Bulk Cooking: Turkey Stock, Breakfasts & More

The last several days Fishmama & Money Saving Mom have been hosting a Freezer Cooking party. I didn't post my plans for this month's Freezer Cooking, because I was afraid that with trying to catch up on Reading the Bible in 90 Days I wouldn't get it done.

But, I had noticed a few problems in my pantry:

• a serious lack of quick & easy breakfast foods (I am sooo not a morning person - gotta do this ahead or its cold cereal & Pop-tarts for sure) 
• I had bought several pounds of meat that needed to be used quickly
• the turkey carcass in my freezer was taking up way too much space
• and a special request from my hubby for his favorite granola bars

So over the course of a few days I developed a plan for what I would make:

Turkey Stock
Shredded Beef
Mashed Sweet Potatoes
Spaghetti Sauce
Ground beef - cooked for future use
Waffles x2
Hot Chocolate Mix
Oatmeal Packs
Pancake Mix x4
Zucchini Muffins
Granola Bars
Cookies - maybe

I didn't get it all done today but was quite pleased with what did get accomplished - including some catch up on my Bible in 90 Days and some extra time with Hubby on his day off.

Here are my totals for the day:

• 6 ½ pints Turkey stock
• 2 lbs shredded beef fillinng - if you've never tried this recipe, do it this week. This recipe will change your life taste buds! Food Lion has chuck roast on sale $1.89/lb this week.
• 3 meals of spaghetti sauce with italian sausage ready to use
• 4 containers (2 cups each) of mashed sweet potatoes
• 4 bags of waffles (probably 5 meals worth)
• 12 Oatmeal packs (3 meals worth)
• 4 bags of dry pancake mix

We had some of the shredded beef for dinner - it's so good we had to force ourselves not to eat it all in one sitting! The oatmeal packs are great for mornings when everyone wakes up at different times. They are also versatile - additions like fruit, nuts or peanut butter can be added according to individual tastes.  The turkey stock is in the fridge letting the fat rise. Tomorrow morning I'll skim it, separate it into 2 Cup portions and freeze it.


I'm also planning to finish up the remainder of the list tomorrow:

• Cook the ground beef
• Peanut Butter Granola Bars
• Zucchini Muffins
• Hot Chocolate Mix - It's snowing here (again!) and we are completely out of mix so, I'm thinking this will be high on the priority list.

What are your favorite things to cook in bulk?

You can see what more people cooked on their Freezer Cooking Day at Money Saving Mom.

Making Ahead - Ground Beef & Improvising

I had a plan for today. I was going to make yogurt in the Crockpot, finish prepping some ground beef I'd bought on Friday and make a batch of jam from juice in my Dad's freezer.

Yogurt:
I started the day well. The kids were well occupied while I prepped ½ gallon of milk for yogurt (recipe here). The milk was heated and cooled and just waiting for me to mix in the yogurt and put it in the Crockpot. When...

Crash.

The bowl hit the floor and milk went everywhere!

Milk on the floor, milk on the cabinets, milk splattered all over the counters. Ugh. What a mess.

That spill put me an hour behind schedule.

After a planned trip for errands, including the grocery store (I added milk to the list), the library and lunch, the next thing on the schedule was to make the jam.

Blackberry Jam:
While cleaning at my Dad's last week I found two large bottles labeled "Blackberry for Jam". The two bottles together looked like enough to make a batch of jam. I brought it home and put it in the frig to thaw.

After our errands today I pulled out a bowl and my sieve and poured the first bottle in. I let that drain and then poured in the second bottle. But something was a bit off. The smell was a bit different. Not bad, but different Then I looked again, and discovered my dad had marked through the "Blackberry" label and written "Grape". Uh oh. I now had blackberry juice/pulp mixed with grape juice/pulp. Hmmm. What to do?

I checked the pectin label, and the Ball Blue Book and discovered that both the blackberry and grape called for the same ingredients except the fruit.

With that I decided to improvise. I had about 2/3 blackberry and 1/3 grape juice/pulp in the bowl to use. Everything else was the same as the recipe. I cooked and canned the jam. It should be a quite interesting combination. I haven't tasted it yet.

Who knows, maybe I've just discovered a new flavor of jam: Blackberry-Grape.

Ground Beef:
I found ground beef on sale Friday and bought 10 pounds with the intention of putting it into the freezer the same day. Unfortunately I'd forgotten an engagement that night and since we were going to Fort McHenry on Saturday for fee-free days I didn't have a chance to do anything with it until today. This morning when I checked the "Sell By" I knew I had to get it into the freezer today.

