Procurement of semi-finished products for a month for retirement. Preparing food for the freezer for a week. Preparation for any dish

Content

There are various ways to save costs. There are situations when finances are running out, but the salary is not yet coming. In such cases, in order not to overpay extra money, it will be useful to know how to easily and effectively save on food, what are the rules of an inexpensive diet, and where to buy cheap food.

How to eat economically

Modern women are trying to save on food without compromising the quality of food. Housewives come up with many ways, from buying in wholesale stores to preparing dishes according to the recipes of their mothers and grandmothers: from simple products, but with invention. It’s easy to save on food without harming your health; you just need to follow the rules of reasonable nutrition. For this:

• plan your purchases;
• use products effectively;
• do not pay attention to marketing and advertising gimmicks;
• keep records of expenses;
• plan your menu in advance;
• you should not buy semi-finished products;
• avoid perishable foods;
• choose fresh fish, chilled meat;
• do not buy wet vegetables and fruits (they spoil quickly);
• keep non-perishable food items at home;
• make home supplies: pickled tomatoes, cucumbers, jam, marmalade;
• Prepare your own drinks: compote, fruit drink, jelly.

Eating cheap and healthy

The modern housewife, having thought about it, will create a delicious, varied and economical menu. This matter requires a systematic approach, desire, and imagination. Don't be afraid to spend a lot of time: the hardest thing is to organize the process, and then it will become a habit. You should immediately analyze the contents of the kitchen. What is healthy in the refrigerator, are there fruits, vegetables, eggs, dairy products? Perhaps it makes sense to exclude something from the diet, for example, canned food, sausage, pates? What is stored on the kitchen shelves - cereals or instant noodles?

Then you need to create a menu for the week, taking into account your culinary preferences, not forgetting that the body requires proteins, vitamins, microelements, carbohydrates, and fats every day. In order to save money when buying groceries, it is recommended to make a thorough shopping trip once a week. An additional effect of this will be saving time in the coming days.

Eat economically and tasty

Food should be tasty, but how to do it in such a way as to save on food? You can use culinary tricks for this. When purchasing, it is better to choose a whole chicken rather than a cut one. It is easy to cook soup from the wings and back, and use the meat remaining on the skeleton for a hearty salad such as Olivier or pies. The remaining parts of the bird will make, for example, pilaf or chakhokhbili.

To make better use of meat, combine it with a side dish in one dish rather than cooking it separately. Eliminate a la carte dishes: chops are an expensive option, while lazy cabbage rolls, beef stroganoff or goulash are cheaper options. Instead of meat, use offal, for example, you can make a casserole filling from beef heart.

Economical food for the family

If you want to see how you can easily and effectively save money on groceries, try planning your family menu for the week. To do this, set aside an hour of free time to choose dishes and make a list of necessary products. During the week, you won't have to figure out what to cook for dinner and then run to the nearest store, buying what's in stock.

You can create a menu in a form convenient for you: print the list; manually write; create a template in which you rotate dishes weekly or add new ones. With this approach, it is important to consider that hot food can be prepared for 2-3 days, for example, soup or roast. You can serve different side dishes with fish or meat products. However, salads are best eaten fresh; their preparation does not take much time.

How to save on purchases

Expenses for purchasing groceries account for up to 35% of the family budget. If you approach this process rationally, you can save money. When going to the store, take a list prepared in advance so that you do not buy unnecessary products and do not forget what you need.

Buy products in factory packaging (vegetable oil, tea, coffee, pasta) where they are cheaper. But for meat, fruits and vegetables, it’s better to go to the market or to a trusted store - in cheap hypermarkets they are rarely of good quality.

Stores often hold promotions and sales - keep track of them, and don’t miss the opportunity to save money on products.

Products by weight

Buy bulk goods, candies, cookies, sweets in bulk. This way you won't overpay for packaging. This will allow you to save up to 20% on products. It is better to purchase sugar and salt in winter, when the canning season has not yet arrived. It is also recommended to take cereals by weight and preferably from domestic production. This approach will save family money.

Grocery shopping for a month

Making a shopping list for the month is not as overwhelming a task as it might seem. To do this, within 2-3 months you need to record information about what, how much, and at what price it was purchased. The effect of making such notes will not take long: a picture will form in your head and everything will be sorted. Wholesale purchases should not be made in small stores; it is better to go to a supermarket.

Promotions and discounts

Large stores regularly hold promotions on certain groups of products. This does not mean that the products are of poor quality or are nearing their expiration date. To track discounts, you can use modern technologies, for example, install the Edadil mobile application. The service finds and compares prices for specific products.

Almost all retail outlets have introduced a system of discount cards, which allows you to make purchases at lower prices. However, if you happen to come across a great deal on an item that is not on your list, don't buy it. Be aware of prices so you don't fall for a marketing ploy where the discounted price is the same as the original price.

