Molasses Cookie Recipe

I used to have marathon cookie baking sessions with my friend Matt.  He made a great molasses cookie and he was kind enough to share his recipe with me.  It's chewy, spicy, and always comes out great.  I know some people will sub out the shortening for butter but to get the best texture shortening is the way to go.



Ingredients
1 1/2 cups shortening melted
2 cups white sugar
1/2 cup molasses
2 eggs
4 cups flour
4 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp salt

Mix together dry ingredients
Cream together shortening and sugar.  Add eggs one at a time then add the molasses.  Stir in dry ingredients.  Dough will be stiff.  Scoop with a cookie scoop or portion out dough into walnut size balls.  Roll dough in you hands to form smooth balls.  Roll balls in sugar, place on a cookie sheet about 2 inches apart.  Press the dough balls with the bottom of a glass to flatten slightly.  Bake at 375 F for 8-10 minutes.  Cool on a wire rack.  The cookies will puff up then shrink back down to a crinkly chewy cookie as they cool.

Check out all the great recipes all Cookie Week long!

Pecan Sandies

Pecan sandies are one of those cookies you make to impress.  They are the gem of a cookie platter and the talk of the cookie exchange.  I don't know if its the buttery crumbly cookie or the big fat pecan crowning the buttery crumbly cookie.  Either way, they are a delicious addition to Cookie Week!

Ingredients

1 cup (2 sticks) dairy free margarine (Earth Balance) feel free to use butter if you are able

1 cup canola oil

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 cup powdered sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

4 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cream of tartar

1 tsp salt

2 cups chopped pecans plus pretty pecan halves for the top of each cookie if desired

Mix the dry ingredients

Cream the margarine, oil and the three sugars until a smooth batter

Add eggs, one at a time, then add vanilla

Spoon the dry ingredient and mix just until incorporated.  

Stir in the chopped nuts

Chill dough for about an hour then scoop and bake OR

Scoop the dough then chill 20 minutes then bake OR

Scoop the dough, then freeze for about 1 hour then transfer to a zipper bag and store in the freezer.

When it's time to bake, roll each dough ball in granulated sugar, top each dough ball with a pecan half or slightly flatten, then bake at 375 F for 10 -12 minutes.  Remove to a wire rack, cool, and store in an airtight container.

Be sure to check out all the other great recipes all Cookie Week long!

Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookie Recipe

This cookie is a delicious combination of a chewy oatmeal cookie and a sweet peanut-y peanut butter cookie. This is another great recipe to make ahead and freeze.

1 ½ cup flour

2 teaspoon baking soda

1 ½ cup quick cooking oats or rolled oats that have been very lightly pulsed in a food processor

2 sticks ( 1 cup) dairy free margarine or butter ( add ½ tsp salt if using unsalted butter)

1 cup packed dark brown sugar

½ cup white granulated sugar

1 cup conventional creamy peanut butter (if using natural peanut butter you may want to bump up the sugar and salt)

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 eggs

Mix dry ingredients. Cream together margarine, brown sugar and white sugar. Add peanut butter and beat again until fluffy and lightened in color. Add vanilla. Add eggs, one at a time, incorporate each egg fully after each addition. Spoon in dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Scoop onto an ungreased cookie sheet leaving 1 ½ inches between each cookie. Bake at 350 F for 12-14 minutes until lightly golden brown. Remove to a wire rack to cool.

Check out the rest of the great cookie recipes all Cookie Week long!

Breakfast Burritos (For the Freezer)

Breakfast burritos are great on the go.  You can prepare a bunch in advance and keep them in the freezer for a quick and easy breakfast.

Ingredients:

12 eggs beaten
1/2 pound of bacon
2 cups of 1/4" diced potatoes
1 cup of finely chopped onions
salt and pepper to taste
8 fajita sized tortilla.  I use Chi Chi whole wheat tortilla because they don't become brittle after freezing and reheating.

