Joanne Roach (00:13)
Hello and welcome to the Food for Kids podcast. I'm Joanne from the Foodies. Today's episode is not so much an episode about children's food specifically, as just about making family food easier in general and it's going to be a list of 12 types of food that you might not know that you can freeze.
So hopefully one or more of these ideas might be helpful, whether it's to help you buy a bigger, more economical pack of something and then split it up to save some money. Also, you can do a lot of cooking or prep effort all in one go and then save energy on a busy weeknight or to just generally save on waste, especially when our children are going through faddy phases or when family life gets really busy and the meals that we had planned don't work out when we thought.
I've got 12 different foods to run through and some of them are groups of foods so I'm going to crack on with the list now to keep this episode as short as possible. So let's crack on!
First up is a category which is dead helpful with kids in the house which is pancakes, waffles and muffins. Pancakes and waffles definitely fitted into the category for me of things I liked to make for the kids when I was on form but would often get fed up with making them So being able to make a bigger batch and then freeze them was great. Often also at the shops they come in packs of six or eight so if your child is the only one eating them and not every day they can go off quite quickly. Scotch or american style pancakes you can freeze on a tray with greaseproof paper underneath, freeze them flat and separate and then later that day or the next morning you can pop them into a freezer bag all together. Waffles are exactly the same. Fflat pancakes so the ones that we normally roll up with sugar and lemon for pancake day obviously don't freeze them with the toppings in but just put pieces of greaseproof paper between each one so they don't stick in the freezer or I actually save old cereal packet inserts and they're really good for separating things up. That way you can just take out one at a time. Most muffins can be saved in the freezer and you can just pop them in a bag all together. I prefer to take the paper cases off before freezing them because sometimes they can go a bit soggy when you defrost them. So those might be your breakfast or after-school snack food split up to last longer.
Second category is eggs and for this I'm going to hand over to a two minute interview with Kate Hall from the Full Freezer.
Joanne (02:22)
So Kate, you obviously know an awful lot about how to freeze all kinds of things that we wouldn't necessarily know that you could freeze. And I bet you have a lot of people being quite surprised about some of the things that you freeze. What do you think are the most surprising things that people don't think you can freeze until you tell them?
Kate (02:39)
So I would say the things that tend to jump out are things like eggs. they have to be broken out of their shell, but you can freeze either just the whites or just the yolks. Although you do need to mix a little bit of salt or a bit of sugar with the yolks to stop them going too gelatinous. Or you can just whisk them up and then freeze them combined and then they can be defrosted and used for omelets or for baking or anything like that. That is one that people are a bit like, what, really?
I've had some people be like, well, why on earth would I need to do that? They have a really long shelf life. But I always find that we go through phases. So we'll use a lot of them and then I'll buy a lot of them. And then everybody goes off eggs. And before I know it, the best before dates come and it's like, right. OK, what am going to do with these eggs? So I love that fact that I can do something really quick. And it's also very handy if you have an egg related incident in your house and accidentally drop a box of eggs.
Joanne (03:39)
I see. An egg related incident. I trying to work out what that might be.
Kate (03:42)
My husband went out specifically to buy some eggs for me because I was doing baking the next day and dropped a box of 12 eggs on the doorstep as he walked in the house and I saved all of them because I was able to freeze them. So that's quite handy.
Joanne Roach (04:01)
Okay so that's eggs. I used to have hens and I froze loads of eggs in the summer. I used to crack one at a time in a bowl and scramble it a bit with a fork and then pop one into one of those silicon muffin cake cases to freeze. One of those holds up to a large egg. And then I put them on a tray and freeze them in those cases until they were firm and then you could pop them out of the cases into a bag so you know that each one of those is one egg. They work great, as Kate says, in anything that you would use a beaten egg for.
The third category is baked goods, so bread, cookies, cakes and pastries. Most of these can be frozen if you can't use them all up in time or you get a bargain amount in one go.
I prefer to slice bread rather than freeze whole loaves because you have to sort of revive a whole loaf with a quick bake and a splash of water and I find that a bit of a faff unless it's something small or special that we would then use up in one go. But if you slice your bread or you've bought a sliced loaf, just freeze the loaf like that and you can use a slice at a time. You can put frozen slices of bread straight into the toaster and just up the cook time slightly. Or you can defrost a slice in the microwave on very low power for about 20 seconds and just check in 10 second increments. I normally find it's 20 to 40 seconds. If you have a whole unopened sliced loaf to freeze, open it and give it a bit of a jiggle to separate the slices so that they come apart easier when you take them out.
The same goes for wraps. Open the packet, peel them apart carefully, put them back into the pack and then freeze them. Otherwise they tend to stick together and can be hard to peel off one at a time. If you want to be sure then put greaseproof paper in between. You can reuse these bits of paper over and over again for this kind of job.