How to buy groceries correctly

When choosing foods, it is helpful to read labels and understand their contents. The ingredients included are arranged in descending order. So, if the label lists beans first, then its contents prevail over the other components contained in the can. Do not take products in which sugar comes first; salt should not be in the first place either. It is undesirable for the number of components to be more than 5-6. Choose products with a long shelf life. When purchasing frozen foods, keep them in insulated bags.

How to save on food during a crisis

The main advice for “anti-crisis” nutrition is to cook your own meals, trying not to buy semi-finished products. To do this, you don’t have to spend a lot of time, effort and money, you just need to approach the issue wisely. As a result, you will get delicious and healthy food at home at a budget price. Cereals and legumes are easy to prepare, nutritious and easy to digest.

• Buckwheat, chickpeas, lentils, bulgur, and mung beans go well with vegetables and are suitable as a side dish.
• You can easily make soup or pilaf from undeservedly forgotten pearl barley (price 30 rubles).
• Sprouted chickpeas and lentils are suitable for salads and side dishes.
• Croquettes are easy to make from rice mixed with spices and cheese.

Regular potatoes are affordable and offer many cooking options: fried, stewed, boiled, steamed, baked. A tasty and healthy vegetable can decorate a holiday table. Don't forget about spices: a skillful combination can easily give ordinary dishes a new accent. Using turmeric, mint, cumin will add an “Indian” flavor, while soy sauce and ginger will add a “Japanese” flavor.

Seasonal vegetables can become the basis of the diet during a crisis. It is better to replace avocados, greenhouse tomatoes and cucumbers with local beets, radishes and pumpkin. They store well and contain a storehouse of vitamins. By combining them, it is easy to get new tastes each time. If you have a summer cottage, then you are doubly lucky: include more seasonal fruits and vegetables from your garden in your menu.

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Dear readers! The rhythm of life of a modern woman forces us to increasingly use semi-finished products. But when I come to the supermarket or the grocery store closest to home, I look with alarm at the store-bought convenience foods. I am always confused by the thought of what they are made from... Sometimes, having bought something from semi-finished products in order to quickly prepare something for the family, you are once again convinced of how tasteless and inedible they can be.

Homemade semi-finished products - benefits

Therefore, I decided for myself that it is quite possible to prepare these same semi-finished products at home. But I am sure that the food prepared from my semi-finished products will not affect the health of my family in any way. But can we save time on meal prep during the week? Quite. And for this you only need to allocate 2-3 hours on Saturday.

Knowing the culinary preferences of your family members and having prepared semi-finished products at home, you will not have to worry about lunch, dinner or the sudden arrival of guests in the future.
You yourself will understand in the very first week, firstly, how much free time you will save on working days, and secondly, you can involve children in the process of preparing semi-finished products - joint work raises children. And your spouse will be glad that you are together and, probably, you will have topics for communication during the work process. Let everyone help you as much as possible, in whatever way they can.

But the most important thing is that later, after a tiring day at work, you will have enough time to relax, be with your family or do what you love. Well, let's get started?

What you need for homemade semi-finished products

What is needed first for this? First of all, of course, you need to prepare food. Groceries can be purchased gradually throughout the week so that by Saturday you are ready. By following a few rules, you can easily provide your family with all the necessary semi-finished products for a whole week.

In most cases, prepared homemade semi-finished products must be frozen. In a frozen state, products will last much longer, and will not lose their nutritional and beneficial properties. This means that freezing equipment is needed for freezing. In the absence of such, semi-finished products can be frozen in the cold, but only if you have an enclosed cold room, such as a veranda or cellar.

From my own experience, I can say that modern freezers are very convenient and simply necessary in modern life, because you can freeze literally everything in them: mushrooms, berries, most vegetables, and, of course, homemade semi-finished products you have prepared. How to properly freeze food, read

Semi-finished meat products

Despite the fact that nutritionists and endocrinologists, not a single family can do without meat.

Cooking broth

For broth we buy meat with bones. It is better to cook the broth in a large saucepan with a capacity of 4-5 liters. After the meat is well cooked, we separate it from the bones. Our broth will be used for soup, and we can grind the boiled meat through a meat grinder and then use it to fill pancakes or make navy-style pasta.

You can add the broth right away and then just heat up the required amount of soup. But you can do it differently. We pour out a little of the total amount of broth and season it. In this case, you will have a different soup every day. It is recommended to consume the soup daily, as the broth contains extractive substances that have a beneficial effect on digestion. Find out about the benefits of soups.

Making minced meat

You can make quite a lot of dishes from minced meat: dumplings, pasties, meatballs, meatballs, cutlets, zrazy, etc. And freeze it all in the freezer. If necessary, some of the above is taken out of the freezer as needed and then put into culinary processing.

Dumplings, of course, are worth making on Saturday. We then transfer the frozen dumplings into plastic bags and then it will take very little time to cook them. Before freezing, cutlets and meatballs should not be rolled in breading, this must be done immediately before frying.

But I like to do it this way: I put the cooked minced meat in small portions in plastic bags and put them in the freezer. In the morning, before leaving for work, I take the minced meat out of the freezer and put it in the refrigerator: it will gradually defrost during the day. In the evening after work, all I have to do is, for example, season the minced meat with a bun soaked in milk and fry the cutlets. Or make pasta sauce.

