Monday, October 3, 2011

Make-ahead meal mania

I've been going into a semi-irrational hyper-nesting mode the last couple weeks as my due date approaches on October 26. 

Phase 1: buy lots and lots of tupperware.

Phase 2: make a shitload of freezer-friendly meals.
So far, I've made a copycat Olive Garden Zuppa Toscana soup with sausage, potatoes and kale; a beef stew with tomatoes, carrots and fennel similar to this recipe; and a slow-cooker 6-layer lasagna (despite the sound advice that I shouldn't eat gaseous, heavy foods that would be passed onto Baby during nursing). Next weekend I plan to make packets of seasoned fish filets (to be left uncooked but ready to rock 'n' roll straight from freezer to oven) and perhaps a copycat Chicken Kitchen Chop-Chop?

Phase 3: Find room for it all in our freezer. 
Somehow my husband, the organizational genius, has managed to figure out what I couldn't: how to reconfigure an already-stuffed freezer to accommodate for all my cookin projects. I don't know how it was even possible, but he did it.

{ Olive Garden Zuppa Toscana Soup }
Soup-1
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{ Slow cooker vegetable lasagna }
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Here's what I find tough about make-ahead meals. In theory, it's great to be able to pull a portioned size out of the freezer and reheat. In practice, I always want to eat it fresh! Any suggestions for combatting this problem? 

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