Breakfast Freezer Meals: Individual Quiche

I am a big fan of Weston A. Price and I make eggs and sausage or eggs and bacon, every single morning for myself and Penelope and sometimes Peter if he has enough time before work.  It gets pretty old.  Not the taste of it, pastured eggs from a local farm, are delicious, but the making a full meal, using the stove, cleaning up in the morning, is just time consuming.  

I was looking for a way to streamline my morning breakfast routine without giving in to eating something like cereal and milk.  I saw someone who had made and frozen breakfast burritos on Pinterest and then I remembered something my friend Bethany did years ago, I used both as inspiration and came up with my own little, frozen, breakfast meal idea.

I basically made a simplified version of my quiche.   I did 12 eggs, some raw milk, a package of sausage (from a local pork farmer, cooked and chopped before adding in), a little bit of cheese and salt and pepper. I didn't measure anything, I just eye-balled it.

Then I poured it into a cupcake cooking pan.  I made the HUGE mistake of not lining them with paper cups or at least buttering the pan.  I had to throw the pan out, after three days of soaking and scrubbing, I still could not get it clean.  Don't make my mistake!

I cooked them at 350 for about 20 minutes.  Actually, I am not too sure on the time, I check on them and when they look and smell done, I stick a knife in to see if any egg sticks to the knife. If the knife comes out clean, they are done.

And then you have little individual servings of an egg and sausage breakfast!  I froze them all after they cooled, I put them on a cookie sheet to freeze them, sort of like how I freeze blueberries.  Then after they were frozen a little bit, I bagged them into small, individual, freezer bags.

I pull two out the night before I want to eat them in the morning.  It is defrosted by the morning and then I zap them in the microwave for 30 seconds.  You could warm them in your toaster oven or regular oven if you wanted to avoid using a microwave.  You should if you can, it really is bad for you, to use your microwave, but I am lazy.

Enjoy!  If you have any questions let me know.

Moroccan Lamb, Italian Beef and Cranberry Chicken Freezer Meals

The menu I did recently was Moroccan Lamb Stew, Italian Beef Stew and Cranberry Chicken.

A trick that I have learned, for an even speedier assembly of meals, is to group all ingredients first.  Sometimes you have items that overlap, like chopped onions, that go into to different recipes. Just separate them out as much as you can, and then go down the line.

First, I assemble all dry ingredients and vegetables in the gallon bags.  Then I add the raw meat last.  This time I bought my meat already cubed, so that save me a bunch of time.

Doing my big cooking day this way (with only slow cooker meals), I do this about every two weeks.  I do three different recipes and double each recipe for a total 6 bags of food.  Each bag, is two dinners and lunch, so that leaves several days that we can use to eat out, or if I get inspired to cook something not in our freezer meal rotation, like a roast chicken.


Not including grocery shopping time, it takes me less than two hours to chop all the veggies, assemble the bags and clean up.  

Pretty awesome, right?!

Here are the recipes, and remember we always buy all organic ingredients.

Cranberry Chicken:
2 medium apples, cut into wedges
1 medium onion, chopped
2 pounds chicken breasts or thighs
2 lemons cut into wedges
2 tablespoons quick cooking tapioca
2 tablespoons honey
1 can of cranberry sauce (or you can use fresh cranberries if they are in season)

Dump everything into gallon freezer bag and label.  When ready to cook, dump into slow cooker and cook on high for 4 hours.  Serve with rice or couscous.

Moroccan Lamb Stew:
2 pounds boneless lamb
2 large onions chopped
1 can/1 cup chopped tomato
2 cups carrots
2 cups chicken broth
1 teaspoon of ground cumin
1 teaspoon of turmeric
1 teaspoon of red pepper
.5 cup of raisins

Dump everything into gallon freezer bag and label (except broth, just add that the day you cook it).  When ready to cook, dump into slow cooker and cook on high for 4 hours.  Serve with couscous.

Italian Beef:
4 pounds of beef sirloin or rump roast, cubed
1 tablespoon of Italian seasoning
1 teaspoon red pepper
1 teaspoon garlic powder
2 red peppers, thinly sliced.

Dump everything into gallon freezer bag and label (except broth, just add that the day you cook it.) When ready to cook, dump into slow cooker and cook on high for 4 hours.  Serve with couscous, or on rolls to make a sandwich or even on a pizza and add some cheese.

Enjoy!!