Semi-finished fish products

Fresh frozen fish does not require any special preparation. It is enough to peel and gut it, cut it into portions, put it in a container and put it in the refrigerator for storage. When needed, all you have to do is take it out, defrost it, and then fry it.

You can make minced fish for cutlets. In the article “” you can find out how these cutlets are prepared; using the same principle, you can prepare cutlets from any other fish.

Vegetable semi-finished products

It is better to boil vegetables (potatoes, carrots, beets) in their skins. Carrots and beets take much longer to cook, so they can be cooked in the microwave. Read how to do this in the article “”. Store boiled and cooled vegetables in a container with a tightly closed lid in the refrigerator.

Raw vegetables (onions, carrots) can also be prepared in advance. Peel them Place individually in plastic bags or containers and store on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator. Or you can immediately fry them and store them in a glass jar with a lid, and then season the soup with them as needed.

Boil eggs along with potatoes. Eggs may be useful for salads, but try to store them in the refrigerator for no more than 3 - 4 days. Please note that their shells are porous and eggs, especially boiled ones, absorb other odors well. Therefore, keep them away from fish and vegetables such as onions or garlic.

Buy enough vegetables and herbs for salads. You can wash them immediately, wipe them with a clean, dry towel, put them in a plastic bag and store them in the vegetable compartment. Salads made from raw vegetables are always healthy. They contain a large amount of fiber and improve intestinal motility.

Pancakes

Bake some pancakes. You can make pancakes from them, with the same minced boiled meat or cottage cheese or something else, or you can just freeze them in a stack, and then defrost them in the microwave and serve them with sour cream or jam.

When I cook stuffed pancakes, I fry the pancakes on one side (this will save time), then I put the filling on it, wrap the pancakes in an envelope and put them away for freezing. The filling for pancakes can be any:

• boiled meat from broth, twisted in a meat grinder, with overcooked onions;
• cottage cheese with or without raisins;
• boiled rice with boiled eggs;
• minced mushrooms, etc.

Side dishes for the second course

A make-ahead option for side dishes is rice. Prepare fluffy rice, cool it, and transfer it to a container with a lid. Instead of rice, you can also do it with buckwheat and pearl barley.

Boiled “frozen” vegetables are also perfect for side dishes. Well, don’t forget about the preparations from the fall either: they will diversify your menu.

Well, you worked a little on Saturday, but during the week with this set of semi-finished products you will quickly prepare food for your family. And at the same time, you won’t spend a lot of time standing at the stove.

I have given several examples of preparing homemade semi-finished products. You may have your own options for semi-finished products that save you time, write about them in the comments. Young and novice housewives will most likely find these tips very useful.

Stuffed cabbage rolls

And cabbage rolls also help me out a lot. I have been preparing them since the fall. When I start fermenting cabbage, I remove the top leaves from the heads of cabbage; they come off very easily even without heat treatment. When I undress with sauerkraut, I scald the removed leaves in boiling water or put them in the microwave, in which after 5-10 minutes (depending on the power of the microwave) they become soft. I wrap the minced meat prepared in advance in cabbage leaves and freeze.

As needed, I take out frozen cabbage rolls and then simmer them in sour cream sauce. There is a separate article on my blog and in this video there is another recipe for making cabbage rolls.

Stereo, more for yourself

Save 30 days: menu for a month

Food is an important expense item for the family budget and a kind of test for the housewife how economical and skillful she is. After all, in order to save on food and at the same time feed your family fully, you must agree, you need skill.

You and I already know how to eat sparingly. I have written about this more than once on the blog. You need to create a menu for the week, monitor leftover food in the refrigerator, and stock up for the winter.

We make the biggest and most unnecessary waste during spontaneous visits to shops, markets and supermarkets. To avoid them you need to follow certain rules.

Two rules for thrifty housewives

1. The rule for buying food is to buy what you need, and not what they want to sell us.

• We make a list of products and buy strictly according to the list
• We monitor nearby supermarkets on the Internet for ongoing promotions on products that interest us.
• We don’t fall for any “temptations” such as “buy two for the price of three and get the third for free”
  
• Let's go grocery shopping, having thoroughly refreshed ourselves at home.
• We choose slowly, compare prices and check the expiration date
• We make the main purchases once a week, according to the prepared menu, and during the week we buy only bread and dairy products.
• We do not buy semi-finished products.

2.To eat economically, you need to cook yourself, creating a menu.

Since wasting money on food is directly proportional to the number of visits to supermarkets and markets, we can reduce it to a minimum

To do this, we’ll choose a time (preferably right after payday), draw up a menu for the month and purchase all the basic products once.

Menu for the month

This is, of course, not a very easy job. Need to:

1. Think over a variety of dishes and calculate how much food you will need.
2. Make a list of products and make purchases
3. Prepare semi-finished products yourself
4. Divide into portions and freeze what is to be frozen.

