Meals from Raiding the Freezer

“And what meal shall I select from the freezer today?”

I’ve been on a self-imposed cooking haitus this week. I decided to scour the freezer for all the leftovers we had stockpiled in there from our snowbound two months, and discovered I had NO LESS than 8 meals in the freezer I decided we should heat up and eat before they were freezer burnt and long forgotten.

I made a list on our fridge white board we usually use for our shopping list, and have been gradually eating them and wiping them off. I can’t help but make meals for 4 to 6 or 8 people (some kind of hangup from growing up in a family of 8), and with my daughter gone most of the time, we simply can’t eat the same meal more than two nights in a row (or sometimes every other night). Many of these just needed a side salad, bread, or veggies/potatoes.

I have compiled for you my freezer list meals, along with links to the recipes for them. (Or similar recipes or part of one, and some are adaptations of prior recipes I’ve posted.) I’ll get back to more recipes and cooking soon! Enjoy!

Lasagna Soup

This freezes really well! Just as good, if not better later with loads more fresh-grated Parmesan cheese.

One-Pot Lasagna Soup

Beef Stroganoff

A classic with a healthy twist. No canned soups! The version in our freezer was a wonderful meal made with shredded cooked beef that my husband made instead of ground beef, but similar concept.

Homemade Ground Beef Stroganoff

Smoked Sausage and Tortellini Soup

Another Italian-based soup recipe that freezes well and gets the same raves as the day you made it!

Smoked Sausage and Tortellini Soup

Cabbage and Chicken Soup

I made this same type of soup, but used shredded chicken instead of ground beef. Try it, you’ll like it!

Mexican-Style Beef and Cabbage Soup

Turkey and Turkey Gravy

Traditional roasted turkey leftover from New Year’s dinner, with gravy made from the turkey carcass stock. Here I give you the recipe for the stock.

Turkey Carcass Stock

White Chicken Chili

One of our favorite winter comfort foods. I know it’s many of my friend’s favorite too! I used white beans instead of black beans for the leftovers in the freezer but I’ve posted both versions before, but this one has the printable PDF.

Creamy Chicken Chili and Beans

Sous Vide Meatloaf with Bacon

I made this with a several pieces of ground up uncooked bacon in it and cooked via the sous vide method. Wow, talk about a flavor bomb! I am linking up to Conor Bofin’s recipe, as his inspired me to make my mom’s meatloaf with bacon and sous vide method. I did not write my own post about it.

Mom’s Meatloaf

Spicy Chicken Florentine

Well I know I just posted this, but it IS in the freezer and we need to finish it. Just two small lunch-sized servings left. 🙂

Spicy Chicken Florentine

Homemade Ground Beef Stroganoff

Homemade Ground Beef Stroganoff

Well, I am back from my (mis)-adventures of a week in Scottsbluff, Nebraska! I survived temps way below zero, lack of mini-fridge for a few days, one night of the smoke alarm beeping incessantly every five seconds, key card not working to get into my room, wake-up calls not received, the TV stations not working due to a “digital upgrade” and somehow miraculously made not only the puddle-jumper flight to Denver, I even made it into the Redmond, Oregon airport that had been closed for a day due to an ice storm and a foot of snow. It reopened a few hours earlier and they even let us land after another plane got stuck on the taxiway. WHEW!

That being said, I had to drive a white-knuckle trip back to Redmond to pick up a quarter side of beef (all packaged and neatly labeled) we had ordered from a local rancher who raised grass-fed cows the very next morning. Several cars off the road in the snow banks, slow going. Said beef was driven straight to the chest freezer that is plugged into the garage in our new house we are remodeling.

I brought home a pound of the ground beef (I think we had said to ground the some of chuck steaks for that, not sure?) and decided to jump right in and make by favorite stand-by of homemade ground beef Stroganoff. I also brought home two packages of short ribs, which my hubby is cooking tonight for another meal.

I guess we are set for beef for the winter. I’ve posted this recipe in two different variations before, but this is my tried and true recipe. You cannot go wrong with this one! (Sorry for the lack of photos on this one, I’m still not 100% back into the blog at this point!)

Homemade Ground Beef Stroganoff

1 pound lean ground beef or chuck
1/2 medium onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
4 oz. fresh mushrooms, sliced
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1/4 teaspoon dried crushed thyme
Mrs. Dash Garlic and Herb Blend, (or salt) to taste
Ground black pepper, to taste
8 ounces of pasta (I used Farfalle, also known as Bow-Tie)
Splash of white wine or chicken broth, for deglazing
Homemade cream of mushroom and celery base (recipe below)
4 to 8 ounces sour cream
Parmesan cheese, for garnish

Homemade Cream of Mushroom Soup (My new base has celery in it too!)

