If I do this again, I will make sure I make copies of all the recipes ahead of time so I can flip easily. The menu plans have instructions on what to do but they aren’t specific, you have to reference the recipe within the book, which can be messy and time consuming flipping page to page!

I then took a few hours break before I tackled the potato project. I had 20 lbs of potatoes, which I had purchased for $1.99/bag. Awesome deal, right? I was most certainly not looking forward to all that peeling, though. I get a little crazy and impatient with the peeler and have numerous times cut myself with that silly gadget. I was happy to discover once I dug into the recipes that one called for baking the potatoes and scooping out and the other for peeled potatoes. If the kid didn’t freak out at the site of brown in their potato soup, I probably wouldn’t even peel them as I prefer a chunky unpeeled potato. Again, the KitchenAid Stand mixer came in quite handy for the mashed potatoes.

I completely spaced on the bulk slow cooker red sauce and did this one a few days later as it didn’t require any fresh ingredients.

Overall, I’m pleased with my freezer and bulk cooking plans. We’ve eaten several of the items I’ve cooked and nobody has cried yet! (Kind of inside joke as often someone in the house will cry or a throw a fit about something I have cooked. I promise I don’t make them eat anything that is disgusting or I wouldn’t eat if I was a carnivore!) I’m going to start doing this a couple of times a month to save on time and money!

{ 0 comments }

Productive Frugal Friday: Bulk Cooking, Cleaning, Freezer Meal Preparations

by Briana Carter on February 8, 2013

I’ve had a fairly productive Friday morning, I think! How about you? I’ve cooked, prepped, labeled items, cleaned, and now I’m working on the never ending laundry piles!

This week at Marsh Supermarkets, they had chicken on sale for $1.87/lb. Of course, as a savvy shopper, I picked up several packages of this chicken at the nearly rock bottom price. I also have an order for pick up in April for just $1.79/lb with Zaycon Chicken. On Wednesday, I made a crockpot meal with rice and green beans that wasn’t very flavorful but the kids did eat the chicken. Everyone just dumped ketchup or barbecue sauce on it to suit their own needs!

I still had a couple of packages left. I decided to go ahead and put a few more pounds in the slow cooker to cut up and freeze cooked for easy meals. I still had a complete package. I just purchased Fix, Freeze, Feast and browsed through it to see if there was a recipe that we had ingredients on hand and that wouldn’t make my kids cry! Bingo, there was a recipe and it was items from the pantry that we needed to use anyway!

This morning, I prepped, chopped, and mixed for the Pecan-Crusted Chicken Strips in the book. The recipe calls for honey, brown mustard, olive oil (which I now realize I completely forgot to add), salt, pepper, garlic and chicken. Then in a separate bag you put in the panko breadcrumbs and the finely ground pecans. When I unthaw this, I’m going to have to remember to add a little olive oil to each package! oops!

These condensed down to three gallon freezer bags very nicely in my freezer. This should work out to the main dish of three meals for my four meat eaters.

This only took about 20 minutes to prepare and should save me 20-30 minutes each night that I cook these meals as I won’t have to do all of this preparation!

I have chicken in the crockpot….

I cooked around 3 pounds of ground sausage to use tonight for calzones as well as freezing the remainder in smaller portions for easy pizza nights, to add to spaghetti sauce, and many other ideas. The kids actually like it when I use the sausage for tacos…weirdos! It happened accidentally once and they thought it was the best!

I cleaned out the fridge and freezer. Threw out the items that were expired or starting to look nasty. I came across this pizza crust that had exploded. The best by date was Feb 3, 2013 but I’ve never had that happen like that before. Bummer….but luckily, I had purchased two so it won’t affect tonight’s dinner.

I labeled some of the items I had cooked in bulk and put in freezer in January that I didn’t want to forget what it was! I really like to flat freeze in freezer bags instead of using containers but I’m all out of quart bags right now. We have spicy vegetarian chili, lentil loaf, black beans, vegetable broth, taco meat, and a spicy pepper mixture. All labeled now!

I also pulled out a banana bread that my mother-in-law gave us for the holidays that we knew we wouldn’t be able to use right away. I’m thawing that out and I know the kids will eat it right up, probably after school.

I really want to do some additional freezer cooking with the Fix, Freeze, Feast cook book. It has really good recommendations. I also have been using Jessica Fisher’s Not Your Mother’s Make-Ahead and Freeze Cookbook. We’ve had success with adapting the vegetarian chili. I made the cinnamon braid and the kids ate it but I don’t think it had enough cinnamon. It needed something extra…maybe I missed an ingredient again.

I know freezer cooking, bulk cooking, and slow cooking is going to be a must this spring! We have a upcoming crazy spring with High School Tennis and rec soccer, middle school track, baseball, and golf! Oh my, it’s going to be busy! I love being busy but it also means we slack on cooking at home. If I can get some meals in the freezer, we won’t have a reason to grab fast food on our way home. I’m sure many of you can relate!

Now, I’m off to finish up that mega laundry situation we have going on here!

Have a great Friday!