Cookies and pastries you can just freeze separate like we said with the pancakes and then pop them in a bag. Pastries with any kind of custard or cream topping won't defrost well, they'll all separate. But things like pain au chocolat or croissants are fine.
Cake is usually better to slice up first so you can take out a piece at a time and even with buttercream in it can freeze really nicely. The only ones that tend not to are the ones that are really heavy on fruit or other wet content. Sometimes they can come out bit soggy.
The fourth category is leftover rice and pasta. For rice, please see episode 6 with Jenna Brown from Food Safety Mum The main safety issue with rice is that it must be cooled down quickly after cooking because the toxins that give us food poisoning grow in warm rice so if you cook too much get it cooled down quickly don't keep rice which is sat at room temperature for more than an hour. I will link to a quick reel that I did with Jenna that tells you how to do that and for that reason don't freeze takeaway rice because you don't know how long they kept it warm before you bought it. For anything to do with rice, I say, see that previous episode with Jenna so you can make sure that you're doing it safely.
Pasta is a similar thing. If you cook too much, you can either freeze it on a tray and then pop it into a bag to scoop out or freeze it in portion containers. It won't be suitable for fancy dinner party food and I'm sure Italians will be shuddering at the idea so I wouldn't use it in anything where pasta is the main star of the dish but for like regular family weeknight foods where you're going to put sauces on it or to add it into a soup or for a child that's obsessed with pasta having portions ready is really helpful. I always had leftover pasta portions and leftover cheese sauce in my freezer to put together when my daughter was ill and struggling to eat because she could always eat mac and cheese even when she was really nauseous.
The fifth category is dairy and non-dairy alternatives.
Most hard cheeses can be frozen and I find it's better to grate it before putting it into the freezer on a tray and then scooping it into a bag time. It can separate slightly on defrosting so I wouldn't put it in a cheese sandwich or anything where it's a star but for the top of a pizza or a grilled cheese where the heat will separate it anyway it's just as good.
As for milk, I often freeze milk when we have too much. Use a plastic container if possible and make sure there is some head space to expand a bit. So if you have a whole bottle that you're not going to use, pour off about 10 % and then freeze it either upright or slanted slightly upwards leaning on other things until it's frozen and then you can lay it flat. It will need a good shake when it's totally defrosted, but it's great if you're going on holiday defrost when you get home.
Most non-dairy milks freeze fine although some of them will split when defrosted so they might be better for cooking after they've been frozen but they cost a lot of money so it's worth trying out. Just google the instructions for your preferred one. Coconut milk freezes well. Ice cube trays or silicon muffin cases works really well.
Butter can freeze too. Cut it into portions for ease when you take it out.
Yoghurt in fairness doesn't always freeze well. Some of the processed ones like the tubes that the children eat or the flavoured ones can be fine and they can be really good for lunch boxes even from frozen. They can be used to keep your sandwiches cool. But lots of other yogurts will split a bit, so they're better to be used for cooking or mixing with fruit when they've been defrosted or make them into lollies or add them to things like curries.
Number six is potatoes. Any leftover potatoes can be frozen and they only really need pepping up in the oven or the air fryer afterwards. As for mash, it just needs properly whisking to reincorporate everything once it's defrosted and adding a knob of butter or non-dairy butter helps to get the texture back. So when you're making mash or boiling potatoes for roasting, why not do the whole bag if you're going to struggle to use them up in time? I will link to Kate Hall's instructions for making extra roast potatoes and reusing those. And if you have some that are starting to sprout just cut those bits off and parboil them for about five minutes and then freeze them. And then when you take them out, you can cook them however you were going to cook them. Never keep potatoes with green patches though, that means they've been exposed to light and the green parts are bad for you.
For category 7 I'm going to hand back to Kate for another 2 minute segment.
Kate (09:32)
I would say the other thing that tends to surprise people is tinned foods. So obviously a little bit broader.
Joanne (09:38)
Right.
Kate (09:42)
But this is something I find really, really helpful because I think there's a lot of recipes, particularly if you're cooking for small children, you know, or any kids really, where you just want half a tin, you want half a tin of chickpeas, you want half a tin of kidney beans. You know, you might be using fruits for baking and you just need half a tin of pineapple ⁓ And so because of the way that, you know, tin foods are produced, the bacteria is killed when they are sterilized in order to preserve them for the tin. So as long as they go straight from the tin, drained off, dried off and straight into the freezer, then it's perfectly safe for those to then sit in the freezer until you next use them and until you next need half a tin of whatever it may be. ⁓ And those can literally just be, know, if you'd frozen some kidney beans, for example, you would be able to just throw those straight from the freezer into your chili and just cook them up as they are. You don't need to think about planning ahead to defrost them in the fridge. They're small enough that you can make sure that they heat through and cook through fully. So as long as you cook them long enough to make sure they're piping hot, It's perfectly safe to do.
