Where Can I Find Free Menus For Cooking Ahead or Investment Cooking?

[MamaScrat]

Hi.  I've just recently made my way back to this site.  After wrecking our 2012 budget with eating out with a side of convenience foods, I'm looking to start cooking again.  I'd like to cook several meals at once and freeze (there is a term for this, I just forgot).

Could any of you ladies please point me to a good site?

Thank you for your time

[Basylica]

OAMC or Once a Month Cooking is the big search term.

I'm really picky, so whenever I come across that info I consider it a vague suggestion, lol.

I found that my receipe for manacotti is time consuming to make when I am shredding cheese and simmering a big pot of sauce, but you can make huuuuge batches for roughly the same ammt of time and it freezes well if you do it seperately.

I stuff (raw) noodles with cheese mixture and "flash freeze" on cookie sheets until firm, then stuff into gallon ziplocks. I figure out how many noodles we can eat (it used to be 8 was a good number, but it's been awhile since I made it) and put into pan and then I measure out how much sauce I needed, then put that ammt of sauce into quart ziplocks and freeze flat. then I eyeball the cheese I put ontop and put into sandwich baggies and throw in freezer. So I always make a pan when freezing, and I usually do enough for 4-5-6 meals.

Then when I want to make some I pull out frozen noodles and put into pan, and cover with foil. pull out sauce and cheese and put everything in fridge in AM. at night I snip baggie with sauce and dump over noodles, top with cheese and bake.

usually the noodles will split a bit because of moisture of cheese, but that happens when you bake cotti anyway. tastes fresh and only takes like 30-45min I think?

I also make baked potato soup and freeze prior to adding cream, and reheat it from defrosted or bash bag against counter until it breaks into chunks and put into pot and add a bit of liquid, and when it comes to temp add in cream and serve.

[MamaBookworm]

This is a subscription site (if you want the recipe cards and grocery list) but you can actually view the menus and recipes and do the legwork yourself, or if you are like me and have to adapt, because my household is both vegetarian AND gluten free.

http://onceamonthmom.com/vegetarian-december-2012-menu/

I like her posts because they're very seasonal and go with what I get in my CSA box.