Here's what I did with my 10 pounds of ground beef:

4 lbs made into hamburgers (stored stacked in a bread bag!)
3 lbs cooked and frozen in 1 lb bags.
1 lb frozen as is - to be used for meatloaf at a later time
2 lbs made into meatballs - recipe here.

The meatballs were a new experience. I've never made meatballs before and I was looking for a good general recipe - one that could be adapted with sauces for Italian or other recipes. After searching several websites and several cookbooks I finally found one in "Make-A-Mix Cookery", a cookbook of my mother's that I recently re-discovered (You can find this book in my right side bar under "I Recommend"). They took longer than I anticipated; I think that's because my meatballs were smaller and I cooked them before freezing them.

It was quite a day but the end results were really good.


To see what other people are tackling visit Tackle It Tuesday.

Cooking Ahead

I found some whole chickens and some boneless/skinless chicken thighs on a markdown last night. So, today I've been working on a "Make Ahead" Day, getting some prepared ahead of time and others into the freezer.

Tomorrow I'll post the results.

Make Ahead Day - Results

I finished up this morning. I cut the Granola bars and cleaned up the last few dishes.

So here are the final results:

• 3 pints of yogurt
• 1 medium + 1 small container of granola bars
• 23 muffins
• 1 quart of hot chocolate
• 2 Cup container of grits (enough for a week of breakfasts)
• 1 1/2 container of garlic hummus
• 1 quart bag of coffee-ice cubes
• 1 small, really bad loaf of wheat bread

A few observations and notes from the day:

Yogurt: I need to work on my yogurt-making technique some more. I strained off 2 cups worth of whey before refrigerating it, but this morning my daughter complained that there were "chunks" in it.

Granola Bars: I'm still looking for a recipe for crunchy granola bars that don't crumble. Hubby loves these granola bars, but my son doesn't because they aren't very crunchy.

Hummus: Gotta work on this recipe too. It came too salty, and I didn't chop the garlic small enough.

Bread: Clearly I need work on this one. There were lots of issues. I don't keep "bread" flour, so I used all-purpose; that along with not letting it bake in the bread machine I think meant that it didn't have enough gluten, and therefore, didn't rise like it should have. Definitely more work to be done there.

On today's schedule is chopping up and freezing the red peppers.

For future "Make Ahead Days" I'll be making chicken stock and pancakes. I've almost got enough bones saved and frozen to make stock.

To see the saga of the whole day from beginning to end, go here.

Make Ahead Day - Part 2

Well, as I expected, the afternoon was not nearly as productive as the morning. Once my kiddos get home there's just too much else going on to be concentrating on cooking much. That's part of why I plan the more complicated things in the morning when I can have the kitchen to myself. Here's how the rest of the day went ...

2:30
My daughter decided she did not need a nap today, so I had a little "help" in making the grits (her favorite breakfast). We started on them at about 2:00 and by 2:30 they were done.

I then worked on the hummus while she played by herself for a while. This was a new recipe I found here via Tammy's Kitchen Tip Tuesday. I don't cook with beans at all, so this was really new for me. I guess it turned out okay. It tastes good to me, and will be a great quick lunch or snack. But I'm not sure the rest of my family would enjoy it. I'll have to work on my technique a bit.

A little after 3:00
I got the food processor and dishes washed up from the hummus and was ready to move on. Of course, this was when my little helper returned to the kitchen and played a great game of "Hide & Seek" in the cabinets, all the while telling me this amazing story - which I totally loved at the time and can't remember a word of now!

Noticing an unusually large amount of coffee left from this morning, I poured it into an ice-cube tray and popped it in the freezer. Those coffee-ice cubes will be used to cool my coffee in the morning or make a frappocino when the mood strikes.

I realized I had less than an hour before my son got home from school, so if I was going to use the bread machine (bought at a yard sale for $20.00), I had to figure out what to do.

I opted for a 1 lb. loaf of whole wheat bread. I figured this was pretty basic - I couldn't mess it up too much. However, I decided I wanted it to look a little more normal, so I set the machine to just do dough and, then I would bake it in the oven. So, I got all the ingredients together, dumped in the bread machine, set it and let it do it's thing.

4:00 PM
Then it was time to take my daughter to the bus stop to pick up my son. After we got back and I checked his backpack for homework, the machine beeped, I pulled the dough out, put it in a small bread pan and then set it in the oven.

