10 Batch Cook and Freeze Recipes You Need! (2024)

FAQs

What meals can you batch cook and freeze? ›

By having batch cooked food stored in your fridge or freezer, you are less likely to eat impulsively, saving you money and helping you to eat more healthily. Eat healthier meals – When you batch cook food, you are more likely to incorporate healthy and nutritious ingredients.

Can You Freeze Anything for Meal Prep? The short answer is that pretty much any food can be frozen. The US Department of Agriculture explains that you can freeze almost any food, except eggs in their shell and canned products. However, you may not want to eat every food after it has been frozen.

Individually-sized meals should be frozen in airtight lidded plastic containers to limit the amount of outside oxygen flowing into the dish. It's also wise to double-wrap your plastic containers in a layer of freezer-proof plastic wrap if you're planning on storing the dish for more than a week.

The biggest problem with batch cooking is that you don't get the variety you would expect from a meal-prepping system. Many recipes do not do well with precooking and storing and that might include a few of your favorite staples.

All types of rice freeze well, including white, brown, and even fried rice (containing meat and veggies). Batch cooking rice and freezing it for later can be a serious meal prep game changer.

You can also freeze scrambled eggs after they have been cooked. This is a good way to meal prep for the week and to use in dishes like ham fried rice, or for a quick breakfast. They freeze well and taste really good. Let the cooked scrambled eggs cool completely.

What food Cannot be cooked from frozen? ›

Whenever it is unlikely that the core temperature will reach the required level for the correct amount of time then food should not be cooked directly from frozen. This is often the case for large joints of pork, rolled beef joints and large poultry. There is then an increased risk of food poisoning.

If you're looking for a healthier, quicker and slightly cheaper way of enjoying delicious home-cooked food, then batch cooking for the freezer could be for you. It involves cooking larger batches of meals and then freezing some for later, ideally in separate portions.

"Generally speaking, anything that has dairy, or a very high water content, is not going to do well when frozen," Patel says. "Freezing these ingredients—or recipes that feature these ingredients up front and center—is going to be disappointing."

Chicken is a well-loved ingredient in many homes for its versatility, taste and protein content. Whether you love to batch-cook or have leftovers from your rotisserie chicken dinner, you can always store cooked chicken in the freezer for an extended time.