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This thread idea came to me when I was reading the one about store bought sandwiches. I don't like throwing food away but also don't like eating the same thing day after day! Some products you just can't freeze and some are more economical to buy already fixed when you look at the waste. I'm very thankful that I'm not feeding a large family in today's economy but curious to know what our empy nesters, singles, couples and other small families are doing. Hope to hear a lot of responses!
Depending on what it is, I either scale down the recipe or I freeze some: If I am making something like soup or a sause I will freeze 1/2 of what I make, if it is a cassarole, I scale down the recipe as much as possible. If it is something like a whole chicken, I dook, devide into portions are freeze some. or I use for a few meals, but I adjust accordingly. Maybe we will have stewed chicken one night, 2 or 3 nights later, a chicken cassarole and maybe chicken salad after or make soup and stock out of the remaining protion. I really don't have much trouble adjusting. Like you, Just yesterday, I made potato salad, I used only 1 potato, 2 eggs, 1 green onion, and so one. It worked fine. The other night I had chicken thighs, I had way too many so used the rest to make egg rolls.
Most of the time there is only my wife and I. When we go to the grocery store, we buy for the week but we buy in small amounts. That said, we "down size" the recipes to fit out needs and very rarely do we have leftovers. By doing this we have very good meals at the lowest possible price and very little waste.
I make the recipes according to instructions, which is usually for 4-6. Most of the time, DH and I eat half and then I freeze the other half and have it a few weeks later. This works out great, because I don't want to have a lot of preparation time on week nights.
I just made the chicken spaghetti casserole from the Pioneer Woman show, and we'll really enjoy just being able to nuke it next week.
My biggest problem in cooking for two is with things like fresh fruit and veggies. Right now I have a half a cantaloupe, a head of broccoli and a head of cauliflower that I did not use quickly enough and I think I might need to pitch them. I hate that.
I do rotations... I like cooking enough for two meals, because it cuts the overall work required. But I usually don't want the same thing for dinner two nights in a row. And with a good cold refrigerator you can safely keep cooked food in the fridge for 4 days without freezing, so I do something like this...
Day 1: cook 2 dinners, eat one and refrigerate the other
Day 2: cook 2 dinners, eat one and refrigerate the other
Day 3: reheat Day 1 dinner
Day 4: cook 2 dinners, eat one and refrigerate the other
Day 5: reheat Day 2 dinner
Day 6: cook 2 dinners, eat one and refrigerate the other
Day 7: reheat Day 4 dinner
and so on. I mix it up a bit, but that's the general idea. If I know I'm not going to eat a leftover right away I'll freeze it, but I don't freeze much.
In other words, I always have a couple of dinners on hand I can reheat, which gives me a lot of flexibility. And it means I'm only cooking about half the time, but enjoying my cooking all the time.
Oh, and to keep it all straight I do what professional kitchens do... I have freezer tape (or masking tape) and a sharpie pen in the kitchen and I write a label for everything, including what it is and the day and date I made it. Don't trust your memory, it's easy to get confused, especially about items in a full freezer.
I still cook the regular recipe amounts - no matter how much it is, DH and I will polish it off, even if it takes us a couple of days. In the words of my oldest daughter (who I spent last weekend with cooking huge meals and dirtying her kitchen), "Mother you eat like a long shoreman, and Daddy eats like a truck driver".
We have so much in our freezer we are out of containers. So, my plan, starting tomorrow: I am taking 2 containers a day out and planning my nightly meal around whatever is in the containers. Most of them are marked, a few are not. It is great saving and freezing, but it isn't so great when you end up with 20 or so containers just sitting there.
About once a month we go to Sam's. I buy granola bars, coffee, canned soups and baked beans, crackers, etc. My husband loves fruit and gets big apples in the bag, kiwi, oranges, etc. enough to fill up the refrigerator. He would like to get more but has to limit because of space. He buys strawberries and bananas in our local grocery store.
Then comes the freezer foods. I buy chicken breasts that will take about 30 minutes to bake from frozen to ready-to-eat. We also like chicken nuggets for really fast meals. Breaded Flounder to bake and sometimes Tilapia to steam. I like frozen vegetables baked in the oven too, so I buy the vegetable medley and I also bake Asian stir-fry instead of using the wok. We also buy sweet potatoes to bake in the microwave, corn on the cob can be fixed in many different ways and Irish potatoes can be baked or steamed. I keep frozen green beans in the freezer and just cook what we will eat in one meal.