Calculation of the number of dishes per month

Let's count:

One week is 7 breakfasts, 7 lunches and 7 dinners.

Therefore, in a month we get 28 breakfasts, lunches and dinners.

Ideally, breakfast consists of a salad, a main course and a drink, lunch - a salad, a main course, a second course and a drink, and dinner - a salad, a main course and a drink.

In addition, we usually prepare desserts or sweet pastries for tea, coffee,

If you prepare a fresh dish every time, then in a month you need to prepare - ATTENTION YOU-MELON... - 84 salads, 84 main courses and 28 first courses!!!

But don't be alarmed. Everyone knows that in practice this is not the case; each family has its own preferences. For some, a hearty breakfast is important, while others have breakfast after drinking coffee and a sandwich. Many families only dine together on weekends. Therefore, one way or another, your own menu for the month should correspond to your habits and preferences.

Besides:

-First course we cook for two to three days. We get 28:3 = 9-10 (first courses), and if no one dines at home during the week, even less (only four on weekends)

-Second course, if it is “substantial”, for example, such as pilaf, cabbage rolls, roast or dishes that require side dishes (cutlets, chops, meatballs) - we also cook for 2-3 days. Therefore 84:2 = 42 (second courses). Again with dinners at home (without lunches there are 5 * 4 = 20 dishes less, 42-20 = 22)

-Garnishes: if it is porridge, cook it for two days.

-Salads: The situation with them is a little different - salad is different from salad. “Olivier”, “Lakomiy”, salads with chicken or meat do not lose their taste for 24 hours, that is, if you prepared such a salad in the evening, then the next day in the morning or evening it is still very edible. These are full meals “two in one” and a salad and a main course.

Salads are simple or seasonal (cucumbers and tomatoes in the summer, radishes in the spring, radishes, beets, cabbage and sauerkraut - all year round), they are prepared quickly and do not require any special wisdom. They must always be fresh.

-Baking a: if there are children in the family, you cannot do without it. Firstly, children need snacks for school, and it is much better to give your child yogurt and a cupcake or pie prepared by you personally than to risk his stomach by buying the same thing in the store.

This was a prelude to the main work. Having reasoned in this way, we take in hand list of economical dishes(if you don’t have one, make one, I insist - it will make your life much easier), we select the appropriate ones and write out those that we will prepare.

Before creating a menu, check all your “bins” in the refrigerator (freezer), cabinets, and pantry. Control your “strategic reserves”; use what you have and don’t buy too much.

Prepare semi-finished products

If we buy food for a month, some of it needs to be quickly processed into semi-finished products. It is cooked and frozen semi-finished products that will allow you to no longer spend money on groceries next month and will reduce the time for preparing dishes.

If you want to save money and eat meat, you need to spend it sparingly. From the same piece of meat, you can fry chops and eat them at one time, or you can grind it into minced meat to make cutlets, cabbage rolls or dumplings.

Homemade liver is very profitable. It is easy to prepare, inexpensive and, as needed, you can use it for pies, pancakes, dumplings or navy-style pasta.

Therefore, if you want to save money, listen to my tips and your own “voice of reason,” include dishes using minced meat or liver in your menu for the month.

You can also make stock of broths for first courses. Boil the chicken or meat (boil the meat for broths for two weeks, and freeze it fresh for another 2 weeks). Boil rich broths, 5-6 liters in a large saucepan, and divide the finished broth into 5 servings and freeze. As needed, take one portion, defrost and add the required amount of water. Do the same with the next portion of preparations for the first courses when these run out.

Use meat cooked in broth for salads, casseroles, or, like liver, for filling dumplings, pies, and pancakes.

The semi-finished products you have prepared are also good because if they are not used, they will be perfectly preserved until the next month (the main thing is not to forget about them)

We choose, write it down on a sign, and next to it we note what we will need to buy.

Menu dishes for the month and their composition

If you, following my example, filled out such a plate, then it will not be difficult to count the number of products and write a list with which you will go grocery shopping. You can buy everything at once, except for dairy, bread and some vegetables and fruits.

Or you can shop once a week or every two weeks.

Don't forget to check what you have available at home. For example, you prepared jam, pickled cucumbers and greens for the winter, and buckwheat, semolina and cocoa were purchased recently and are enough for the planned number of dishes. We will not include them in our list. And so on for all positions.

Our task is to optimize food costs. Now, thanks to the fact that we have compiled a menu for the month with a complete list of products, it is easy. If the amount received is too large, we change one or more dishes to more economical ones.

Well, then we go shopping and, at our own discretion: we buy everything at once, leaving a small amount for the purchase of bread, dairy products and fruits, or we write a menu for the week and buy groceries for the week plus, partially, for semi-finished products.

In any case, you will benefit - either money for food has been set aside, or food has been purchased for the month. And the question that some careless housewives ask, “The money has run out, what should I cook?” will not arise.