Homemade Cream of Mushroom and Celery Base

 2 tablespoons real butter
1/8 cup small diced mushrooms
1/8 cup small diced celery
1/4 cup flour
1/2 cup chicken broth, low sodium or homemade
1/2 cup milk (any kind)

To start, begin browning the ground beef in a large skillet. After a few minutes, stir in the onion, celery, mushrooms, garlic and seasonings to taste. Also put some water in a pot for the pasta on medium high heat to get ready to boil.

Meanwhile, make the cream of mushroom and celery base (recipe above). Add the butter to a small saucepan with the mushrooms and onions over medium heat, and cook until vegetables are softened. Add the flour and mix into the butter to form a paste. Slowly stir in the chicken broth, then whisk until smooth. Then slowly stir in the milk, whisking until smooth again. Turn to the lowest heat possible at this point, or set aside.

At the same time, keep an eye on the ground beef, stirring occasionally until the mushrooms have released their water and the burger has cooked through. Deglaze the pan with a splash of white wine or chicken broth.

Once the water in the pasta pot is boiling, add the pasta to the pot and cook according to package directions.

Bow-tie Pasta (Farfalle) (We like to use this since it is sturdier than egg noodles)

Once the ground beef and cream base are done, add the cream base to the burger mixture and bring to a simmer. Stir in sour cream, and simmer until pasta is done. Serve over the hot noodles, with shredded parmesan cheese if you like.

Download and Print this Yummy Recipe!

 

Strong Enough! An old family recipe revamped.

Stroganoff in Process

Update: I decided to make this for dinner tonight.  One of the pitfalls of writing a recipe from memory is that certain things an be omitted or wrong. I had to revise the amount of condensed soup. And since I did a truly salt-free version, I added Parmesan cheese atop for more flavor. The upside is I got to take some photos!

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I chuckle to myself every time I make this dish and think about how it got its name. When our daughter was about three or four, I finally got her to taste this simple dish of beef and noodles in a sour cream sauce. When I told her the name, she didn’t quite understand me correctly and said, “Strong enough? Like this?” Then she proceeded to pose with her arm muscles flexed in the classic strong man stance.  I burst out laughing, and she giggled and giggled and ran around the house shouting “Strong Enough! Strong Enough!” with her arms raised high. The name was then born. For those of you who haven’t figured it out yet, Strong Enough = Stroganoff.

My mother made this dish often, which was a quick and easy dinner to prepare for a house full of six hungry kids. This was not the Russian version made with strips of tender beef, fresh mushrooms and roux-based cream sauce, but a skillet full of ground beef mixed with cans of cream of chicken and mushroom soup and a carton of sour cream thrown in. Boil a big pot of water, cook a bag or two of egg noodles, and voilà — “Strong Enough” for the entire family.

Bow-tie Pasta (Farfalle)

I’ll be the first to admit that I make it my mom’s way more often than not when I’m in a pinch on a busy work night. But when I have the time and the ingredients on hand, I make a healthier version with a homemade salt-free cream base rather than the sodium-riddled canned variety. I do still use ground beef, but I’m sure this would work with beef strips if you add a little oil to the skillet first. My mom used to make this with wide egg noodles, and so did I, but my husband said they get too mushy as leftovers, so now I use the sturdier bow-tie pasta.

Strong Enough

1 pound lean ground beef
1/2 medium onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
4 oz. fresh mushrooms, sliced
1 teaspoon minced garlic
Dried thyme
Mrs. Dash, Garlic and Herb Blend
Black pepper
Splash of white wine
2  “servings” of cream of mushroom soup — recipe here: http://bit.ly/AnHON3
4 to 8 ounces sour cream
1/2 box of bow-tie pasta (also known as Farfalle)

Homemade Cream of Mushroom Condensed Soup

Cook the cream of mushroom soup and set aside. Bring a pot of water to a boil for the pasta. In a large skillet, begin browning the ground beef. After a few minutes, stir in the onion, celery, mushrooms, garlic and seasonings to taste. Stir occasionally until the mushrooms have released their water and reduced and the burger has cooked through. Deglaze the pan with a splash of white wine.  Put the pasta in the pot of boiling water now. Add the cream of mushroom soup and bring to a simmer. Stir in sour cream, and simmer until pasta is done. Serve over the hot noodles.

Note: I never thought to take a picture of Stroganoff when I make it, as it’s not a very exciting dish to look at. But I did happen to have some bow-tie pasta in one of my canisters so I snapped a shot of that instead.