Well, let me tell you... This was a flop. I made the tinniest, most dense loaf of whole wheat bread I've ever seen. I'm too embarrassed to even post a picture! I won't throw it out. I guess it'll be good for french toast, or if all else fails - croutons & bread crumbs. But, man. This was just not good. The number of things I could have done wrong is endless. I won't go into that now - that's a whole other post. I've got a lot to learn about making bread.

A this point I decided not to cut up the peppers for freezing - that will have to wait until tomorrow.

While it was cooking I bagged the muffins and got them into the freezer and put the granola bars into the refrigerator to cool some more.

5:15 PM
Time to start thinking about dinner. I'd planned leftovers from the night before, but needed to add one veggie. So, I heated up dinner, we ate, and hubby went off to his rehearsal.

6:45 PM
The yogurt is ready to come out of the crockpot - it looks really good on top. However, when I spooned down a bit it seemed too liquidy. So, I started straining it through cheese cloth in batches.

7:15 PM
the kids & I relaxed for a bit, then it was time for a quick 10 minute "toy pick up" and then off to bed by 8:00PM.

It's now 9:15. I'm still straining yogurt and I need to cut the granola bars, but all the dishes I can do are done and the kitchen isn't a total disaster!

The final results with the whole shooting match will be posted tomorrow morning.

To see the saga of the whole day from beginning to end, go here.

Make Ahead Day - Update

It's now 5:25.

I've made the grits, hummus, and "something in the bred machine".

However, as I was getting the bread into the oven my son got home from school. At that point it's time for snacks, homework, dinner and a little down time with the kiddos.

So, I'll have a more detailed update later (with pictures - I hope).

Please come back later tonight for the final results.
To see the saga of the whole day from beginning to end, go here.

Make Ahead Day - Part 1

Here's how Make Ahead Day goes for me...

The Night Before:

• Clean up all dishes
• declutter kitchen counters
• make sure the list is ready
• find all recipes that I plan to use (sometimes this means searching the web)

The Morning of:

• Wear comfortable shoes & clothes
  
• Have two timers ready; one that counts up is very helpful.
  
• Tie my long curly hair back in loose pony tail (hair in food? - very unappetizing!)
  
• Wear an apron (I'm a messy cook)

10:30 Progress report:
I had to wait till my daughter left for preschool about 9:30, then I did a quick clean up of a few breakfast dishes and gathered the ingredients for the yogurt. The milk went on the stove just before 10:00. It's now in the crock-pot, wrapped in a beach towel, incubating for 8 hours. Next up... Granola Bars for hubby.

11:10 report:
Granola bars in oven (My recipe to be posted here). Dishes washed up. Grabbed a quick snack. On to the Muffins!

11:45
Granola bars cooling; these will cool for several hours, then I'll put them in the frig, probably overnight, before cutting. I find that they stay together better when I do this. Whole Wheat Banana Chip Muffins are in the oven, dishes are washed for next batch of muffins. Must get last batch in oven and hot chocolate ready before daughter gets home at 12:45!

12:10
Banana Chip Muffins cooling, Blueberry Muffins in oven. Washing dishes.

12:40 - Time for a Break!
The Blueberry muffins are out of the oven and cooling And the Hot Chocolate is ready for when my daughter gets home. Now it's time for a real break. The baking part of the day is done, so I've turned off the oven. I've washed a "bazillion" dishes and my hands feel like the Sahara. My daughter will be home from preschool in about 5 minutes. This is a good time to sit down, have some lunch and visit with her for a bit. I'll pick back up on the rest of the list after she goes down for a nap at 2:00PM

Stay tuned for more later in the day.
To see the saga of the whole day from beginning to end, go here.

Make Ahead Day - The Plan

I'd been planning a "Make Ahead" Day for Wednesday anyway when MoneySavingMom stole my thunder posted about her bi-weekly Baking Day today. So, I decided I'd go ahead and post my plan and then I'll post some pictures and blog about it tomorrow as the day continues. I'm doing several things in advance so that we have them for quick breakfasts and snacks as well as making meal preparation easier. I tend to do Make Ahead breakfast things rather than dinner things because I am really NOT a morning person and don't want to think that much in the morning. Heating it up in the toaster or microwave is about all I want to do.

Anyway, here's the plan:

• Yogurt (using this recipe)
• Granola Bars
• Banana Chip Muffins
• Blueberry Muffins
• 1 pot hot chocolate (ready for when my daughter gets home from preschool)
  
• 1 batch grits
  
• Garlic Hummus
• Freezing red peppers (found on a great sale this week)
• Bread in the bread machine.

To see the saga of the whole day from beginning to end, go here.