Huzzah and Question

[hkellick]

Huzzah! The work at BWI is finished! It's opening today!
Huzzah!
Good timing. Gotta book July 4th Tickets soon.

OK, my question..
I need help from people who do much cooking and/or freezing.
I'm trying to figure out a way to make salads easier.
One of the ideas I just had, and I want to test this through people with more experience is... buy a whole bunch of vegetables, cut them up, portion them and stick them in a bunch of freezer bags.
Then freeze them.
I'm thinking: carrot, celery, onion, peppers, mushrooms, sprouts, broccolli, cauliflower, radishes.. if I can find some, some green peas.
And some already cooked chicken (Yay Foreman Grill! :D)
Does anyone see any issues with this plan? Will I have any problem freezing any of these?

Thanks in advance!

EDIT: OK, upon further thinking the carrots, celery, onion, sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower and radishes should be Ok cut up for a week.
The mushrooms and green peppers could get slimy, though.
I may need to consider taking them out and just sticking with vegetables that would be OK pre-cut for a week in my fridge.

Comments

[kiwiria.livejournal.com]

Carrots, celery and onions, no problems at all. I'm not too sure about the rest. I'd be hesitant to try to freeze mushrooms if they aren't to be cooked afterwards, and have no clue how peppers, sprouts, broccolli and cauliflower will react. Radishes and green peas should be fine too.

[dawnstar.livejournal.com]

Anything that has a lot of water to it probably won't freeze well. (ie lettuce, cucumber, etc.) I would probably put celery in that category too, but the above poster seemed to think it would work and I've never tried it, so I could be wrong on that one.

I'm not sure what you mean by making the salad "easier," either. If you can elaborate on that, I might be able to have some ideas.

[kiwiria.livejournal.com]

Well, I've never tried it either, so I might also very well be wrong. I think the best idea is to freeze a little bit of everything and then see how they defreeze.

[lite.livejournal.com]

What I'm thinking is...
I'm going to try to flip and have my big meal at lunch and a smaller meal at dinner.
I'm doing this under the assumption of coming home late and drained.
I'm looking for quick and easy ways to have something filling. One idea that occured was salads. Salads can be filling, but are lighter than my usual dinner fare.
Unfortunately, it's a big PITA to cut this and that and this and that every day.
I'm looking to make the process of getting salads at night a matter of putting some salads in a bowl and then dumping in alot of already presliced vegetables.
hence my idea of freezing things. My idea was.. I'd take a bag of veggies out before I left to defrost, go to work, come home, dump the lettuce in a bowl, dump the thawed veggies on top, add dressing and enjoy.

[dawnstar.livejournal.com]

Why not just get a big bowl and make a big salad at the beginning of the week, to then carry yourself through the rest of the week? That seems simpler, less wasteful (with all those plastic bags), and you don't run the risk of anything not freezing well.

[lite.livejournal.com]

My major concern is that by Friday, everything would be nasty, soggy, and brown.

Any idea how to get the salad to last, pre-cut and ready, for a few days?

Willing to look into large tupperware (or glassware with a top like my grandma has) container, if people think it might work.

[lainiest.livejournal.com]

I honestly doubt you can get salad to last several days without some sort of preservation method. Like..
Well, you could get a jerky machine and make salad jerky.
But even plastic wrap and all that craps out pretty fast with veggies.
I don't eat salad that much. z_z Generally dad just gets it in bags from the grocery store.

[lite.livejournal.com]

That was my concern, yeah.
Kind of why I'd considered the idea of freezing some of this stuff.
Not the salad itself, that'd make it brown faster, but maybe some of the vegetables.

Also, you're right about the carrots. Alot of the vegetables might be OK for a week. But some, like the green peppers, probably not. They grow slimy quickly. :p

[coderlemming.livejournal.com]

The only thing in your list that's not going to like to survive for a week in salad form is the greens themselves. The rest, you can slice up and keep in tupperware. As for the greens, I've heard of a method where you wash them and store them in a paper-towel-lined tupperware, mostly along the sides. This soaks up the water and prevents it from causing the greens to wilt. I've never tried it. Anyway, of course, the key is that you _don't_ put the dressing on, not until you're right about to eat it.

