Saturday, April 10, 2010

Nesting Phase 2 - Cooking/Stockpiling Food

Both Christopher and I grew up in households with large chest freezers stocked with food. It was especially handy in his house with 2 growing teenage boys. From the stories my mother-in-law has told me, it was nearly impossible to keep food in the house, and that was with regular shopping trips to Costco!

So when I told Christopher that I wanted to get an upright freezer for our basement, he was all for it. My plan was to prepare and freeze meals for when the baby came and we were too tired/busy to cook and also use it to store breastmilk for when I went back to work. And we were both pleasantly surprised when we discovered a separate circuit in our basement labeled "Freezer" so no rewiring was involved - score!

I thought it would be a good idea to take an inventory of what we had in our freezer to make sure that it all gets consumed and nothing ends up with really bad freezer burn. With a chest freezer it's alot easier for things to get "lost" in the bottom, but I love our upright. The shelves help to keep things organized and since most things are at eye level it's easy to find what you're looking for. Here is a list of what we have:

1 x chicken parisienne
3 x beef stroganoff
2 x continental beef
1 x lemony flank steak
2 x Chinese style satay beef3 x Chinese beef stew
3 x Woodland Park Italian Beef
1 x turkey meatloaf
13 x homemade hamburger patties
3 bags of Chinese dumplings
1 x porkchops a l'orange
2 x BBQ spareqibs
2 x cottage pie
1 x Chinese style curry chicken
3 x spicy penne with sausage & peppers
5 x manicotti
2 x cheesy chicken bundles
1 x meatless spaghetti sauce
5 x spaghetti sauce with meat
1 x honey pecan chicken
2 x Hawaiian chicken
3 x Colorado style beef enchiladas
2 bags of chocolate chip "lactation cookies"
2 bags of bacon & cheese potatoes
2 bags of chocolate chip muffins (Christopher's latest addiction)
plus store-bought frozen pizzas, ravioli, pierogies

Each homemade "meal" is portioned into either a serving for 2 or more, depending on what it is. So by my count we should have enough food for over a month without needing to buy/make anything. The freezer is pretty stocked - do you think we have enough?

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