Bulk Cooking Club

[Mrs. Awesome_Pants]

Since we're already forecasting snow for this week (can you believe it's not uncommon here?), I've been working on soups to have ready ahead of time.  We recently froze the leftovers of my mom's ground beef soup and it was great to have on hand.

It's a fairly simple recipe, very easy and filling.  We make it in the crock pot, but it can be done in a stock or soup pot on the stove.

Canned tomato sauce + water (or 1 part water, 1 part beef stock) + vegetables + 1 pound of ground beef browned and drained.

I don't have exact measurements; basically we just add tomato sauce and water together until it fills the crock pot about 2/3 of the way, then add veggies and cook on high.

We season the meat the same way we do meatloaf -- oregano, pepper, garlic, and sometimes dried onion.  If you add seasonings while cooking the meat, don't put it in the crock pot until about an hour before you plan to eat, since it's easy to overcook dried herbs.

I was going to take a pic, but it got eaten up too quickly ;-)  Next on the list is trying dry soup mixes that we can add to water/stock quick and easy.

[LadybugsAndBumblebees]

DH bought me a crock pot!  I guess he got over his fears of a fire. . I cant wait to use it!

[TroubleT]

You have one yummy dinner simmering on a Sunday afternoon and the smell alone will banish all of his fears Mrs B!

I'm making pot roast a la crock pot tomorrow. YUM!

[Mrs. Awesome_Pants]

Crock pots are definitely among my top ten kitchen gadgets   You pretty much do anything with them!

[zippecar]

  I haven't been keeping up like I should, but we are still working on eating from home and getting more than one meal out of any cooking projects we tackle. Sunday I took a leftover chunk of roast beef and the gravy I had made to go with it last weekend, thinned out the gravy with a little water and an marvelous product called "Better than Boullion" sliced up the rest of the roast beef and dropped it in the gravy to cook/reheat for a couple of hours. I threw in a handful of mushrooms from the freezer and put together some instant mashed potatoes to have with it. We got Sunday dinner out of it, and 3 work lunches. (one of which I had for breakfast this morning  )

[Antidigger]

Today I've been crumbling under the pressure! I've made a block of butter's worth of crumble topping, which will go in the freezer for when I have lots of fruit that has to be used immediately. I also made some pots of stewed apple slices for when I've got no fresh fruit to use up. I have also been drying apple rings as if there were no tomorrow: the big apples all fell of the trees in the June gales, but the little ones have done really well.

[batgirl]

I went to a restaurant last night and had amazing quinoa stuffed peppers. I wonder how well that would freeze if I can find a recipe?

[TroubleT]

I'm betting quinoa would act like rice when refrigerated or frozen but I'm just guessing. I'd be interested in finding out too.

[lesakay67]

I do this to some extent. I cook extra taco meat and freeze leftovers, then I can throw that in the crockpot with some kidney or black beans, corn, sometimes a pack of ranch dip or dressing mix. The last time I used some leftover rice, leftover stewed tomatoes, corn I had in the freezer from my garden, black beans and some other leftover veggies I had. It was a hit even with my picky daughter. I always have leftover roast which goes into crockpot with leftover veggies for stew. Mom freezes the bread she has, either stale or end pieces for filler for meatloaf, stuffing mix, whatever. I cook double batches of spaghetti sauce and freeze then use it with bow tie pasta layer with the meat sauce and mozzarella for a quick baked dish. I cook a big pot of soup beans after I bake a ham and put them in dishes (sometimes plastic coffee cans with a layer of plastic on top then the lid) in freezer, throw in crock pot with just a little water on low.

[MareMare]

How is everyone doing? I have been super crazy for the last several weeks, so I've not planned out any specific bulk cooking. However, my mom did get a big package of hamburger from Costco the other day. So I made~

~Sliders for lunch for 4 people one day
~2 meatloaves for the freezer ( 1 lb each) We usually make meat loaf in a ring with a hole in the center so it will cook faster. So I liked two metal cake pans with plastic wrap, put my meat loaf mixture in, formed my hole in the middle, and wrapped it in plastic. Threw them in the freezer, when frozen I moved the plastic wrapped discs to ziplock bags and got my cake pans back.
~Tonight I just made and baked 3 lbs of meatballs After eating some and leaving some out for dinner tomorrow I will freeze the rest. I followed the recipe pretty closely (for me) but was low on dry Lipton onion soup (we buy it in bulk) so added in half a diced onion, 4 crushed garlic cloves, a good squirt of both mustard and ketchup, a heavy dose of Worcestershire, and a bunch of black pepper.
~And I still had another pound at least that I just froze raw for a future meal.