Joanne (10:48)
That's really cool because yeah quite a lot of tin sizes are 400 grams ish aren't they and actually what you need is 100 or 200 grams of something.
Kate (10:57)
That's it. And I think, you know, with that as well, it gives you the opportunity to just be that little bit more thrifty. So things like sweet corn, rather than buying the diddy little cans, you know, you can buy the bigger can with the intention that you're going to freeze the leftovers and then they'll be there whenever you want to use them.
Joanne (11:14)
That's brilliant. you heard it here first eggs and tin beans is what we're freezing now. What about baked beans in sauce? Can you freeze those?
Kate (11:22)
So you can, but the consistency will change. I wouldn't freeze beans and then defrost them or cook them and then put them on toast or anything. I would add them to a chili or, you know, I'd find a different way to use them just because that consistency change and the flavor change, I think is quite noticeable if you were just having them as they were. But equally somebody could try it and if you know, if they're not bothered by the changes then…
Joanne (11:50)
But if they're not going to get eaten, then they can go in the freezer and they can go in a stew or a soup just to add that little bit of protein and fibre and thickness to something later on.
Kate (11:59)
Totally, totally. Yeah,
Joanne Roach (12:04)
That’s definitely one of the things that I learned from Kate about freezing half tins of things. I've always frozen half tins of tinned tomatoes but I'd never thought of freezing half tins of beans or fruit.
Category 8 is herbs and chillies. They often come in bigger packs than we need and they go off fast. Chillies can just be thrown into a bag in the freezer and used for cooking later. Herbs can be chopped and added to water or oil to keep them from going slimy and then you can add them to recipes from frozen. Kate has great reels on freezing herbs so I will link to those.
On a similar note is category 9 which is things that are a pain to prep at the time but can make food lot tastier so freezing can make life a lot easier which is onions, garlic and ginger. If you're chopping onions and you've got a few extra minutes, why not chop up the rest of the bag and freeze them like that? Double bag them or they can make the freezer a bit smelly, but they're great to be able to get a handful out. Or if you like caramelised onions but not the time taken to make them, then do a massive panful in one go and freeze what you don't need that day in portions. Again, silicon muffin cases work of those is about a medium onion once it's sweated right down. It saves loads of time.
I find garlic and ginger an absolute faff to peel and mince at the time so I copy a lot of Asian chefs online. I do loads of them in one go and freeze them. So for garlic I soak loads of garlic cloves in water for a bit so that the peels come off dead easy. Or you can buy big vacuum packs of peeled cloves if you have an Asian supermarket nearby then I put them in a food processor and pulse them to the desired level of mashiness. then I put them in ice cube trays or you can flat pat them into a bag and put indentations into break off sections. can't imagine what I'm describing I will link to a video that shows this. Same goes for ginger, peel and chop and grate it all in one go and then freeze it in portions or breakable sheets. If I've gone to the trouble of peeling garlic or I've bought a big vacuum pack of garlic I also keep some peeled but not minced garlic cloves when I'm just too lazy to peel one one out and you can chop it while it's frozen and add it straight into the pan
Category 10 is one food which is hummus. If you don't use a lot of hummus and you buy a big value tub or like our house you eat loads and so you make it or buy it in big pots it is great to freeze. It does separate slightly when it defrosts but you can fix it very quickly by giving it a good stir and either adding a splash of water or a splash of oil until it gets back to its normal consistency.
On a similar vein is category 11 which is pesto and a bunch of other sauces. Pesto freezes brilliantly which is great because most family meals need half a jar and it's one of those things that can very easily get shoved to the back of the fridge and goes mouldy quickly. The oil in it heats quickly when you're defrosting it So if you're going to defrost it in the microwave use a low heat and a microwave safe container. But you can just add it to a pan and stir it for a minute or two. It defrosts really quickly because of the high fat content.
Lots of other sauces do work too. Garlic butter, steak sauce packets, leftover BBQ sauces. Just check the packet or Google them as you go to check. But it does mean you can save a small amount from something to make something special later on.
Last but not least is a one food quick category which is avocados. As you know, avocados are usually rock hard for a week, they only turn perfectly ripe for 15 minutes and then they turn into brown mush. I mean I'm joking but I'm kind of not. If when your avocados are ripe you have more than you need at the exact ripeness that you like them you can freeze them in chopped chunks and they are great for sauces or guac when they come out.
So that's my 12 things that you might not have known you can freeze. Were any of them new to you?
As always, Kate's Can I Freeze It Instagram feed is a great help so please do check that out and let me know if any of these things surprised you. It's amazingly the end of September so I'll be back on Thursday with the start of the month run through of seasonal foods for October so I hope to see you then and in the meantime, happy eating!
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