I freeze chai concentrate (either store-bought or homemade) and then use it to make chai smoothies (great with just the addition of milk & a banana). So tasty, and SO much cheaper than buying something similar at a coffee shop.

Triple yes to making babyfood cubes! all you need is a food processor and the sentience to boil water. What I do:

-Buy frozen organic veggies, boil them in a little water, and puree them (this also works for carrots). Then freeze and pop into a plastic bag.
- Bake sweet potatoes in their jackets (or boil peeled ones). The skins slip off easily. Puree and freeze.
- Poach some chicken breasts or tenders in organic boxed broth. Puree with a little broth, put in trays, freeze.

The veggies are easily combined with rice cereal or other foods. It's incredibly fast and cheap -- because who can't boil water? And the bright color and taste of my fresh-frozen veggies compared even to the organic jarred veggies sealed the deal.

I keep a Sharpie in my box of freezer bags, and date them as I use them. Most frozen foods will keep 3-6 months, but three months is all they get in my tiny freezer.

Use it or lose it, I say ;)

I haven't tried freezing in ice cube trays; great idea! In our house, fruit smoothies are the breakfast du jour, especially during the hot summer. I bulk-buy fresh fruit when it goes on sale and then clean and freeze it individually. For example, I clean and chunk strawberries, pit cherries, pick over blueberries, etc, and then freeze them for an hour or two on plastic-wrap covered cookie sheets. Bananas work, too; when I find turning bananas on sale, I pick up 10 pounds or so and chunk them, dip them in lemon juice to prevent browning, and freeze. As soon as they're frozen, I pop them off the tray (this is where plastic wrap makes things easier and less messy, but it's optional), and dump all the chunks in gallon-size freezer bags. I've also frozen them in serving size snack/sandwich bags, then put those into a gallon bag; they last a bit longer that way. Either way, I can pull out a handful of individual berries or banana chunks w/o them sticking in a lump, then dump them in my blender with a cup of skim milk. I wind up with something the consistency of a milkshake, no added sugar or chemicals, and it's a great start to the day. I've found it helps to let them thaw a bit, 5-10 minutes or so, to avoid choking my blender. Using frozen fruit keeps me from needing to add ice to the drink to water it down. Plain yogurt or pineapple juice are good alternatives to the milk, as well. And berries needed for baking, etc, can be used the same way. I imagine you could also puree them ahead of time and freeze in cube trays and go from there. A huge time saver in the morning and a relatively inexpensive breakfast!

now this is something i've never thought of. I've always chucked my avocados in the fridge and watched them turn brown! will try this one next time

Absoulety the greatest idea ever! tt

OK, maybe not an ice-cub tray, but the same idea -- I make big batches of oatmeal (the GOOD kind, like Irish oats, not the instant or rolled oats) and freeze it in muffin trays. Each lump is about a one-third cup. I pop two of them out in the morning and microwave them. Yum!

I need to go get some ice cube trays! We have an icemaker so I just never thought to get any.

we did this when my daughter was still on mushy foods. She didn't even like commerical baby foods.

However, in general, this is not doable for an apartment dweller who has an average size freezer. Our freezer is always full. We certainly do not have space to store everything.

I too freeze bananas for smoothies. I buy them marked down at the grocery store, peel and freeze 10-12 to a bag. They don't turn brown if peeled. For a great smoothie that keeps me going all morning:

Blend until smooth:
3/4 cup low or no fat yogurt (I make my own)
1/4 cup no fat cottage cheese
1 TB dried pasturised whole egg powder
1 TB ground flaxseed meal
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 frozen banana (may need to thaw or nuke briefly)
1/2 cup fresh/frozen, or 1/4 cup dried berries: cranberry, blueberry, strawberry, raspberry, etc.

Pour into a cereal bowl and add 1/3 cup raw oats.
I figured this around 500 calories.

We are cross-country bicyclists; on-the-road, we make do with fruit on the bottom yogurt and raw oats. We buy a pound of oats (lasts 2 meals) at a time, pour into a ziploc bag and buy 2 yogurts each for breakfast. We add as much oats at a time as we can, eat, add oats, eat, add oats....

