Ideas for batch cooking

[crazymuseummumtobe]

I finish work today!! (and working hard already, as you can tell...) Obviously got Christmas to deal with first, but come the 27th/28th or so, and I've then hopefully got a month or so to myself until baby comes - due on 23rd Jan.

What would your go-to recipes be for batch cooking? It needs to be stuff that I can freeze flat (i.e. in snap bags) as the freezer in our rental property is ridiculously tiny - three small drawers. I'm thinking:

• basic mince base (can be turned into chilli or bolognaise or shepherd's pie)
• basic tomato sauce (for pasta)
• big batch of pea and ham soup (my fave)
• a slow-cooked pork joint, to turn into pulled pork (have with rice and veg, add beans and put in enchilladas)

Any other ideas?

Thank you!

I filled our freezer with batch cooked meals before our baby was born and nearly 8 weeks on we are just finishing them, they've been a godsend! Ignore me if you're an experienced mum already but you may be surprised in the early days and weeks how little time and energy you have to even transform a mince mix into anything. I made entire meals and on days where baby wouldn't be put down all I had to do was chuck them in the oven. I get that space in your freezer is at a premium but could you you get some foil trays to do some full meals? Lasagne and chicken pie were particular hits of the meals I made. Packed full of veg to make up for the diet of 'whatever carby snack I can grab and shove in my mouth without putting baby down' for the rest of the day.

If you can only manage bags then I'd still try to minimise the additional preparation you will need to do. So rather than a generic mince base, make a shepherds pie mix which you can heat up and serve with microwave mash. Or a bag of chilli you can serve straight off with wraps or rice. I love cooking but If I'd have had to faff around making mince into shepherds pie when DD was a newborn I'd probably just have ordered a takeaway

Curry’s freeze well if you like them.
I have a friend who part boiled potatoes, Carrots and parsnips,so she could just put them straight into oven for a roast.
Braised steak I did too.

I'd agree, minimise the amount of rework required when you get the things out of the freezer - so freeze Bolognese /chilli/ shepherd's pie

Frozen mash separately. Buy in microwave pouches of rice/rice+ grains

Lentil soup/stew also good

Ooh watching for ideas here also

Think I will get some foil trays as mentioned above also so instant ready meal type things we can just add a salad to.

Lasagne, lentil soup, beef goulash.

Cous cous to go with curry instead of rice - quick & easy you can boil a kettle. Pop pitta bread in the freezer and pop them in the toaster to eat with the curry.

I'd just stick with chilli con carne as opposed to the versatile mince thing but each to their own. That's what we did. All we had to do was defrost, reheat it and boil some rice - nice and simple.

We also bought ready meals occasionally.

following

I've done some lasagne, bolognese mince mix, cottage pie, chicken spinach & mushroom pesto mix, beef casserole, 2 different chicken casseroles and some soup (leek & potato/butternut squash). I found a really lovely recipe on BBC good food for a chicken/butternut squash/pesto lasagne but ran out of room. I've frozen everything in zip lock bags to save space and we should be able to just add rice/pasta as we need. It's taken up around 2 drawers so there isn't much room for anything else at the moment!

I’d personally freeze actual meals so it’s zero effort. Our batch cooked meals were a godsend. We did lasagne, chilli, spagbol (we did cook fresh pasta), tuna pasta bake & curry. Also did a veg loaded tomato sauce. We stocked up on those pasta parcels you get in the fresh pasta section. Take two minutes to cook & just throw in the sauce! Also stocked up on pizzas!

All I wanted after labour & with a newborn was carbs & comfort food & the above really helped. I didn’t worry about being so healthy or calorie conscious for the first 4/5 weeks. It was survival mode! Once things settled, then it was mission baby weight 😄

I did:
-Lasagne
-Bolognese sauce with mince frozen in ice blocks
-Masala frozen in ice blocks
-Shepherd's Pie
-Chicken pastry pie
-Lentil soups and barley broths
-Homemade frozen lean mince burgers
-Frozen marinated peri peri chicken legs
-Frozen marinated lamb chops.
-Frozen marinated boneless chicken and lamb in portion sizes bags (to add to the frozen masala to make a curry or the Bolognese & mince sauce to make pasta bake/ spaghetti bolognese).
-Also child specific ones: frozen Iceland mashed potato, peeled new potato tins, tinned veg, lots of fish fingers, frozen fresh fish fillets (3 packs for £10 in Iceland), Lidl instant noodles, frozen pizzas and garlic bread.

Managed 4 months without cooking thank God (with MIL sending food over occasionally) .