>When I have a crazy-busy week, it might look like this. Monday: evening meeting. Tuesday: IEP. Wednesday: lengthy staff meeting. Thursday: staff development. Friday: Bring daughter home for weekend. Saturday: collapse.
With all that in mind, we cook ahead.
As long as we have the grill fired up, we grill the evening’s hamburgers and a package of brats and several hot dogs for later.
When I dice the potatoes, I make twice as much as we need.
When I make our salads, I prep enough lettuce to feed us several more salads without fuss. If we have extra, Buttercup the bunny will eat it. Nothing will go to waste.
Last week was one of Those Weeks. In addition to all of this planning, I made a batch of Freezer Beef Mix. The container of browned ground beef will come out of the freezer some time for a quick batch of sloppy joes, spaghetti sauce, dirty rice, chili, or tacos. When the grocery store has a special on lean ground beef, we buy up and freeze it. I’ll often make a batch of this to pull out when time and energy are short.
Freezer Beef Mix
1 1/2 lb. ground beef
green pepper
red pepper
diced onion
Brown the ground beef with the peppers and onion. Drain and rinse. Place in freezer-safe container. Label!!
Thaw when needed for any dish that uses browned ground beef. The meat can be thawed in a microwave, in the refrigerator overnight, or even reheated from frozen with the desired sauce. How’s that for easy? If works for me!
>I always cook ahead too. It is so helpful in managing my time. I am always doubling recipes.
>NOTHING like sloppy joes on a busy night!
>The thing I have been freezing the most is pizzas. It’s nice to put out an organic frozen pizza on busy nights.
I also like to make up french bread pizzas and Italian loafs which I slice and put out a few at a time to go with dinner.