The Importance of Freezing Food

Last week was a ridiculous week at work. I didn't arrive home until at least 9pm every night, which is far too late to start cooking anything (a dilemma I think many of you also face). When I get home that late from work, all I want to do is enter the kitchen and eat ASAP. I'm usually starving for food, but too tired to actually cook anything. There are seemingly few options for such a speedy and satisfying meal, so late at night:

1. Scrambled eggs with toast...breakfast for dinner? Sure, it's delicious and takes fewer than 10 minutes to whip up, but it's not something I want to eat multiple nights in a row.

2. PB & J - almond butter, peanut butter, sunflower seed butter, honey, bananas, jam...yes, the combinations seems endless. However, the general pb & j concept is something I can only stomach once for dinner, since I usually also have it at least once for lunch during the week as well.

3. Take-out...It’s super easy to pick something up on the way home. In fact, when you get home, you don't even need to enter your kitchen; you can go straight to the dining room and chow down. But eating out more than once a week can rack up a hefty bill, and as a young professional, I'd rather save my dollars for a nice dinner out (that I comfortably savor), instead of a dinner brought in (that I ferociously inhale).

4. Frozen meals...store-bought frozen meals are typically loaded with added salt, fat, and other unidentifiable ingredients. However, freezing your own food is another story...

Take a look in your freezer. What’s in there right now? How much space is available? You probably don’t look in there all that often, unless you need to make ice cubes or store that pint of ice cream you “shouldn’t have bought”. For some reason, most people completely overlook their freezer space. In fact, you might even wish your freezer was gone, and instead you just had more space in your fridge. Your poor freezer...so unloved.

Well my friends, it's time to show your freezer some lovin'. Why? Because your freezer is an untapped resource that has the potential to make your life oh-so-much easier. Here’s what you need to do. Next time you cook a meal, don’t try to scale back the amount you’re making. For instance, if a recipe says “serves 6-8” you might usually scale back the recipe so that it only makes two or three servings (one lunch, two dinners!); especially if you’re only cooking for one person (yourself).  Don’t do this. Make the full recipe. Yes, make enough for 6-8 servings. Once you’ve cooked the recipe, divide about half (or more) of what you’ve made into individual size containers (I use 1 or 2 cup Tupperware containers). Stick the containers in the freezer and PRESTO! you just made homemade frozen dinners. I do this with soups, pastas (like a big batch of mac ‘n cheese), casseroles, homemade vegetable broth, even tomato sauces and pesto. And I don’t just use these meals for dinner. On days when I’m too lazy to make lunch, rather than waste $8 on a sub-par sandwich from the local café, I reach into my freezer before I leave for work and TA-DA! my homemade frozen lunch is there. Who needs lean cuisine or Amy’s frozen meals anymore? Not I! And if you heed my advice – not you!

A helpful hint: put a piece of tape on each container. On the tape, use a sharpie to write down the date that you put the container into the freezer. This way, if something gets shoved to the back of the freezer and doesn’t pop up for who knows how long, you’ll know when you froze the darn container and therefore, whether or not the food is still okay to eat. And using tape means, once you've eaten the food in the container, you can rip off the tape and start fresh!

So, go to a supermarket, Target, or even the dollar store, and buy yourself a bunch of individual size containers. Next Sunday night, make a big batch of chili. Freeze half of it. Then, watch how your world gets turned upside down with the new availability of food (real food, not just ice cream) in your freezer. On nights when cooking just isn’t an option, you’ll reach inside your freezer; in 5-10 minutes you’ll enjoy a delectably satisfying meal. You’ll realize the importance of freezing food; and you’ll be grateful you read this post :)