Fry the bacon until crisp and drain away most of the fat.
Fry the potatoes for about 10 minutes until cooked through and browned.
Add the onion and cook another 1-2 minutes until they are softened.
Add the eggs and stir continuously until the eggs are set.
Cool the egg mixture.
Assemble the burritos using 1/2 cup of the filling in each tortilla.
Wrap the burrito in foil, label and freeze

To reheat: place the foil wrapped burrito in the oven or toaster oven at 400 degrees F for about 15 minutes or remove the foil and microwave on high for 2 minutes, turn over and cook another 2 minutes.

Serve with hot sauce or salsa.

Sloppy Joes

Today I have another easy recipe which also freezes beautifully: Sloppy Joes.  My family does cheat a little on the sloppy, we eat our with a fork and knife... and a napkin.

This recipe is a great one to have in the freezer.  Its not hard to make, but letting it simmer for at least 30 minutes is the key to the most delicious sloppy joes.  If you'd rather use that 30 minutes doing something else on a busy weeknight, then make a big batch ahead of time and freeze individual or family size portions.  Then when dinner time rolls around, just heat and eat!

 

Classic Sloppy Joes 

4 servings

1 pound ground beef
1 green bell pepper chopped
1 medium onion chopped
1/2 cup ketchup
1 TBSP yellow mustard
1 tsp sriracha sauce
Salt and pepper to taste
Hamburger buns or sliced bread, toasted

Honey Glazed Tarragon Chicken and Gravy (Freezer/Batch Recipe)

Honey glazed tarragon chicken is a great meal to have stocked in your freezer for a quick and easy meal.  In just about the time it takes to warm through, dinner is ready.  You can serve this chicken and gravy over rice or noodles or for an even quicker and easier meal, over toasted bread for a hot open face sandwich.  Add a side vegetable (you always have frozen veggies on hand, right?) and dinner is served!

Honey Glazed Tarragon Chicken

The recipe below makes 4 servings but its easy to make up a big batch for the freezer.

1 pound bone-in chicken breast, skin removed

1 tsp dried tarragon leaves or 1 tbsp chopped fresh tarragon

1 tsp chicken base or 1 chicken bullion cube

1/4 cup honey

3 tbsp flour

1 cup water

Salt and pepper to taste

1. Season the chicken with salt, pepper and tarragon and cook the chicken until done.  You can bake the chicken in a covered baking dish or you can use a pressure cooker.  Follow all the manufacturers directions when using a pressure cooker.  Once the chicken is cooked, remove it to a dish to cool.  Reserve all the cooking liquids.  When cool enough to handle, remove the bones and break the chicken meat into chunks.
2. Add the chicken, chicken base and the honey to the reserved cooking liquid.
1. Cool, package and freeze the chicken with the cooking liquid.  Be sure to label, date and include the remaining instructions for finishing the recipe
3. Bring the chicken and liquid to a simmer in a large saucepan.  Make a slurry of the flour and water and add it to the saucepan while stirring continually.  Simmer for 5 minutes more until the gravy is thickened and everything is warmed through.
4. Serve over rice, noodles or toasted bread. 

Dirty Rice - Freezer Cooking Recipe

I love dirty rice. It's a true comfort food. Warm and spicy, perfect on these cold winter days. When you have the time, there is nothing better than a simmering pot on the stove filling your house with the delicious aroma.

 Make a double or triple batch and freeze it for when time is short. You can freeze this once its completely finished for a heat & eat meal or stop just before adding the rice. Then you when you are ready to eat just add the rice and a cup of water to the prepared base and simmer until the rice is done.

This is the kind of recipe that works great for batch cooking.  The peppers, onion and celery give this dish a rich flavor but it takes some time to chop all those vegetables. You can chop the vegetables for three batches in just about the same amount of time as for one batch. The simmering takes some times too. So you might as well simmer 3 batches all at once. In the end you have dinner for tonight and 2 in the freezer for later.

Ingredients (4 servings):
1 pound ground beef
1 cup uncooked brown rice
1 large onion, chopped
1 green bell pepper, chopped
1 red bell pepper, chopped
2 stalks of celery with leaves, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, mined
1 TBSP worcestershire sauce
1 cup homemade chicken stock or beef stock
2 TSP bacon fat or vegetable oil
salt and pepper
cayenne pepper powder (to taste)

Heat the bacon fat in a cast iron dutch over or other large pot.  Season the ground beef with salt and pepper and fry in the fat for about 5 minutes until it is mostly cooked.  As you are frying, break the beef up into small pieces.