We can take out individual portions from all the freezer foods. For instance a meal might consist of one flounder fillet for me and two for him. I make slaw from 1/2 head of cabbage and instead of corn bread I take 9 hushpuppies out of the frozen hushpuppy package from our local grocery store and bake them with the fillets. I eat four hushpuppies and he eats five. We are supposed to limit fat, so there are no fried foods. At another time my husband might just want one fish fillet in a hoagie roll with sliced tomatoes on top and I might prepare another meat choice for me in the same oven or bake vegetables for me. Everything from the freezer usually takes 400 degrees for 30 minutes. But the freezer and taking out a little at a time is the secret.
I keep lettuce wedges prepared in the refrigerator and we add our individual choices to it to make a salad. I cut the lettuce head in four pieces so one lettuce from our local store lasts through two days for us. We have about one salad per day. I only shred two big carrots and 2 T. of raisins with Raspberry dressing for mine. My husband prepares his own and puts everything in it but the kitchen sink. One day I am going over to the sink and it will not be there.
I like things like casseroles, but they just seem to ruin in the freezer because my husband does not like casseroles, so I bake them when we go to pot lucks and eat my own food. I have a very small slow cooker that I make small portioned mixtures in just for me or enough beans either green or baked for the two of us.
We buy tomatoes at Sam's and cucumbers at the local store because cucumbers spoil very quickly. We buy one at a time.
We don't eat a lot of piggy or cow. My husband gets gout. Every once in a while I will buy a pound of 93% ground beef and make a hamburger or use in spaghetti sauce. We usually use a pound of ground turkey breast in spaghetti though.
I also freeze hoagie rolls in zip-lock sandwich bags because the package is too big for us. I sometimes buy a hoagie meat mixture of ham and turkey that has a wax paper in between the portions and freeze taking one section of sandwich meat out to thaw at a time.
About once a month we go to Sam's. I buy granola bars, coffee, canned soups and baked beans, crackers, etc. My husband loves fruit and gets big apples in the bag, kiwi, oranges, etc. enough to fill up the refrigerator. He would like to get more but has to limit because of space. He buys strawberries and bananas in our local grocery store.
Then comes the freezer foods. I buy chicken breasts that will take about 30 minutes to bake from frozen to ready-to-eat. We also like chicken nuggets for really fast meals. Breaded Flounder to bake and sometimes Tilapia to steam. I like frozen vegetables baked in the oven too, so I buy the vegetable medley and I also bake Asian stir-fry instead of using the wok. We also buy sweet potatoes to bake in the microwave, corn on the cob can be fixed in many different ways and Irish potatoes can be baked or steamed. I keep frozen green beans in the freezer and just cook what we will eat in one meal.
We can take out individual portions from all the freezer foods. For instance a meal might consist of one flounder fillet for me and two for him. I make slaw from 1/2 head of cabbage and instead of corn bread I take 9 hushpuppies out of the frozen hushpuppy package from our local grocery store and bake them with the fillets. I eat four hushpuppies and he eats five. We are supposed to limit fat, so there are no fried foods. At another time my husband might just want one fish fillet in a hoagie roll with sliced tomatoes on top and I might prepare another meat choice for me in the same oven or bake vegetables for me. Everything from the freezer usually takes 400 degrees for 30 minutes. But the freezer and taking out a little at a time is the secret.
I keep lettuce wedges prepared in the refrigerator and we add our individual choices to it to make a salad. I cut the lettuce head in four pieces so one lettuce from our local store lasts through two days for us. We have about one salad per day. I only shred two big carrots and 2 T. of raisins with Raspberry dressing for mine. My husband prepares his own and puts everything in it but the kitchen sink. One day I am going over to the sink and it will not be there.
I like things like casseroles, but they just seem to ruin in the freezer because my husband does not like casseroles, so I bake them when we go to pot lucks and eat my own food. I have a very small slow cooker that I make small portioned mixtures in just for me or enough beans either green or baked for the two of us.
We buy tomatoes at Sam's and cucumbers at the local store because cucumbers spoil very quickly. We buy one at a time.
We don't eat a lot of piggy or cow. My husband gets gout. Every once in a while I will buy a pound of 93% ground beef and make a hamburger or use in spaghetti sauce. We usually use a pound of ground turkey breast in spaghetti though.
I also freeze hoagie rolls in zip-lock sandwich bags because the package is too big for us. I sometimes buy a hoagie meat mixture of ham and turkey that has a wax paper in between the portions and freeze taking one section of sandwich meat out to thaw at a time.
Just a hint from an old neighbor of mine< if you are going to put bread into individual bags and freeze, stick a paper towel in the bag, it will absorb any water that gets into the bag and keep the rolls or bread completely fresh..
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