In trying to crowd out foods with sketchy ingredients, I’ve completely eliminated the need for canned cream of… soups in our diet. I make them myself. However, I don’t like to make them each time I need them. A girl needs her convenience!
Since it doesn’t freeze well on its own, the solution that makes the most sense for our family right now is to work our meals around the soup, thereby making the most out of my efforts. I’ll make a batch of cream of mushroom soup on Monday and use it three times this week. I might even double a couple of the recipes to stash in the freezer for later.
Sunday, May 9
- scrambled eggs with ham and cheese, blueberry crumb muffins
- grilled ribeye, baked potatoes, lettuce salad
- popcorn/smoothies
Weekday Breakfast: eggs (scrambled/fried) with toast or muffins, breakfast burritos (in the freezer), lazy granola, fruit
Weekday Lunch: leftovers, sandwiches (pb&j or grilled cheese), fresh fruit and veggies, pizza, quesadillas
Suppers: (recipes coming!)
- beef stroganoff, green beans, applesauce
- tator tot casserole, peas, fruit
- skillet enchiladas, tossed salad
- sandwiches/chips/fruit/snacks for the track meet
- leftovers/snacks to tide us over before high school graduation. We’ve been invited to several receptions afterward… lots of yummy food to be had!
What homemade convenience foods do you regularly make yourself? Any tricks to make them more… convenient?
OrgJunkie is the place to be for hundreds of menu plans each week!
Happy Mother’s Day! Your Tater Tot Casserole is on the menu for Monday night this week.
Would love the recipe for your cream of mushroom!
Love the blog, btw! Happy Mother’s Day ♥
Just click on the red links that say “cream of mushroom” and it will take you to the recipe. Enjoy!
Hmm, I froze my cream of mushroom soup and it seemed to come through fine. Not sure how it differs from your recipe (mostly because I can’t remember what recipe I used…) Your way is good too, though! :>)
I’m leery of the whole milk separating thing… but since I only use it for cooking, it probably would be just fine.
Do you have a recipe for skillet enchiladas? (Is it different from the usual baked kind?) That sounds good!
Hope you have a great week!
Blessings,
Michele
Posting it next week!
It looks like another delicious week:-)
The granola looks great! So easy to add things like almonds, cranberries, currants, etc.
Cook once a month ot three. I just finished up 80 meals last weekend. That way I cook everything from scratch all at once.
80 meals! That is amazing!
I make my own ‘cream of’ soup as well. Basically I follow the recipe at Tammysrecipes and just make it with chicken stock/broth (that I make with bones/carcass). Then I divide up and freeze in about 2 cup portions. Since I only use it as an ingredient in things that are being baked it does fine. It would probably be as good just as soup or in something that didn’t bake, but I find freezing it to be very, very helpful!
I also make up my pizza dough ingredients into containers or baggies so I can just throw it all in the bread maker with the oil and water and hit the dough start button. Then I divide it in two, one gets made and the other goes in the freezer. The next week I just thaw it out, roll it out and pizza is really quick. By making about 6 recipes worth at a time I only get out and put away the multiple ingredients one time in about 2 months. Before the baby comes I’ll probably freeze 6 or more balls of pizza crust dough to use for pizza, stromboli, calzones or whatever. (Along with like 4,370 other meals..I’m on a kick!). Either way it saves me a lot of time and makes homemade easier!
Heather
That’s a great idea with the pizza dough. Actually, any “ready mix” would be super handy! I might need to do that before our next baby arrives.
So maybe this defeats the purpose of convenience but…what about canning your cream of soups? When prepping the mushrooms for your cream of mushroom do you think it is ok to wait until that last second before you think the mushrooms have to be thrown away to saute them for freezing or is it better to do it when they are truly fresh? I usually can finish my mushrooms but occasionally I have a handful I have to throw out. I’m thinking this could be the perfect solution.
Outing my canning ignorance… can that be done?
I do saute all of my mushrooms and keep them in the freezer for when I’m ready to make soup, though. Works like a charm.
I just blogged about making a big batch of yogurt in the crockpot.
http://starvingstudentsurvivor.blogspot.com/2010/05/crockpot-yogurt.html
That is something I haven’t tried yet. Need to take the plunge!
I just made your cream of mushroom soup this weekend, and plan to use it in a crockpot recipe tomorrow. Yum!!!