Creating a menu and purchasing groceries for a week or a month will protect you from such problems and help you save on food. Saving is easy

On the topic of rich, wealthy, middle class people, poor and beggars, we began to notice a trend that most people in our country do not at all reach a decent standard of living. Despite the fact that we consider ourselves not poor people and even “average” to our friends and neighbors, it is obvious that we should admit that our standard of living is not quite high.

Therefore, the issue of saving personal finances in each individual family arises more or less acutely. After all, by reducing their expenses, the family acquires new opportunities for savings, recreation, and making necessary purchases.

For the sake of reliability and adjustment of the family’s financial plan, do an interesting study for yourself: collect food receipts for several months or write down these amounts in a notebook. This includes buying food in the supermarket, market and store, eating out: restaurants and cafes, buying cakes and other things for going to friends, lunches and snacks at work, school breakfasts, etc.

This action has two beneficial effects: you find out the exact amount of food costs and begin to understand the structure of your payments. As a rule, completely useless purchases are discovered.

So, we have received some results from our research. Now we find out the share of food costs in total family income. For example, the joint income of mom and dad for the month amounted to 50 thousand rubles, food costs for the same month for a family of four amounted to 25 thousand rubles. As a result, 50% of the family budget was spent on feeding the family. Record your result.

Now let's find out what the correct result should be. Many financial advisors, economists, and thrifty housewives recognize almost the same option for proportional division of expenses and consider it correct if family expenses on food amount to about 20% of income. Well, if you can achieve 10% or less, you obviously have something to congratulate.

Please note that we are talking here not only about reducing food costs as much as possible, sometimes to the detriment of the family, but about the percentage. You shouldn’t switch to eating only potatoes and pasta to get the desired 10%. In fact, you will need to significantly increase your income. In a word, completely reconsider the structure of the family’s finances.

The same goes for families with high incomes and expenses. If the family income is 400 thousand rubles per month, and food expenses are 200 thousand rubles, then the overall result will be equal to the previous example - this is fundamentally not a rational approach to building a family budget.

The information portal “Motherhood.ru” offers a series of articles on how you can significantly reduce food costs without compromising the quality of food.

Today we will talk about chicken meat. This is the most common and economical version of the meat base for various dishes.

Have you ever thought about how many dishes can be prepared from one chicken? How much do you get?

The main saving effect is that we buy whole chicken, and not already cut semi-finished products (drums, thighs, breasts). Naturally, any work on cutting up a chicken carcass, sorting and laying it out costs money. Therefore, such sets are initially more expensive than whole chicken.

I buy three chickens at once weighing about one and a half kilograms. This way, time costs are compensated with great effect. You can take five or seven pieces - depending on the needs of your family.

The time required for preparing semi-finished products is an average of two hours.

Actions step by step:

1. I cut up chicken carcasses as follows:
-separately 6 chicken wings;
-for minced meat, I separate the meat from the legs and the white meat from the chicken breasts;
- I leave the white meat from one chicken breast separately;
-I divide the back part into two horizontally.

2. I fry or bake chicken wings in the oven, or freeze them for later use.

3. I pass the chicken meat through a meat grinder. I leave a few pieces of minced meat without additives. I freeze it in portions, each piece is about the size of one to one and a half cutlets.

4. Add onion, dry white bread, eggs, salt and pepper to taste to the minced meatballs.

Minced chicken has one feature - it is quite liquid. If you put bread in it, previously soaked in milk, then you will not be able to form cutlets from such minced meat; they will not hold their shape. Therefore, we add something dry that will “take” excess moisture from the minced meat - dry bread, oatmeal or semolina. It is worth taking into account the peculiarity of cereals. So, for example, with the addition of oatmeal, the cutlets will acquire a slightly sweet taste. Potatoes as an additive to chicken cutlets are also not suitable, because they will release additional liquid.

5. I form soup sets from the remaining raw materials. I freeze it in portions according to the needs of the family.

As a result, from three chickens you get:
. set for frying chicken wings (other small pieces of chicken can be added here if desired) - 1 serving;
. depending on the size of the formed cutlets and the volume of “additives” in them - 30-40 pieces;
. pieces of minced meat for navy-style pasta, preparation of meat sauces and pastes - 3-4 pieces;
. white meat, which can be fried with onions and carrots for a kind of chicken pilaf - 1 serving;
. Soup sets, depending on the desired volume of the resulting broth - 5-10 sets.

So, from three chickens we got several different independent dishes, including the first and second.

With such “waste-free production” we received these food products for approximately 450-550 rubles (120 rubles * 3 chickens * weighing 1.5 kg = 540 rubles).

Let's return to the main question: what can you cook from one chicken? We divide our result by three. The cost of these dishes is about 200 rubles.

The economic impact is obvious. You just have to have the desire and time to prepare semi-finished products from whole chicken. Subsequently, the cooking time for the final dish is significantly reduced. After all, we no longer butcher, wash, or clean up after ourselves. It is enough to remove the required amount of semi-finished products from the freezer and cook.

What kind of chicken dishes do you cook? Which of them can be classified as economical?

We wish you success in your practice as a thrifty housewife!