{ 0 comments }

Once a Month Cooking Experiment: Part 2 Cooking Day

by Briana Carter on September 22, 2010

If you are a Bargain Briana Facebook Fan, you may have been following along to my cooking day. I decided to take a stab at the Once a Month Mom September Menu all by myself. After this long day, I know why Tricia recommends finding a cooking partner!

I shopped.

Prepped the night before by cooking the meat….

Chopped the veggies…

Shopped my pantry and set out all my pantry items…

Followed Once a Month Mom’s detailed instructions. Well, I tried too anyway. I highly suggest crossing off the items as you go or you will get to the end and wonder why the instructions have you cook the penne pasta so soon before using it. I actually skipped around 4 recipes somehow and ended up doing them at the very end. It all worked out but had me really confused!

My work station was ready to go.

I started the morning off with the Apple Baked Oatmeal, which are very tasty! It was a quick and easy way to start off the day!

As you know, I don’t eat meat anymore but the rest of my family does. So this meant I had to make a few variations or leave the meat out to be added later.

Something new I’m trying is the Morningstar Crumbles. I’m kind of grossed out by the items that are suppose to resemble meat but aren’t meat but thought I would try these as a substitute for the ground beef/sausage in a few recipes.

Below is the Pizza Soup (meatless variety), which I froze in a few individual containers.

I set aside a few cups of the Down Home spaghetti sauce before I added the meat and meatballs.

The pizza croissant are going to be a huge hit! Though, I highly recommend reheating these in the oven and not the microwave. Otherwise, they are a little mushy from the oven.

The meatless variety I deleted the pepperoni and added spinach instead.

These are quick and easy to make and is a easy way to make use of all those Pillsbury refrigerated bread deals we find!

The Baked Pasta Eggplant is going to be a new favorite too! The meatless variety just omitted the sausage.

I now have a freezer full of meals!

I made all the meals plus a few extra (not pictured) except the California Sushi Rolls. I decided no one in the household would be eating them especially if they had crab meat. There are a few meals I’m concerned that the entire family might not like. However, it isn’t going to hurt them to try something new.

We started Sunday off with the Down Home Lasagna. My oldest son has some freakish aversion to red sauce so he wasn’t too hip on it but the two little ones were almost surprised themselves that they actually liked it. I didn’t make a meatless variety of the Down Home Lasagna. Though, if I did, I would have used Eggplant or spinach instead of the meat. This meant it actually made two meals for the family instead of one meal. One meal down, many more to go!

I didn’t track my hours but I would guess I spent 2 full days shopping, prepping, cooking, and cleaning. This is probably why a partner is recommended. Already I have the satisfaction of having meals in the freezer and discovered a few new favorite recipes already – my son loves the breakfast burritos! My husband did complain that most of the meals take too long to cook so we will have to still do some pre-planning of our meals.

I will let you know at the end of the month if it was worth it.

Stay tuned for more follow up!

{ 11 comments }

Once a Month Cooking Experiment: Part I Prep & Shopping

by Briana Carter on September 16, 2010

“What’s for dinner?” asks someone in my family every evening on our way home, which is usually after 5pm. Totally stressful coming home not knowing what we are going to have for dinner. Usually, it is what we call a “Free for All.” Whatever, you can find or make.

Since this isn’t the most healthy or economical situation, I’ve decided to make a change this month.

Have you ever heard of the Once a Month Mom? If you haven’t, it is a site by a friend of mine Tricia, who does these fabulous meal plans every month. I’ve raved about her before but I’ve never actually done a full once a month menu.

I’m finally doing it. I’m not a big fan of cooking as it just take too much time to prep, make, and clean up! I’m looking forward to basically just one day of cooking and the rest of the month enjoying the meals I cooked and sharing them with my family.

As promised, I’m going to share this experiment with you!

To start with, I’ve done batch cooking before. However, it has been me compiling the lists and is not organized in any way. Invariably, I would always be missing a couple of key ingredients. With the Once a Month Mom’s handy grocery list, I was able to check my pantry for items I already had and then create my grocery list to shop for the items I needed.

I had quite a few items already in my pantry and refrigerator, which was good news. However, I still needed quite a bit on the list including some expensive items like spices and meat.

(Items I already had stockpiled)

I decided to do this on Tuesday, which didn’t allow me much time to stockpile some of the list items at a the best prices. However, I decided in the end, I would be saving money and time so I went ahead and splurged on the remaining items. I spent $225 additional at the grocery store and much of that was fresh produce, spices, and a few items I purchased so I could make portions of each recipe meatless. I would estimate I had $50 in stockpile items already purchase for a total of around $275.

(This is all of the pantry items I need to complete my meals!)

Once a Month Mom (Tricia) held a Facebook discussion tonight for questions pertaining to the September Menu. As soon as I get this post done, I’m going to get chopping.

I’m really enjoying the step by step instructions and already have our meat in the crockpots cooking. Tricia has years of experience of once a month cooking and has to spend hours creating these menu plans and detailed instructions. I’m looking forward to using her information and get cracking!

Oh, Once a Month Mom highly recommends a cooking partner! Since, I decided to do this minute and Bryan claims I’m a loner, I didn’t get anyone to partner up with me. I do think I’m a bit crazy!

Stay tuned for updates on the actual cooking day, the meals, and follow up!