What I Keep In My Freezer

What do I keep in our freezer? That is a good question. I have to admit, I have quite a wide variety of foods in our freezer, but all for a purpose. Freezing food allows for QUICK and EASY meals, with less prep time because many of the items are either cut up or made and just need to be heated up. I am all about efficiency and this is where our freezer is a key component!

Here is a sample list of what we keep on our freezer:

Meat

Beef - hamburger (cook with taco seasoning for tacos), steaks, roasts

Chicken - mainly chicken breasts. If there is a sale on fresh chicken parts, I will buy a whole package of chicken and freeze each part in individual freezer bags, for easy cooking. Chicken is another item you can cook ahead of time and freeze.

Pork - we buy from a local butcher (cheaper) and have a wide variety of pork options. Ground pork sausage is our favorite for pig-in-the-blankets

Fish - rarely do we buy fish, but we are into fishing, so anything we will not eat within the next day or two, we freeze. We mainly have crappie and walleye in our freezer, which makes for a summery meal in the dead of winter!

Cheese

Sale on cheese? This girl definitely stocks up! I am known to buy 5 packages of each at a time, knowing full well, a sale like that might not occur again for a few months.

Bread

Hamburger/Hot dog buns - if frozen when they are still fresh, they will taste just as fresh taken out of the freezer, as the day you bought them.

Rolls - company is over and you bought one too many packages; freeze the other and heat in the microwave for a warm roll

Sliced bread - if a sale is calling my name, I just throw the extra into the freezer

Pizza dough - my homemade pizza dough recipe makes 2 lbs., so I use one and freeze the other. When we have a hankering for pizza, all I do is pull out the dough that week and thaw in the fridge.

Vegetables/Fruit

Corn - creamed corn (for chicken corn chowder), whole kernel corn, and corn on the cob (haven't perfected this yet)

Green beans - our garden in 2013 was filled to overflowing with beans, so instead of canning them all, I froze many of them, which we are still enjoying today

Black beans - making black beans in the crockpot was the way to go; if I need them for soup or beans and rice, all I need to do is pull out a container and then I don't have to worry about all of the preservatives

Zucchini - our town had an abundance of zucchini, so I took advantage of that and shredded numerous zucchini into 2 cup portions for zucchini bread

Strawberries/blueberries - pureeing, slicing, and freezing whole strawberries in specific portions is a must for smoothies, pies, and desserts. Freeze blueberries whole, for the same reasons!

Bananas - overripe bananas causing an eye sore and fruit flies? Freeze them (even though they will turn brown) and use them for banana bread, muffins, and smoothies

Desserts

Cookies - cookie dough AND already-made cookies are a must in our freezer. If company is company over and you want fresh-baked cookies, just take out your pre-made cookie dough and you will enjoy a bakery-style feeling right in your home. Don't even have time to bake them? Keep baked cookies in a container and take out as needed.

Bars - freeze by the pan or cut into individual servings and freeze in containers.

What are your favorite items to keep in your freezer?