Freezing for Later

I think most people know that meat can be frozen, but what about other things that are generally consumed fresh instead of thawed?  My sausage and bacon almost always go directly to the freezer instead of the refrigerator, especially since I usually buy them in bulk when they’re on sale.

Before ground beef became too expensive, I would buy several pounds at once when it was the right price.  Then, I used several 1-pound containers to freeze it since most of my recipes call for one pound.  I also made several quarter-pound patties and individually wrapped them in plastic wrap.  Now, I no longer pay attention to the price of ground beef because I don’t want to buy it since it takes much more time to cook than everything else.

I love frozen grapes.  They’re a wonderful desert, and I can have them all year if I freeze enough when they’re in season.  I learned the hard way that frozen strawberries (when using the shortcut that I took) aren’t as good.

Bread is also okay to freeze, and it normally thaws pretty well.  Buns normally thaw perfectly.  Thawed loaves of sliced bread sometimes need to have a few pieces at each end to be toasted.  The bread I buy now has a regular price of $0.89 so I normally don’t need to buy an extra loaf for the freezer (although there’s two in there now).  When I bought expensive bread in the past, I would buy and freeze an extra loaf whenever it was on sale.  I’ll also freeze a partial loaf when going out of town for a while so my bread won’t go bad (even though I always keep it in the refrigerator).

I used to have a peanut butter sandwich every day for lunch.  Now, I have a piece of toast with peanut butter on it.  So, a loaf lasts me twice as long.  Another benefit to toasting it is that I eat more of it.  I used to not eat the end pieces, and I also removed the side and bottom crusts.  All of that would be saved in the freezer for the ducks.  Now, I have more room in my freezer.

My recent trial was milk (pictured with a container of ice).  I generally buy lactose-free milk because it has a longer expiration date than other milk.  It’s a little more expensive, but I don’t have to throw away milk.  A half-gallon normally lasts at least a month.  A few months ago, I had to buy regular milk because the lactose-free was out of stock.  I was told to freeze it in small portions so I put it in the containers I previously used for beef.  I should have frozen more of it because the fresh milk spoiled five days before it’s listed date, and I had to throw away twenty-two ounces of milk (yes, I actually measured it because I wasn’t happy).  I discovered that I needed to place the frozen milk in the refrigerator at least twenty-four hours before I wanted to use it.  It worked great!  The taste and texture were no different than fresh milk.  At the beginning of this month, I stocked up on groceries so I could avoid shopping for a while.  So, I bought two cartons of milk and froze one of them in my little containers.

Have you frozen something else that you didn’t buy already frozen?

Linda 🙂