Add the vegetables and stir to combine.  Cook on medium for about 10 minutes until the vegetables are softened.

Stir in the chicken stock and worcestershire sauce.  You can stop at this point, cool, and freeze the base.  To continue the recipe add 1 cup uncooked rice and 1 cup water and simmer at medium heat for 20 -30 minutes until the rice is tender and the liquid is absorbed.

Garnish with fresh parsley and Louisiana style hot sauce.

**To continue this recipe from the freezer, add the uncooked rice and water to the thawed base and simmer until the rice is tender and everything is warmed through.  If needed you can use the base directly from the freezer but it may take a bit longer to cook.


This recipe was submitted to the MaMade Blog Hop 

Tomato Butternut Squash Soup

Are you looking for a great tomato soup recipe?  This rich and creamy tomato butternut squash soup really hits the spot!  Make a large batch and stock up your freezer.

Ingredients: 

1 small butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cubed

2 (28 ounce) cans of diced tomatoes

1 quart of chicken or vegetable stock **

2 fresh sage leaves or 1/2 tsp dried sage

Combine all the ingredients in a large pot and simmer 25-30 minutes until the squash is tender.  Puree with an immersion blender or in a blender until smooth.  Serve with garlic bread.

**Store bought chicken stocks and broths often have dairy ingredients.  Use homemade stock or check the label carefully.

Freezer Cooking Storage

Food in the freezer is an investment.  You put the time, effort and money into making your freezer meals and you want to protect that investment.  Some things are perfectly fine stored in reused yogurt containers but other things do best in freezer bags or vacuum sealed bags.  Lets look as all the ways you can store your freezer cooking

 No Container

Storing food in the freezer without any wrapping or container not recommended.  Foods can dry out, absorb odors and become freezer burnt.  Flash freezing can be done without any covering but you will want to be sure to transfer the food to an appropriate container as soon as its becomes firm.  You can flash freeze by placing the food on a silicone mat lined cookie sheet or in ice cube trays.

Freezer Paper, Aluminum foil

Freezer paper or aluminum foil usually won't provide much protection but they work well when you want to individually wrap items or keep items separated.  A small square of freezer paper between hamburger patties will keep them from sticking together so you can remove just what you need from the freezer without thawing the entire package.  Aluminum foil is also useful for odd shaped items that don't fit easily in another container, like breakfast burritos.  If possible add another layer of protection, such as a freezer bag.

Zipper Bags

Some people exclusively freeze in zipper bags.  They are cheap, disposable and can be frozen flat to save freezer space.  Zipper bags are also great if you need to get into a bag over and over.  Choose freezer bags over thinner storage zipper bags.  Zipper bags won't provide much protection and should be only used for short term storage.  I love keeping cookie dough balls in zipper bags.  Take out a few at a time to bake fresh cookies without being tempted by an entire batch.  Thaw in the fridge overnight or remove the food and warm in another container.

Plastic Containers

You can re-use plastic food containers like yogurt or margarine tubs or buy containers.  Glad Ware or Ziploc type containers come in lots of sizes and shapes to fit your needs.  Freezing can cause the plastic to become brittle and break.  There are food containers specifically made for freezing which won't break as easily.  Containers are great for soups or liquid foods that can be hard to pour into a freezer bag.  Make sure you do not heat foods in the container unless they are made to go into the microwave.

Glass Jars

I love the idea of freezing in glass jars but if you have to do it properly.  Expanding food can break glass jars and because there could be shards of glass in the food, you will have to throw the food away.  Even heavy duty mason jars meant for pressure canning can break in the freezer.    If the jar has shoulders or tapers, it is not appropriate for freezing.  Only freeze in jars that have straight sides like half pint or wide mouth pint jars.  The small size of these jars means they won't work for most thing.  I do love using wide mouth pint jars to store raw ground beef.  One pound of ground meat fits perfectly in wide mouth pint jars.  It's a tight fit but less air space means less freezer burn.  Thaw in the fridge overnight or place the jar in cold water to thaw.  You can reheat food directly in the glass jar if the food is thawed.  Do not heat in glass if the food is still frozen, it could cause the glass to break.

