Once upon a time I would make a weekly menu for the family and this is how I planned my grocery shopping. Those were the best days because we knew exactly what we were having each day no questions ask. Somehow I have fallen by the wayside but I will get back on track soon. For the last few days, I have been waiting until the afternoon and asking myself, “what are we going to eat tonight?” I start looking through the hundreds of cookbooks and magazines that I have and nothing is really popping out at me. Then I look on the internet for quick meals, and different recipes and nothing there is really popping out. I know that I have so many under 30 minute meals but I will tell you from start to finish all of them are OVER 30 minutes. Most of the times if I do see a recipe that I want to make, there are so many ingredients involved and most of them I do not have on hand and.... another trip to the grocery store.
Tired of going through the same situation every day, today I did a little “freezer cooking.” In the February edition of Martha Stewart’s Living magazine she has a great recipe for a Ground-Meat Mix. I took the base of the recipe added some Italian spices and parmesan reggiano cheese and made Italian meatballs. I bought a cute little meat baller scoop years ago (but I added the same meat baller scoop that I have to my Amazon widget below just in case you are looking for one) so I had 62 cute meatballs.
I put them on a baking tray in a big Ziploc bag so that they would not lose shape and once frozen, I took them off of the baking sheet and into the bag. When I can’t think of what to have for dinner, I can easily make spaghetti with meatballs or use them as an appetizer .
The next recipe, I have been making for about a year on a regular basis because it is that good. It is another Martha Stewart recipe. It is Baked Penne with Chicken and Sun-Dried Tomatoes. This recipe makes enough for two batches. Now, Martha Stewart states that you can cook one now and save the other for later. The first one that I make never tastes as good as the one that I freeze. I think that it is because the flavors have time to “marry” when you freeze them as opposed to when you first make the dish. I use Martha’s recipe as a base but I always have to go a step further. For example, I use more chicken breast, and instead of using just salt and pepper, I also use Italian seasonings which really wakes the chicken up. I also use a provolone/mozzarella mix because while staying in Italy the provolone by itself was very pungent to me.
This dish is perfect with a salad and garlic bread. I have popped this dish when we had friends over and they think that I have been in the kitchen for hours. Here is the finished product once it goes into the freezer:
I wish that I could have made more “freezer meals” but my freezer is only so big but this is a good start for those days when I just can’t figure out…what our family will eat.
No comments:
Post a Comment