Photo - photobank Lori

You can freeze not only dumplings and cutlets, but also pies, stuffed pancakes and even broths for soups. Below you will find 10 original dishes suitable for freezing. But before moving on to the recipes, a little theory.

In the freezer -18 ºС. At this temperature, the action of microorganisms stops - frozen food for a long time without losing its taste. How much exactly? Considering that we constantly look into the freezer, that is, temperature changes occur, food slightly thaws and freezes again, no more than two months.

Some foods are not suitable for freezing. For example, zucchini, cucumbers and other watery vegetables. After defrosting, almost all the flavor leaves them along with the moisture. Lettuce leaves lose their texture, and raw potatoes take on an unpleasant aftertaste.

You need to know how to freeze and defrost food. The colder the dish is before going into the freezer, the better. If foods have been heat-treated, it is recommended to first cool them at room temperature, then keep them in the refrigerator and only then freeze them.

Thawing should be done in the reverse order: take the dish out of the freezer, place it on a tray and put it in the refrigerator for 10–12 hours. Slow thawing allows food to absorb moisture lost during freezing. This way the taste is preserved as much as possible. But, if you don’t have time, you can use the defrosting function in the microwave.

Vacuum bags, plastic and glass trays are used to store food in the freezer. Bags with zip locks are convenient when it is not necessary to maintain the shape of the dish: they significantly save space in the freezer. Plastic containers can be taken with you to work, they are convenient for heating lunch in the microwave, and glass trays are ideal for cooking in the oven, since there is no need to transfer the dish from dish to dish.

Debbie R/Flickr.com

Muffins are a sweet pastry, but if you use ham and cheese as a filling instead of chocolate and fruit, you can get hearty mini-buns for breakfast. They take little time to prepare, and after freezing and reheating, they are just as delicious as piping hot.

Ingredients:

• 3–4 pieces of bread;
• 3-4 slices of ham;
• 100 g cheddar or other hard cheese;
• 8 eggs;
• 1 glass of milk;
• 2 teaspoons mustard powder;
• 1 teaspoon ground pepper;
• dried parsley and other spices to taste.

Preparation

Cut the bread and ham into thin strips. Grate the cheese on a coarse grater. Fill the muffin tins about two-thirds full with this filling.

In a separate bowl, whisk eggs, milk, mustard powder and pepper. Pour the resulting mixture into the mold. But not to the edges, otherwise the muffins will run away during baking. Sprinkle each cell of the mold with dried parsley and other seasonings to your taste.

Preheat the oven to 200 ºС. Bake the muffins for 15–20 minutes. Let them cool, then put them in a plastic container and put them in the freezer.

Julia Frost/Flickr.com

In the morning you can get the required number of buns, heat them in the microwave and get a quick, satisfying, and most importantly, tasty breakfast.

cupcakesandkalechips.com

Ideal for breakfast, nutritious and healthy. It provides about 20% of the daily value of fiber and protein, contains a lot of essential nutrients and helps control appetite. If you are too lazy to bother with preparing porridge in the morning, there is a solution - frozen oatmeal cups with various fillings (fruits, nuts, dried fruits, etc.).

Ingredients:

• 2 cups oatmeal;
• 3 glasses of milk or water (optional);
• 1 tablespoon honey;
• 30 g butter;
• a pinch of salt;
• fruits, berries, chocolate, nuts, dried fruits and other fillings.

Preparation

In a small saucepan, bring the milk to a boil. Add oatmeal and mix thoroughly. Reduce heat to low and simmer porridge for 5–7 minutes until thickened. Stir constantly. Remove the oatmeal from the heat, add a knob of butter and a spoonful of honey, mix well. Let cool slightly.

Grease a muffin tin with vegetable oil and place the porridge among the cells. Sprinkle some filling on top of each serving. This could be diced bananas, raspberries, raisins, flaked coconut - whatever you like to eat your oatmeal with.

Wrap the pan in cling film and freeze. When the cups are well set, remove them from the mold and wrap them individually in film. This will significantly save space in the freezer.

Remove the required number of cups from the freezer the night before to easily have a healthy and delicious breakfast in the morning. Just heat the porridge in the microwave. Add milk if necessary.

Barbara Krawcowicz/Flickr.com

Frozen stuffed peppers work almost as well as dumplings or dumplings. If you know you have a busy day ahead and won't have time to cook, take the peppers out of the freezer the day before. They will thaw overnight in the refrigerator, all you have to do is put them in the oven.

Ingredients:

• 8 bell peppers;
• 700 g minced beef;
• 250 g rice;
• 250 g tomato sauce;
• 1 onion;
• 2 cloves of garlic;
• hard cheddar cheese;
• salt and pepper to taste.

Preparation

Wash the peppers, cut off the tops to create “cups”, the inner cavity from the seeds. The cut caps can be crumbled and used in the filling.

Peel the onion and garlic and chop finely. Combine ground beef (you can use ground turkey instead of ground beef), rice, peppers, onion, garlic and tomato sauce. Salt and pepper to taste. Stuff the peppers with this. Sprinkle grated cheese on top.

