Freezer Cooking Sundays

 After doing a lot of research, I have decided that freezer cooking could really help in preparing meals for my family. Cooking for six people when homeschooling, trying to keep the house clean, and just living a busy life can seem like a daunting task. However, adding freezer cooking to my weekly schedule has really helped give me a little more time. I have mostly used it for breakfast foods and a few crock-pot meals. 

Now, I am not one of those wonderful freezer cooking mamas who can do a marathon cooking session for an entire day. We would just never be able to manage the amount of time required to do that. My solution to this is to choose one or two items to prepare for the freezer and only prepare those items on my designated day (Sunday evenings). Two Weeks ago, I made muffins, sandwiches and smoothie mix for the freezer. Last week was breakfast burritos and a crock pot soup. 

This week I fried a 10 lb. roll of hamburger separated into two different pans. Once they were finished we drained the grease and then seasoned one pan for spaghetti and one for tacos. As part of menu planning we are alternating tacos and spaghetti every Friday for the month, this batch will cover those meals for two months. 

The next item on my list was whole wheat pumpkin pancakes. These turned into waffles as my wonderful husband decided to warm up the waffle maker and waffle all the batter for me to place in baggies and freeze. If you would rather have pancakes, I just heat the oven to 350 degrees and spray a sheet pan with nonstick spray. Pour the batter in the sheet pan and bake about 10 min. or until a toothpick comes out clean. If you prefer them browned you can kick on your broiler for a few minutes but keep a close eye on them. I then let them cool and cut in squares with a pizza cutter. It really saves having to flip and fry over the hot stove. If you want to make these here is the recipe:

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Pancakes/Waffles

Mix dry in a large bowl:

4 cups whole wheat flour

1/2 cup ground flax

1 tsp. Himalayan pink salt ground (or plain salt)

2 tsp baking soda

4 tsp baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

Mix wet in separate bowl:

1/4 cup olive oil

4 eggs

4 1/4 cup milk

1 cup canned pumpkin

Combine wet into bowl of dry and stir until mixed.