Get ready to be inspired because I'm going to teach you how to freeze time. I'm currently orchestrating a winter that won't include making dinners or cleaning up after making dinners. I'll let you get the smelling salts after that revelation before we continue.
Every summer it's the same. I grow, I freeze, I preserve, I plop. It's a setup for my winter ahead. Instead of cooking most nights, I will have long winter evenings filled tv shows, dog walks and snow more cooking.
Courtesy of the garden. But it could also be courtesy of a sale at the grocery store. Or courtesy of this little bit of dinner prep inspiration.
This post is also an answer to the most popular question I get from people which is - what do I do with all the vegetables I grow?
The answer is, I eat some of what I grow during the actual growing season but most of it gets stored, cooked, frozen, canned or otherwise preserved for the rest of the year.
Why? Because I have no choice. A lot of my vegetables are good in cold storage, like squash, potatoes, onions and carrots. Everything else needs to be dealt with as soon as I harvest it.
Like green beans. I just canned some green beans this week as a matter of food fact. They're the easiest of all the vegetables to can.
As I was doing my first snow cook this week, I realized I don't think I've ever told you about how all summer long as various crops become harvestable, I turn them into winter meals and freeze them.
I barely have to cook at all in the winter. With the vegetables I harvest all summer, I make precooked side dishes, soups, and entrees. Even desserts.
This is one of the dishes I make with the vegetables I grow with the star ingredient being broccoli.
Broccoli Burritos
From the Thug Kitchen cookbook (now known as Bad Manners)
Garden Ingredients: Broccoli, onions, garlic
Homemade garden spices: homemade garlic powder, homemade onion powder, homemade cayenne pepper, homemade pepper flakes, smoked paprika, ground coriander
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Had to buy 'em ingredients: Chickpeas*, red peppers**, lime***
* I tried growing my own chickpeas twice. I'd need to dedicate my entire life to chickpeas to grow enough for a burrito.
** My peppers aren't red yet, they're still green.
*** Check back with me after another couple years of climate change.
First I grow the vegetable. In this case we're looking at a shining example of purple broccoli heads cut up into florets.
All the broccoli gets chopped up along with the other vegetables, slathered in spices and then roasted.
Please enjoy these terrible photos of the winter meal prep process I took on a whim.
The recipe is from the Thug Kitchen cookbook (now known as Bad Manners) and I've been making it every winter for almost a decade.
Based on the amount of broccoli I wanted to use up, I doubled the recipe which got me 8 cups of burrito filling. I use half a cup per serving, plus cheese, homemade refried black beans, yes from beans I grew, sour cream, cilantro, avocado, and more to make a huge - you need to take a rest break in the middle of it - burrito.
8 cups of filling = 16 meals
TIP
Keep 16 tortillas in your freezer too so you have them when the time comes.
They're delicious. If I'm going to eat something 16 times over the winter (or even year if I want) it has to be delicious otherwise I'll just reach right over it for the pizzas I froze.
The really great thing about pre-making this burrito filling is everything you put on it as a topping will be fresh and not frozen so it doesn't feel like a freezer meal.
One hour of work for 16 winter meals, 16 nights of not cleaning up, 16 days of not windering what I'll make for dinner.
That frees up space in my winter schedule for bar fights, carousing and competitive gloating.
I'm going to say this once again. You can make dinner for 16 winter nights in one hour. Snow more cooking, today's inspirational tip from me to you.
Wendy
I am quite inspired by your snow more cooking! What I need help with is, exactly how do you freeze all of these things? More specifically what kind of containers do you use? Aluminum pans? Silicone bags? Help me!
Karen
Good point! I do use certain things to hold certain things. For soup, I use freezer bags with the air pushed out and pressed flat so I can stack them. To remove the soup I crack it into quarters and pull it out of the bag into a pot to heat. Then I wash the bag and reuse it for more frozen soup. Other things go in mason jars and other things (like entire meals) go into aluminum TV dinner pans (which I buy on Amazon). I could probably do a whole post on it. I could probably write a little ebook on it all actually! ~karen
Linfy
Well, I'll be damned. I realize that my brain hasn't yet fully rewired to assist my communication skills, but I'm having a wretched problem here, Karen. All I'm getting is pictures and references to the wonderful 16 meals one time prep without any directions to follow at all. I tried clicking on everything through out the post, but no link happens so I'm left wondering what the recipe entails for me to try preserving my own 16 meals of burritos. Is there a secret I missed while I was not accessing my favourite site such as this is now a paid subscription only site? I would completely understand this requirement naturally, but it would mean I never again get to go carousing at bars vicariously with you!!! That would be my extreme sacrifice, however one I will happily do for you Karen, because I do believe you're totally worth subscriptions and it just doesn't work on this wee budget of mine, bwhahaa. I had changed your site to my personal family and friends only email which may have been the trigger that caused the lack of access. However, I hope truly want the Cosmos to ensure that your future is always bright! Stay well and have fun doing so too. Thank you for many wonderful years.