In this form, the peppers can already be frozen. When you need to cook them, defrost and bake in the oven at 180 ºС for 30–40 minutes.

budgetbytes.com

What to take for lunch or? For many, this is a daily headache. This recipe will help diversify the contents of your lunchbox. The ingredients are simple, the preparation is easy.

Ingredients:

• 1.5 kg of potatoes;
• 500 g salsa sauce;
• 500 g hard cheese (for example, cheddar);
• 50 g butter;
• 9 eggs;
• 1 tablespoon olive oil;
• 1 teaspoon paprika;
• ½ teaspoon garlic powder;
• ½ teaspoon salt;
• ground black pepper to taste.

Preparation

Wash the potatoes and cut into cubes. If it is young, you don’t even have to peel it. Add paprika, garlic powder, salt and pepper to the bowl with the potato cubes and add olive oil. Mix everything thoroughly. Place the potatoes in a single layer on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and place in the oven preheated to 200 ºC for 45–60 minutes. Stir the potatoes about halfway through cooking.

While it's cooking, make the omelette. To do this, break the eggs into a bowl and lightly beat them with a whisk. Melt the butter in a frying pan and carefully pour in the eggs. Remove the omelette from the heat a couple of minutes before it’s ready; the eggs should still be a little runny.

Divide the potatoes into containers. Add 2-3 tablespoons of salsa or any other sauce of your choice to each of them. Divide the omelette into portions and sprinkle with grated cheese.

budgetbytes.com

With this amount of ingredients you will get six office lunches. Store them in the freezer, and when necessary, take a container with you, heat them in the microwave and enjoy excellent country-style potatoes.

Scott/Flickr.com

Short pasta in the form of corrugated tubes with diagonally cut edges is called penne. You can use them and ground beef to make a delicious casserole, which will help out if you don't have time for dinner. You can take it to work for lunch.

Ingredients:

• 1 kg minced beef;
• 800 g of tomatoes in their own juice;
• 500 g penne pasta;
• 400 g marinara sauce;
• 400 g ricotta;
• 400 g mozzarella;
• 1 large onion;
• 1 egg;
• 3 cloves of garlic;
• 2 teaspoons of Italian herb mixture;
• ½ teaspoon coarsely ground red pepper (flakes);
• salt and black pepper to taste.

Preparation

Peel and finely chop the onion and garlic. Fry them in olive oil. Then add ground beef to them. Fry it, stirring constantly, until excess moisture evaporates. When the minced meat is browned, pour the tomatoes in their own juice and marinara sauce into the pan (if you don’t have it on hand, you can use any other tomato sauce). Add spices: Italian mixture, red and black pepper, salt. Simmer for half an hour. After 30 minutes, transfer a third of the sauce from the pan to a separate bowl. Cool.

Also, in a separate bowl, combine the ricotta, grated mozzarella (save some cheese for sprinkling) and eggs. Salt, pepper, whisk until smooth.

Boil the pasta. Rinse them under cold running water. Mix with minced meat and cheese. Place everything in a glass container. Pour in the remaining tomato-meat sauce and sprinkle with grated cheese.

Thrivinghomeblog.com

You must use a glass container so that when you take the casserole out of the freezer, you can immediately put it in the oven. Bake at a temperature of 190 ºС. Moreover, if you put the casserole in the oven straight from the freezer, the cooking time will be 2–2.5 hours. Therefore, it is better to first defrost the dish in the microwave or naturally, on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator.

Nikki G/Flickr.com

Taquitos are a Mexican dish made from stuffed corn tortillas. This recipe is a salvation for those times when everyone is hungry, but there is no time to cook and nothing to cook with. In just 15 minutes you will have dinner on your table no worse than a restaurant one.

Ingredients:

• 15 corn tortillas;
• 500 g chicken breast;
• 250 g cream cheese;
• 170 g salsa verde sauce;
• 4 tablespoons chopped cilantro;
• 2 tablespoons lime juice;
• 1 teaspoon onion powder;
• ¼ teaspoon garlic powder;
• 1 ½ teaspoons chili powder;
• ¾ teaspoon cumin;
• vegetable oil for frying and greasing.

Preparation

Cut the chicken breast into strips and fry in vegetable oil until golden brown. Mix cream cheese with cilantro, lime juice and spices (cumin, onion, garlic powder and chili powder). Since the dish is Mexican, Pepper Jack cheese goes well with taquitos. It has a creamy taste with slightly tart notes. But you can use other semi-soft varieties.

You can make your own tortillas or buy them ready-made. In the latter case, first microwave the tortillas for 1-2 minutes so that they are soft and do not break when folded.

Place chicken and cheese mixture on tortillas. Add some salsa verde. Read about how to prepare it at home. Roll the tortillas into a log.

Preheat the oven to 220 ºС. Line a baking sheet with foil and spray with vegetable oil. Place the rolls on it so that the edges are down and they do not touch each other. Bake for 15–20 minutes.