Vacuum Sealed Bags

You should consider investing in a vacuum sealing system if you want the best protection from freezer burn.  Food Saver is the brand I use.  The bags can be pricey so I use them for long term storage or for things that have no better alternative.  The bags can be washed and reused but I wouldn't if the bag was used for raw meat.  You can find good deals on rolls of off-brand vacuum bags online which work just as well.  Most vacuum sealing bags are microwave safe.  To reheat the food cut a vent in the bag and heat in the microwave or place the bag in a pan of simmering water.


No matter which way you chose to store your frozen foods, make sure you clearly label and date everything.  Add reheating instructions and last minute additions so you won't be guessing come dinner time.

Return to Freezer Cooking 101

Freezer Cooking (Batch vs Bulk vs OAMC)

Freezer cooking is an umbrella term to mean any meal prep done ahead of time and frozen.  There are different ways to freezer cook and there are pro and cons of each.  Let's look closer at each style to see which might be the best fit for you.

Once A Month Cooking

Once a month cooking (OAMC) is preparing or mostly preparing an entire months worth of meals in one day.  The cooking day is usually very long, must be thoroughly organized and works best if you have helpers.  Most OAMC recipes are not actually cooked on cooking day but prepared and portioned out for quick cooking when they are needed.

Batch Cooking

Batch cooking is when you make a double, triple or even quadruple batch of a recipe.  This can be a large scale or small scale process.  Making a big pot of soup and freezing portions is an excellent way to ease into freezer cooking.  

Bulk Cooking

Bulk cooking is when you make large portions of meal components.  Roast several chickens and use the meat for chicken salad, chicken soup, chicken and dumplings, or chicken club wraps.  Ground beef seasoned with Mexican flavors can be used for tacos, burritos, taco salad, chili or casseroles. 

Return to Freezer Cooking 101

Freezer Cooking 101

It goes by many different names; bulk cooking, batch cooking, once a month cooking (OAMC), or freezer cooking. They have slight variations but the basic concept is doing meal prep ahead of time to make dinner time less hectic.

Freezer cooking has helped me during so many stages of my life. I have dietary restrictions which makes it hard to eat at restaurants, or use convenience foods or prepared foods. I have to read every ingredient, grill the wait staff, and hope there was no cross contamination. I only truly feel comfortable eating food I have prepared myself. Good thing for me, I love to cook!

Like everyone else, my life gets busy and setting aside an hour each evening to prepare a wholesome meal can be hard. Freezer cooking helped when I was single and cooking for one, when I was in school and limited by the options in the cafeteria, when I was working 12 hour days, and when I had a baby. I have learned a lot over the years and I want to share my knowledge with you.

Before we get started, lets explore the benefits of freezer cooking.

• Saves time
  • For most recipe it takes just about the same amount of time to make a double or triple batch as it does to make a single batch. Knock out the time consuming prep when you have the time, and reap the benefits when time is short.
• Saves money
  • Take advantage of sales and in season prices. Get the best prices by buying in bulk. Then turn those great deals into great meals or meal components with a locked in price.
• Makes dinner time less hectic
  • Who wouldn't love to come home from work and have dinner already made? Who wouldn't also love most of the dishes from that meal already washed?
• Adapts to complicated diets
  • When you have special dietary concerns it can be hard to just grab something. There are freezer recipes for all sorts of diets including vegetarian, paleo, gluten free, food allergies, etc.
• More wholesome
  • Not all freezer recipes are healthy but homemade foods are generally more wholesome than packaged foods or fast food.

Does this sound good? Would you like to try freezer cooking? Check out my freezer cooking resources to learn more.

The Basics of Freezer Cooking
Batch vs Bulk vs OAMC
Storage 


Freezer Recipes
Tomato Butternut Squash Soup
Dirty Rice
Honey Glazed Tarragon Chicken
Sloppy Joes
Breakfast Burritos