Cooking for the freezer

I decided to cook for an army the other day. I picked two recipes that I love, my family's lasagna and Chrissy's Chicken Pot Pie. I thought it would be quite the undertaking but it was actually quite simple. I made enough lasagna for 2 pans and enough pie filling for 2 pies. I bought a bunch of those aluminum mini loaf pans from the store and set out to fill them. 

I didn't take many photos of the Lasagna since that is a family recipe and I have to like you a lot to share it. And with how simple Lasagna is you can easily guess the recipe just from pictures. But after boiling the noodles, cooking the meat, spreading the cheese and filling the pans, here is the result. 

One pan for dinner

And 8 single serve pans for the freezer. 

Now onto the Chicken Pot Pie. Chrissy's Chicken Pot Pie is one of the tastiest I've ever had. But a whole pie is way too much for a two person meal. So...single serve!

You'll need an onion, some chicken broth, veggies, milk, butter, pie crust....and of course chicken. 

Chopped onions with the broth in the back. I added extra broth because I had read that the freezing and then baking process takes some goodness out of the pie and adding some extra broth helps. 

Melted butter to saute the onion. mmmm buuttteerrr... Just call me little Paula Deen...without the accent...

Everything in the mix now. This smells like childhood. 

Since I was prepping these for the freezer instead of the oven, I cooked the chicken thoroughly in the pot. 

After letting the filling cool a bit I loaded up the tins. I did my best to cut lots of rectangles out of the circular pie crust. It wasn't pretty so I didn't photograph it. 

And thats how you turn 3 hours of cooking time to weeks worth of food. 

Now that's domesticated...

Liz DiNatale

It's aaalliiivveeee

Everything is growing. The rain we've been having has been feeding our lawn and garden steroids. The only downfall is now we have to mow every week and in a few weeks I'll be overrun with tomatoes. I have about 50 green ones now. I know, I know, terrible things to complain about. 

So far this weekend I've been immersed in awesomely domesticated tasks. Lawns and weeds and vacuums, oh my. But what struck me the most is how well everything is doing (even the weeds, much to my dismay). 

I planted these a while ago on our deck and have since forgotten what they were. Dalhias maybe? They're finally blooming and I heart them. 

Then there's these guys. We have 4 of these trees in our yard and I have no idea what they are. All I know is they bloom every year, they're super pretty and they grow like weeds. 

 The garden is also doing well. I realize though that I planted far too many tomatoes. I have 3 rows. I'd better learn how to can them. 

Cucumber ready for the picking. 

I'm crossing my fingers that this little guy grows into a squash. I don't have any luck with squash (which is odd b/c they're the weed of veggies). 

 The other side of awesomely domesticated: The domesticated male. Steven has so far spent the weekend working on vehicles and bikes. That gets him greasy. 

And silly. 

Haha this photos totally makes my day. What a goof. 

I can't believe it's already August, this summer is flying by. As much as I want the months to drag on until I have to take the PE, I am seriously ready for the heat to go away. The mosquitos can go with it. Ugh.

Liz DiNatale