Load the freezer with some basic meal components to make recipes quicker, easier, and cheaper to assemble. With cooked chicken, browned ground meat, meatballs, and a homemade cream of celery soup, you can stock your freezer for all kinds of delicious meals.
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While doubling dinner can be an easy way to fill the freezer, sometimes stocking the freezer on purpose with meal components can be highly satisfying. Rolling into fall, I love to have easy proteins and sauces on hand to mix and match for soups and casseroles.
My favorite recipes to batch and freeze include:
- Perfectly Poached Chicken to tuck into soups, salads, sandwiches, and casseroles
- Make-Ahead & Freeze Seasoned Ground Beef that’s perfectly at home in pasta sauce, tacos, and myriad casseroles and chilis.
- Versatile Meat Mixture that can be made into meatballs and meatloaves.
- Homemade Cream of Celery Soup that is an excellent soup starter or casserole component. (5-Minute Easy Gravy Recipe as well as White Sauce or Bechamel are close runners up.)
To make it easier for both you and me to prep these items for the freezer, I put together this quick little power hour freezer meal prep plan.
Decide how many batches of each that you’d like (keeping in mind that some of the recipes already make a big batch), adjust the grocery list, and get shopping.
Grocery List
Remember you can use ground turkey, chicken, pork, or lamb instead of the beef, depending on the price and availability as well as your preferences.
Prep Plan
Here’s the prep order I recommend so that you can maximize your minutes:
- Chop the onions and celery.
- Prep the breadcrumbs if you’re making homemade.
- Get the chicken started in the instant pot right away.
- Combine the meat mixture and form your meatballs and meatloaves accordingly. Freeze the meatloaf unbaked, but slide a pan of meatballs into the oven to bake.
- While the chicken cooks and the meatballs bake, start the cream of celery soup in a pot on the stove. This may take awhile to thicken depending on how big a batch you make.
- Once you’ve got the soup on low, brown the beef in a large skillet.
As each item completes cooking, divide into freezer-safe containers and chill completely in the fridge. Once thoroughly chilled, label and freeze.
Be sure to keep track of what you’ve got with a freezer inventory!
Recipes I’d Use These Components In
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