Happymoneysaver.com

Once the taquitos are baked and cool, place them in a zip-lock freezer bag and place them in the freezer. In a situation where “everyone is hungry, but there is no time to cook and nothing to cook with,” place the rolls again on a baking sheet, lightly sprinkle with vegetable oil and heat in the oven for 10–15 minutes.

Arnaud Dessein/ Flickr.com

Nuggets are usually associated with fast food, but they can be the basis for a second one for lunch or dinner. When you don't have time to fry the cutlets, remove them from the freezer and reheat the nuggets. As a side dish, you can boil pasta or make mashed potatoes.

Ingredients:

• 1 ½ kg chicken fillet;
• 200 g flour;
• 200 g corn flakes;
• 5 eggs;
• 1 tablespoon paprika.

Preparation

Rinse the meat, dry it and cut it into small pieces about 3–5 cm long. Grind the corn flakes in a blender. Mix flour and paprika in a separate bowl. Also whisk the eggs separately.

Dip each piece of chicken first in flour, then in eggs and finally in cereal. Do this carefully if you want the nuggets to have a real crunch. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and place the breaded chicken pieces on it. Bake the nuggets in the oven at 180 ºC for 15–20 minutes.

Once the nuggets have cooled, place them in a sealed plastic bag and place it in the freezer. It is useful to label frozen food packages. Indicate the name of the dish and the date of preparation.

Julia Frost/Flickr.com

Meatballs are an Italian dish made from minced meat balls. They are similar to meatballs and meatballs, but neither. Meatballs are usually stewed, meatballs are boiled in broth, and meatballs are baked in the oven (Italian version) or deep-fried (American version). Meatballs are a great solution for those who don’t have the time or desire to stand at the stove. It's tasty and satisfying. Meatballs can be eaten as a separate dish or served with a side dish.

Ingredients:

• 1 kg minced beef;
• 200 g breadcrumbs;
• 200 g ricotta;
• 2 eggs;
• 5 tablespoons of olive oil;
• parsley, salt, pepper and other spices to taste.

Preparation

Mix all ingredients in a large bowl. Ricotta can be replaced with thick sour cream, but it is better to use minced beef: pork is too fatty for this dish.

Julie Magro/Flickr.com

Form the resulting minced meat into balls about 5 cm in diameter. Place them in a container, wrap it in foil and freeze. Meatballs should be baked at 180 ºС for 20–30 minutes.

Stew with chicken and vegetables - preparation for multicooker

Thehumbledhomemaker.com

Significantly simplifies life: put in groceries, press a button and go about your business. And if, in addition, you freeze the preparation, where all the ingredients have already been washed and cut, then the time savings becomes even more noticeable.

Ingredients:

• 1 kg chicken fillet;
• 2 bell peppers;
• 1 onion;
• 2 cloves of garlic;
• 1 tablespoon honey;
• 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar;
• 1 tablespoon chili powder;
• 2 teaspoons cumin;
• 1 teaspoon paprika.

Preparation

Wash the chicken and cut into strips. Also wash the pepper, remove seeds and chop. Peel and chop the onion and garlic.

Take a ziplock bag and add all the ingredients, including honey and apple cider vinegar. Release as much air as possible from the bag. Freeze. When needed, defrost the bag, pour its contents into the slow cooker and simmer the stew for 3-6 hours. You can do all the manipulations in the morning so that in the evening, when you come home from work, you can enjoy a delicious dinner.

N i c o l a/Flickr.com

Guests are on the doorstep, and there’s a ball rolling in the refrigerator? For such a case, it’s a good idea to have a pizza preparation. Remove the foil and cling film, and after 15 minutes a delicious treat is on your table. Pizza dough, of course, can be bought at the store. But homemade tastes better.

Ingredients

For the test:

• 200 ml hot water;
• 2–3 cups flour;
• 2 tablespoons olive oil;
• 1 tablespoon honey;
• 1 ½ teaspoons dry yeast;
• ½ teaspoon salt;
• 1 teaspoon each of a mixture of Italian herbs and garlic powder (optional).

Filling option:

• chicken fillet;
• salami;
• olives.

Preparation

Dissolve a spoonful of honey in hot water, then add yeast and let stand for 5-7 minutes. Pour in the olive oil, add salt and seasonings if you decide to use them. Mix well. Carefully gradually add flour and knead the dough. Cover the bowl with the dough with a towel and leave for half an hour. The dough should rise and double in volume.

Roll out the dough. You can make small portioned pizzas (it’s easier to store), or you can make one large circle. Bake the dough without (!) filling at a temperature of 220 ºС for 7–8 minutes.

Remove the future pizza from the oven, let it cool slightly and brush with sauce. It can be anything, such as alfredo, barbecue, or just ketchup and mayonnaise. Place the filling on top. It also depends on your imagination and the products at hand. Don't forget to sprinkle with grated cheese!

Wrap the semi-finished pizza in cling film and then in foil and freeze it. When guests arrive, place the pizza in the oven for 15 minutes. All you need is for the filling to bake and the cheese to melt.

Bon appetit!

Write in the comments what foods and dishes you freeze.

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