As a home-schooling mom of five children, I find a large portion of my day in the kitchen, especially since we eat wheat-free foods because of allergies in the family.  I make breakfast, lunch, dinner, and the occasional dessert.  It can be exhausting and frustrating at times.  If I am not cooking, it seems then I must be doing dishes or wiping down the counters, etc.  My husband may complain at times that he never gets a day off, but we all know that we never go a day without eating something.  It is a job that requires daily planning.

After reading Heart of Wisdom by Robin Sampson, I made many goals.  One of which was to try to cut down on my time in the kitchen.  One of her suggestions is freezer cooking.  You prepare many meals at one time and freeze them to serve at a later date.  This was not an entirely foreign idea as I used to do something similar when I was expecting a child.  I wanted to make sure that we had plenty of home-cooked meals made and waiting to be heated up in the oven.  It made that time especially enjoyable to me in that I did not have to worry about dinner.

However since being on a wheat-free diet, I assumed erroneously that I would not be able to find recipes in which to freeze.  My old standby dinners had cream of something soup in it which contains either wheat, milk, or both.  I decided to thumb through a cookbook of mine that was stored above the vent hood in my kitchen.  You can tell by its location that I had never really used it before.  Big mistake on my part because it is fantastic.  It is called Once-A-Month Cooking by Mimi Wilson and Mary Beth Lagerborg.  I was immediately impressed by the number of recipes that were already wheat-free as well as even more that could easily be converted.

So, I sat down and read the book.  I marked all the recipes that we could eat and began choosing enough recipes for a two week time period.  I created a menu complete with sides, lunch, and breakfast.  Then I compiled a list of foods I needed to purchase.  It was time for my bi-weekly grocery store trip; therefore, the list was relatively long.  I spent $280.00 at the store.  I thought I did a great job considering that I was shopping for 7 people for two weeks and many products were gluten-free items which are usually more expensive.

The next day I cooked after our schooling was finished.  Even though I spent hours in the kitchen, I had a great time with my daughter.  She helped on recipes that intrigued her.  The rest I did solo; however, Jake did help me chop celery, onion, and bell peppers.  The following is the list of recipes we cooked:

Marinated Flank Steak,
Meatloaf,
Hamburger Tomato Stew,
Savory Beef,
Chinese Chicken Morsels,
Chicken Spaghetti,
French Stuffed Potatoes,
Pork Shoulder Roast (makes 2 different meals),
Teriyaki Chicken,
Sweet and Sour Chicken,
Red Chicken Enchiladas,
Ham Dinner Slices, and
Teriyaki Burgers.

The kitchen was a disaster by the end of the day.  It seemed that every dish and pot was dirty.  On the other hand, I saved time and a mess by chopping up all the vegetables I needed at one time.  I saved money by being able to buy extra large cans of crushed tomatoes or green beans instead of several smaller cans.  The extras do not have to be saved in the refrigerator either.  It was all used in the cooking and preparation phase.

With a permanent marker, I wrote the date, name of the dish, and reheating instructions on the freezing container.  Most of my dishes went into plastic gallon freezer bags, which saved a lot of space in the freezer.  After the food cooled off, I filled the bags, sealed them, and laid them horizontally.  The food leveled out and I froze them.  Some dishes like the Red Chicken Enchiladas had to be frozen in a 15″ x 10″ dish.

Now I just have to follow my meal plan and make a side of rice, potato, salad, or vegetable when I need them.  I am looking forward to these next two weeks.  I hope this is the solution for which I was looking.  By the way, I am happy to report that the Sweet and Sour Chicken and Teriyaki Burgers were both delicious.  So far I am a fan of freezer cooking and I highly recommend that you try it, too.

Tags: Food Allergies, freezer cooking, gluten-free, Heart of Wisdom, Once a Month Cooking, Robin Sampson, wheat-free

This entry was posted on Monday, September 14th, 2009 at 6:14 am and is filed under Food Allergies, Homeschooling, Homesteading. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.