I think you should be able to do this stuff fine, without even bothering to freeze. Just pull the greens prepared as above out, tear them up (a quick process) and toss them in a bowl with your veggies and chicken. Take a bottle of dressing with you to work, and you're all set.

Btw, a quick way to extend a salad and make it more exciting is to add small cubes of cheese. Try pepper jack for a little kick.

[lite.livejournal.com]

I usually added shredded cheese, but otherwise yeah.
And unsalted sunflower seeds, as much for the protein as for the crunch :)

[lainiest.livejournal.com]

Oh, and you shouldn't have to freeze carrots. Just having them in the fridge should be fine if it's just for a few days.

[peachtess.livejournal.com]

You might want to consider mixing it up a little more for dinners. A salad every night will get boring really quick. Maybe make some soups or buy them premade in the cans and have that some nights. Soups are fairly healthy and its a light and quick meal. Also precooked chicken, frozen veggies that you defrost and cook in the microwave, and those instant side microwavable bags of rice will make a meal up really quick as well.
So I would suggest premaking the salad and having that early in the week and then move to other things later on in the week.

[lite.livejournal.com]

You know.. I honestly keep forgetting that.

Since you bring it up, I DID, at one point, have some of these thoughts. I was going to look into pre-baking some potatoes so that I could have them as a side, look into using my foreman grill more this summer (especially summer) for hot dogs, hamburgers, shiskabob etc.
Look into frozen meals or piergoies (num, pierogies) and such.
Soup and a sandwhich (Mmm. GRilled Cheese) is a good choice too.

The trick with using my microwave is.. I need to replace it. Bugs have started inhabitting it and, frankly, it's too creepy to ever really consider using.
You've read Pratchett, right? My microwave is sort of like Dwarf Bread. It's to have. It's to remind myself why I don't use it.
Really, I should dump it since i'm so paranoid about using it.

Thanks for reminding me not to go overboard, though :)

[phoenixsong]

If you do ditch the microwave, you could replace it with the homemade trap 3/4 of the way down the page. Looking for others that are non-toxic, since it'll only get worse as the summer progresses. s:P~

[lite.livejournal.com]

I really SHOULD just ditch it. I am paranoid about actually putting something in there.

[phoenixsong]

That'd be two of us, kid s:P~

[lite.livejournal.com]

Who you calling kid, kid? I'm older than you, dorkus.

[coderlemming.livejournal.com]

Oh, I guess maybe I misunderstood and thought the salads were for lunch in the above comment. Anyway, I run into this problem too -- too tired to cook something big for dinner. The best trick I've come up with is to pretend I'm cooking for like 5 or 6 people every once in awhile (think weekends here). Making tacos? Make 10-20 of them. Making enchiladas? Make a whole heck of a lot. Making lasagna? Go wild. You'll end up eating it all soon.

[lite.livejournal.com]

I've been doing some of that.. keeping leftovers in my freezer and specifically cooking some dishes I know we won't eat all of to stock up the freezer now.
Apparently (I didn't specifically plan it like this) this week is crockpot week... I plan to prep four crock pot meals, with leftovers that will go into the freezer.
That's why I need to get some new gladware containers tonight.

[phoenixsong]

If you can, go for the Rubbermaid -- thicker plastic. More expensive, yes, but it'll last.

[lite.livejournal.com]

I can probably look into a few rubbermaids this time, yeah.

[blackfelicula.livejournal.com]

I realize that I'm somewhat picky in my cooking, but my opinion is that it would take a stalwart soul to enjoy thawed-out frozen salad. Though many veggies survive the process of freezing, flavor and texture are never the same after. It would likely resemble wilty salad. The quickest way to do salad on the go are those salad-in-a-bag thingies. My recommendation would echo those who say cut up some harder veggies and pre-cooked meat and store them in tupperware. Then you can add rough-torn greens, canned beans, and other toppings the day you use them.

If you're interested in heartier fare-on-the-go, you could make a giant weekend batch of rice-with-taco-seasoning and beans, or other hearty filler, and keep the supplies for assembling tacos/ burritos / enchiladas on hand. Nummy stuff that is filling and can last for days if necessary.