My Freezer Cooking Day

I've been wanting to have a Freezer Cooking Day for quite some time, and today was the big day!  One of my favorite bloggers is doing a series this month on freezer cooking, and I'm going out of town this weekend for a baby shower, so those two things combined were enough motivation to start this endeavor.

The last time I did freezer cooking on a regular basis was when I was pregnant with my daughter, the one who just celebrated her third birthday last weekend.  Yes, it's been that long.  There were many things I had forgotten about freezer cooking, such as-

• how messy it is
• how much I can get done in a short time
• how much preparation it takes when shopping
• how nice it is to have meals ready to go in the freezer.

So, this morning, I took my son to school, and then headed to Aldi with my daughter.  After our shopping was done, we headed home, put away the groceries, and got started. 

First up- onesies.  

Onesies?  

Yes, onesies.

You see, I'm helping out with a baby shower this weekend. It's gonna be a super-fun evening on Friday night and I am so excited!  

I'll share more details of my dyeing onesies experience next week, but for now, just know that there was a pot of onesies soaking up yellow dye throughout my freezer cooking session today.  The finished product will hopefully be some adorable Freezer Paper Stenciled Onesies, but you'll have to check back in next week for the update on that project.

After the onesies were started, I tackled the Tomato Soup.  I adapt the recipe by omitting the butter, and using less whipping cream to make it a little healthier.  I also bought this amazing kitchen gadget a few months ago, and it has revolutionized the way I cook soup.  

You see, my son loves this tomato soup.  He asks for it at least twice a week.  It's a great way to sneak in some veggies, so I usually oblige.  But the entire process of transferring it to a food processor to puree it and transferring it back to the pot was way too messy for me.  That's when my new kitchen gadget saved the day- an immersion blender.  It makes this soup "soup-er" simple- and I'm super excited about that.  :)

As the soup was simmering, I started the Freezer Friendly Baked Oatmeal.  I've made this before, and it's always a hit with our family.  I add raisins and chopped apples, and of course use my homemade vanilla

which makes it absolutely delicious!  I made three batches of it- two to freeze and one to cook tomorrow morning!  

It was during this part of my Freezer Cooking Day that things started going south.  I went to get the cinnamon off of my magnetic spice tin on the side of my fridge, and the lid came off.  Suddenly, cinnamon went all down the side of the fridge, on the trash can {it's a shame it couldn't all just land in the trash, but that would be way too simple!}, and all over the floor.  I caught it in time to salvage enough cinnamon for the oatmeal, but was bummed about the mess.  

However, knowing that things were just going to get messier and messier the more I cooked, I decided to let the cinnamon sit on the floor/fridge until I was ready for clean-up.  And it really didn't smell that bad in the kitchen.  

Then, I went to the kitchen sink to transfer the tomato soup to a ziploc bag.  I guess the curse of the cinnamon spill was following me to the sink because about one-third of the soup went out of the bag and into the sink.  I wanted to call it quits, I really did, but just like the cinnamon sat on the floor, the tomato soup sat in the sink until clean-up time.

I had been itching to try this idea I found on Pinterest, and although I didn't follow it exactly, I still really like the idea of having something simmering on the stove all day.  However, Aldi didn't have lemons this morning, so I just added some lemon juice which I'm sure doesn't smell as great.  I think it's nice to have this aroma especially while freezer cooking to help absorb and offset the many smells that come from the kitchen.  

So after the triple batch of Baked Oatmeal was done, I started the rice for the Chicken Broccoli Rice Casserole.  I planned to make more of these, but didn't realize I was so low on chicken breasts, so I just made one casserole, which will be our dinner tonight.  It already looks amazing, though, so I'm sure we'll be making it again soon.  I cooked the chicken in the oven and then shredded it in my mixer, then steamed the broccoli, then added canned soups and mixed everything together.  

Finally, I chopped an onion and some garlic and browned 2 lbs of ground beef.  Once brown, I divided it in half and added a jar of spaghetti sauce to each.  All frozen and ready to be made into spaghetti or lasagna now!  

Clean-up wasn't all that bad- I am so grateful for a dishwasher!  And the items that couldn't be put in the dishwasher were fairly easy to hand wash.  So for about two hours of hard-core work in the kitchen, I now have three batches of baked oatmeal, two batches of spaghetti sauce, one tomato soup and one chicken/broccoli/brown rice casserole.  Not too bad.

After putting all of this in the freezer or refrigerator (for the items that will be cooked tonight and tomorrow), I had a lady from Craigslist come by to buy my old bar stools, and then headed to pick up my son from school. 

But, I just remembered one thing.  I never brushed my teeth this morning.  

How I made it all day without realizing that is unbeknownst to me.  Obviously, I was so focused on the freezer cooking tasks that I forgot such a simple part of my morning routine.  

My apologizes to my son's teachers, the lady from Craigslist, the people at the grocery store, and my daughter.  I'll try to remember to start my next Freezer Cooking Day with proper oral hygiene.  

And the onesies?  They're bright yellow and ready to be rinsed and thrown in the wash.