Work smart not hard

I grew up living a life where I prided myself on working hard. As a result I never really had the time for cooking an elaborate meal. I also liked to have variety, but I didn't really like to work hard for it. So although I never had a recipe that I cherished I learned how to cook in large portions specifically to make freezer meals and make life a little less hectic when I had other things to deal with in life anyway.

When I made spaghetti for the family I would make the entire package of pasta, which would obviously be too much for the family, but it gave me the opportunity to portion out the remainder of the pasta into single serve portions and freeze them in ziploc bags.

I started by guesstimating, but in all honesty I've never been good at guessing anything, so I graduated to using a kitchen scale. One of my pet peeves about freezing them too was that blobs of pasta made for disorganized freezer, with hard to find leftovers, until I came across this meme another lifetime ago.

Once I learned that the lines across the bottom of the freezer were to stand up frozen meat, that again improved my meal prepping, I began to flat freeze the portions and stand them up along side the frozen trays of meat, once again upgrading my meal prepping skills. I still had the issue of having to tear the frozen food out of the ziploc bag, but I could see it, label it, organize it & that was worth it to me anyway.

Then I came across a box of frozen KD that had been frozen in cubes then vacuum sealed and it gave me the idea to push the sides of the ziploc bags by a centimeter on each side and flat freeze them that way. It made life even easier because suddenly I stopped having to fight the freezer bag in order to get to the food.

I only ever freeze my starches alone, that way I can mix and match them with the frozen veggies, meats, and sauces that have also been portioned and frozen for maximized meal options. I may not work as hard anymore as a disabled person, but having the ever improving meal prep habits, does help me to continue to eat a variety of healthy delicious food when I may not have the energy to cook.

I got a job at an Italian restaurant in order to learn recipes and how they stored large portions of premade pasta and learned a fantastic trick on how to cool pasta and make it easier to handle when cold.

Spray water on your cleaned counter, lay aluminum foil down on top and smooth it down to cover the surface completely.

Strain the pasta, pour olive oil over it and mix it thoroughly so the oil is evenly dispersed.

Lay the pasta across the counter to cool quickly and evenly so it can be put in containers in the fridge for future use.

The olive oil coating prevents the pasta from sticking together once you put it in the containers for future as well, making meal prepping much easier.

Learning that working in a kitchen benefited meal prepping so much, the oil didn't just make the cold pasta easier to work with in the fridge, but easier to slide out of the freezer bags, and prolonged the life of the pasta in the freezer by creating an additional barrier between the freezer air and the food.

Who knew a family tradition born of workaholics would serve me as a disabled person, living a life centered around self-care so well. It's truly something to be grateful for.