Cookie

If you freeze them in FoodSaver (or similar) type bags, they will last nearly forever!

Puree any extra garlic with a little water and freeze in the mini freezer trays (like the ones that are used in college dorm refrigeradors)... I believe one cube is equal to 1 tbs. (I use a lot of garlic, so I am very liberal with it). You can do the same with ginger root... I use ginger for making chai drinks, and the garlic in most everything that needs it.

Thank you for the fantastic ideas on freezing baby food! I am currently making my son's food and just preparing three day portions at a time... I had never thought about feeding him avocados!

I use them for freezing lemon juice if someone gives me a bag of lemons from their tree. I juice them, pour them in the ice cube trays, then pop them out and story them in a ziploc bag. These lemon cubes are easy and conveient to
to use when making lemonaide, ice tea, or in any ecipe calling for lemon juice.

I often end up with more carrots, onions, celery, and green peppers than I need, so I just dice them up and freeze them when they start to go-- in ice cube trays with a little water to hold them together, or in baggies holding 1C. Even better is pre-mixing mirepoix for freezing, and freezing small cubes or disks of diced shallots. Fwiw the celery loses a lot of texture through freezing, but it's not an issue if you're really cooking down your mirepoix.

There are some great ideas for the baby food. I'm expecting my third baby this spring and money will be very tight. I would love to prepare my own baby food when the time comes but can you tell me how to prepare it after it is frozen? Do you microwave it or boil it in baggies? Do you need to add any liquid? Any additional baby food recipies would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

In 'Deceptively Delicious', a cooking book by Jerry Seinfield's wife, she uses purees to sneak vegetables into regular recipes. If you're looking for information on how to cook or make or thaw purees, this is a great resource!

My mom and sister both have used the book Super Baby Food by Ruth Yaron (you can get it on Amazon). There are recipes for cereals, methods for freezing the food (this method with ice cube trays is used), and nutritional guidelines for feeding your baby the best possible food. I plan to use this book when feeding my own baby, and would recommend it if you need some more information!

I had two children both of whom had food allergies or malabsorbtion problems from birth. I made all the baby food mainly from food I already cooked for the rest of us, except for fruit which I made additional specially for the babies. Commerical baby food always had things my babies could not digest. I could not have survived as a working mother (had to supply all the allergic children's food for daycare) without a freezer. It was a huge chest one that could fit an entire moose! I had baskets for the little things like baby food. Now that the children are grown and there are only two of us (and we have downsized to a condo), I sold the huge chest freezer and bought an upright one. I find meat gets freezer burn faster than it did in the chest one (unless it was because we went through more food then). I also have a new fridge with bottom pullout freezer, which is so handy, but I still use the upright one for sauces, desserts (e.g. apple or other fruit crisps), cookies both baked and unbaked dough, and other prepared food (e.g. cabbage rolls, lasagna...). I have a microwave with defrost function for fast thawout before finishing the cooking. This means when someone drops over unexpectedly, presto meal! When we have a snowday and can't go out shopping, who cares - we have meals to spare. Don't feel like cooking or I am in hospital, there is always something to eat. One question though - I make a wicked clam sauce for spaghetti with canned clams. The sauce used to be eaten in two days with a family, but the two of us eat only half in two days and get sick of it. Can this sauce be frozen? I can't do a half batch of the sauce because it takss on full can of clams.

Hi, I was just curious about the frozen breast milk ice cubes..
Is it safe? I mean.. bacteria???
When you take the bag out of the freezer to get the cubies.. open the bag and then close it again.. doesn't this allow bacteria to get in??
After freezing the ice cubes, what kind of bag is good to put them in?
I'm just trying to do this, but this is my only concern. :s
Thank you.

Just found this great post, but as per the avocados turning brown, just save the pits! What I do is use the half of the avocado without the pit, and I put the one still holding the pit in a ziploc bag and toss it in the fridge. Something in the pits keeps them from turning brown...you can do this when you make gauc too, just put them on top!