• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 806 0

and convection ovens increasing in use, householders are often likely to freeze in the container they will be reheating and cooking in. It depends, really, on how formal you want to be. You can always freeze the prepared makings of a casserole or stew or hash in the dish in which you plan to serve it, first lined with foil or plastic wrap. When it’s rock hard, remove and overwrap it, label and stack it. Come the time you want to cook it, remove all wrappings, put it in its chosen container, and carry on with thawing or cooking or whatever must be done to serve it.

Meanwhile there is in any supermarket an almost endless variety of aluminum-foil pans in all shapes and sizes; they are re-usable if you clean them carefully and make sure that they don’t get punctured the first time you serve from them.

BUT such metal pans are not for microwave ovens. Instead, shape-freeze in ceramic ramekins or dishes designed to be used for microwave cookery, and follow the wrapping-to-shape idea above. And you can always thaw or reheat in plastic in these ovens, a thing that could mean disaster in a conventional or convection oven.

Foil is ideal for convection ovens, though. Because of the drying effect of the moving hot air, it’s a good safeguard to cover the food in the cooking pan with foil crimped around the rim for part of the reheating or cooking time.

It goes without saying that your wrappings and containers should be just as moisture/vapor-proof as for regular freezing. Still, if you must make do in a hurry, you can always use the best food-grade clinging plastic film, patting and smoothing it to the newly frozen shape, and using several layers; then put it into a plastic food-storage bag of suitable strength (tucking a written label inside with it), remove as much air as possible from the bag, and seal it. This system is particularly good with an odd-shaped piece of food (small unfrozen but precooked poultry, for example—which of course does not contain stuffing); and it helps to prevent the freezer-burn that comes from moist air held inside with the contents.

Perhaps the most valuable container/shape for freezing a 6-serving main dish is the 8 × 8-inch square cake pan. Its 2 inches is deep enough, it can be divided evenly in thirds by two cuts vertically, and then divided further by one horizontal cut across the center. Makes generous helpings.

But the beauty of doing your own convenience foods is the leeway you have in freezing very small portions, collecting them in a fairly large bag, and taking out what you want—instead of taking an ice pick to one end of a quart brick of, say, spaghetti sauce. So freeze it in muffin tins: a large muffin’s-worth of sauce should be generous for a normal serving of pasta; if not, make it two.

If the consistency is stiff-ish, freeze any such thing in dollops on a cookie sheet. Whatever its shape when it is frozen hard, first wrap each bit separately (either in clinging plastic food film, or in a flimsy little plastic storage bag), then collect the pieces in best-quality true freezer containers.

Tuck a label inside the large freezer bag, or stick a label on the box with clear plastic tape you can read through. Be sure to say what the measurement is.

These Don’t Freeze Well

Rather than note crankiness or poor behavior in freezing as some ingredients come along, we think it’s sensible to deal with them in a bunch. So:

These suffer flavor changes:

Garlic, especially if uncooked, gets stronger.

Onion, though, tends to lose its flavor (although being sautéed before its being added to the other ingredients will help it hold).

Sweet green (or the ripe red stage) bell peppers get stronger.

Sage gets bitter; so does some pepper.

Cloves get both stronger and sharp. (A number of spices either give up or overdo when frozen, but short storage will be OK) You can always add apple-pie spices before cooking, etc.

Artificial vanilla essence gets truly unpleasant in freezing.

With the exception of sucralose (Splenda), artificial sweeteners should wait until actual serving