Karen
Hi Linfy! I'm not sure what's going on. Maybe you just misunderstood what I was saying. The 16 meals are the 16 burrito fillings that I made and froze. The recipe for them is in the cookbook I linked to, but I just realized now that you might be able to find the recipe online on the Bad Manners website. ~ karen!
Linfy
Thank you so much Karen! I'm very happy to be able to browse my fave site as eye infections were dastardly for my reading, bwahaha. Stay well and above keep having fun so you can entertain us so well. Mwah!
Jo-Ann Pieber
Yeah. Probably should have read This post before my Last comment. I'm a freezer meal person too - just, I buy the stuff from the grocery store. But I love your recipes and combinations. And I Would grow broccoli, etc if I had the space. Ug.
Beth
I thought you wrote "competitive grooming". It made sense.
Karen
Ya, it kindda would. ~ karen!
Jody Farrand
Brilliant....snow brilliant.
Hettie
I laughed out loud at the "bar fights, carousing, and competitive gloating." Thanks for the burrito idea. I've got alotta vege to prep for winter too. I'm going to copy you. Again! :D
CathyR
Do you still have your outdoor pizza oven?
Karen
I do! I use it for winter meal prep as well. :) Mainly for roasting chickens with stuffing. ~ karen!
Helen
Wonderful stuff! More please? Meal prep followed by freezing has changed my life. However I'm always on the lookout for new recipes.
Terry
I’m looking to make some frozen, easy to reheat meals before knee replacement surgery. This looks perfect. Thanks
Karen
I just did a cheddar broccoli soup from Half Baked Harvest for freezing last night to use the last of my broccoli heads. It's excellent. ~ karen!
K.
Sounds nice : ) I love broccoli but haven't had a meatless broccoli burrito before, would love to try this.
Do you cook them all in the frying pan before you freeze them, or is that usually your method for heating the frozen ones for dinners in the future? Thanks!
Karen
Everything gets prepped and roasted together, then that gets frozen into portions, ready to put on a tortilla whenever I want. ~ karen!
Linnea
Oh my WORD, that looks so freakin' tasty
Karen
They're delicous. DELICIOUS! ~ karen!
Mary W
MORE - MORE - MORE I need MORE of that! I assume you freeze it in individual freezer bags? How do you do your refried beans? This looks so good and nutritious. There is no substitute for homemade garlic powder!
REBECCA SARTAIN
an FYI to Karen: the link above to the Amazon page to order the cookbook leads to a discontinued item. The book is still available through Amazon, but your link isn't directed to the right page.
Karen
Thanks Rebecca! I've updated it. ~ karen!
Genevieve Dee Gonsor
I like to cook and I can't be a vegetarian like the time.
Chris W.
I love doing stuff like this - usually ends up tasting really good and also appeals to my laziness! Actually, I'm not lazy but sometimes I just don't feel like cooking/cleaning up every night after dinner. Even though we don't have a beautiful garden like yours, you can still do this if you follow sales at the grocery store and take good notes of what you did. For me, that's key so I always know what I have on hand and in which freezer.
Sabina
I’m overwhelmed this year and not feeling the “put it up for winter” vibe; but, alas, I must! My eggplants are like Christmas trees dripping with ornaments; cherry tomatoes coming out of my ears; peppers and other tomatoes yet to ripen - oh my! I did manage to utilize my cucumbers in the form of relish and refrigerator pickles. I only grew bush beans this year and have gotten “just enough” to utilize fresh. Some of the carrots are starting to show their shoulders and I planted a late crop in place of the lettuce I just tore out. I also thwarted the dreaded squash vine borer and grew two new types of zucchini; and I have two bush variety of pumpkins I’m skeptically watching. May the garden gods cooperate this year! With a high temp of low 60’s predicted today I guess it’s time to get roasting!
Karen
I get it. Last night was supposed to be broccoli soup night but instead it turned into watch the Kingsman and eat potato chips night. ~ karen!
Lois Baron
Homemade garlic powder? wow. I had no idea.
Karen
I keep meaning to do a post on that. Maybe I will this week. :) ~ karen!
Hettie
Yes, please! I have so much garlic!
Randy P
I portion into single servings, vac seal and freeze most proteins I buy . Helps me make meal prep a snap. That veggie burrito sounds great if I add meat to it.
Karen
You 100% don't need to add meat. I mean, of course you can, because it's your kitchen, mouth and stomach. BUT by adding the refried beans and everything else, you really won't miss the meat. ~ karen!
Randyp
The list of things at which I excel is truly very short,but being a carnivore remains at the top. Lol
Kat - the other 1
Lol! I was just talking to mum last week after roasting a bunch of garden veg and chicken, best way to make veggies taste good is soak em in chicken fat! 😂
(Obviously not actually "soak," but at least toss with a spoon of drippings makes a huge difference in flavor. Cheese and breadcrumbs good too, except when stupid gluten and dairy allergies get in the way. But chicken fats' free of both. 😉)
I don't like veggies, gotta add good flavor somehow, lol.
Although cooking all of them till they turn into chips helps a lot with the flavor too.
Green bean chips, that and or with some chicken dripps is the only way I can stand them. The yellow ones do taste better though, less green flavor. 🤔