Once A Month Freezer Cooking Simply Explained

I am taking a break from our contest to participate in Kitchen Tip Tuesdays and write more on my freezer series!

Before I even start this let me just say that this is not the method of freezer cooking I usually use, but it is a great method if you have the time and the freezer space! It is reading about Once a Month Cooking that helped me develop My Usual Method, and that my usual method is just a mini-version of a once a month cook! And of course, if you have been reading here for a while, you will know of my fit of insanity I did a double month of cooking in my marathon cook with the help of my MIL where we made 50 freezer meals for our family - or if you ask her, I made 50 meals, and she washed dishes (we are both convinced the other worked harder!)

Once a Month Cooking is great if you have the freezer space and can carve out two or three days a month to devote to it. When we have no children under 3 I anticipate doing either this, or at least larger freezer baking sessions than I do now!

Once A Month Cooking is basically a couple of days dedicated to preparing and making your meals for an easier supper preparation each other day of the month! If that is not a great kitchen tip, I am at a loss for what is! :-)

Once A Month Cooking often it looks like this:
Day 1 - Shop (If you have to do a two cart shop, get all your perishables second)
Day 2 - Prep and start cooking
Day 3 - Finish cooking

Usually the cooking day is a very full and long day, and often it requires two cooking days with one day being a lot of preparation such as chopping vegetables etc.

Our Marathon Cook looked like this:
Week leading up: Pick recipes based on sales and good prices on meat and ingredients, make lists
Shopping Day 1: Ralph's and Henry's Market Place for my usual shopping trip and the things I needed for our cooking day
Shopping Day 2: Costco trip - best price on meat and some canned goods that I needed
Cooking Day: One day of craziness with the priority being to do everything that needed the stove or oven before the day got warm! We also had two slow cookers on the go. We started at 8 and were finished in time for supper!

When selecting the meals it is common to try to select meals that use up either ingredients you have been able to pick up on sale throughout the preceding month, or take advantage of current sales on the big dollar items like meat. Also, as much as possible you want to choose meals that have common preparations of common ingredients, like in the Kitchen Day - Tortilla Soup and Enchiladas (How To) example I posted in July.


If you are new to freezer cooking, or want to try freezer cooking for the first time in any kind of quantity of meals, I recommend:
Once-a-Month Cooking: Revised and Expanded: A Proven System for Spending Less Time in the Kitchen and Enjoying Delicious, Homemade Meals Every Day
It has a number of monthly menus available and does all the calculations and math and preparation for you! It is an excellent primer.

Another great example is Bethany who posts all about her experiences! She was posting about the start of her August preparations (and is using two of my recipes) with the promise to post more about August's cooking. If you click on her Once A Month cooking cooking link you will find lots of information.

The important thing to remember is that it is the same preparation whether you are doing two freezer recipes for two meals for 4, or 15 recipes for two meals for 8, or however many people you are preparing for! It is just a case of it being more figuring and preparing depending on how many you are serving!

So my next post on freezer cooking will be on exactly how to prepare your shopping and cooking efficiently! This post is already long enough!

But the thing to remember is that it is all the same whether you are making two different sets of meals that will each provide two meals for your family like I usually do, preparing a week's worth of meals, preparing two week's of meals or preparing a month of meals, it is all the same thought process, it is all the same preparations, it is all the same everything, except the amount of work at once!

The only thing you have to watch as you ramp up to do more meals at once is your cost as it is easy to fall into the trap of not watching your sales, which is why I usually choose to do smaller cooking sessions, but if you plan your freezer cooking around the sales you will do great! And of course, freezer cooking allows bulk buying which often results in big savings!

I hope this helps, I wanted to cover this before I explained the nuts and bolts of preparing your own cooking session!

Next up in the series, apparently in no particular order:
- Planning your shopping, prep and cooking
- Storing your meals revisited and revised
- Keeping track of what is in your freezer and what is the oldest
- Freezer lunch stash complete with ideas
- Freezer breakfast stash complete with ideas
- Recipes I used in my marathon cook that have not yet been posted
- What little I know about having a group of friends who share freezer meals
- Books and resources I love
- Answers to questions you post for me or email to me (email button is in my profile).


Previously in the series:
Introduction to the series
Why Freezer Meals?
My Usual Method
Chicken Breasts Stuffed with Pesto Butter and Chicken Cordon Blue
Chicken Enchiladas
Kitchen Day - Tortilla Soup and Enchiladas (How To)
Blessing of Freezer Meals
Lazy Lasagna - A Freezer Meal
Sauce for Freezer Meatballs
Pineapple Tuna Cracker Snack
Freezer Cooking with Limited Space
Orange Beef and Broccoli Stir Fry
Orange-Apricot Glazed Pork Chops
Converting your Casserole Recipes to Freezer Recipes
Converting your Meat Recipes to Freezer Meals
Triple Chocolate Cookies
Bacon-Macaroni Bake