Breakfast can be a rough meal of the day. You know it’s good for you and your family to eat a good breakfast each morning, but getting it together can be a tough job to tackle.
Freezer cooking can save the day!
You’ll be pleasantly surprised to see what great breakfasts you can pull off if you do some prep work ahead of time. Here are just a few ideas to get you started.
- Make a Your Own Baking Mixes – Having homemade baking mixes at the ready helps my mornings go so much more smoothly. And they free me up to be more creative, like with these Coconut-Lime Muffins with Chocolate Chips. Just mix up the wet team, dump in the dry goods and stir in some mix-ins. Yum!
- Prepare Your Own Instant Oatmeal – My kids love this stuff, especially the three younger ones. I make a million little packets of homemade instant oatmeal, and breakfast for the early birds is ready before my coffee is. (We have had recent issues with salt lumps, so make sure you mix it well before serving.)
- Enjoy Cinnamon Roll Convenience Without the Can – Homemade Cinnamon Rolls are a household staple at our house since Amy taught me how to make them to freeze. Brilliant! I keep a bag of cinnamon rolls in the freezer at all times. I use this same flash freezing method for Chocolate Butterhorns as well as Raspberry-Blueberry Scones. Oh my!
Here’s a run-down of my breakfast freezer meals this month:
Over the course of the last couple days, my kitchen has seen some action. FishChick came down with a fever and my mom was here for a visit, so I didn’t do the concentrated all day cooking thing, but tackled things in fits and spurts.
- Assembly-line mix-making resulted in the following: Instant Oatmeal Packets, Mix and Match Muffin Mix, Biscuit Mix, Brownie Mix, and Pancake Mix
- I found a loaf of Texas Toast on markdown at Sprouts so I baked up some Oven French Toast. I cooled it on a wire rack and then put it in the freezer in a 2-gallon freezer bag. I made some slices whole and cut others in half. I’ve got teenage boy eaters and itty-bitty, birdy girl eaters. So, now each has his or her own size.
- I love having both a bread machine and a KitchenAid! I got both those babies doing double duty and made double batches of both Cinnamon Rolls and Chocolate Butterhorns. I flash froze them on every tray I own and then once they were solid, moved them to freezer bags.
- Lastly, me and my food processor joined forces to make a huge batch of Raspberry Blueberry Scones. These are so good! I cannot imagine what they would be like if I used heavy cream like the original recipe I tweaked says.
All I can say is that breakfast oughta be suh-weet around here in the coming weeks!
What does breakfast look like at YOUR house?
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{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
During the week, it’s oatmeal made with milk for me and cereal/granola with milk for husband. On the weekends I almost always make waffles. I love your freezer plan. If I did that, maybe I wouldn’t eat oatmeal every day during the week.
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Thanks for sharing freezer breakfast ideas! I like to freeze pancakes and cook them in the toaster.
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We have a constant stash of mini whole-wheat pancakes for the chillin’s and some sort of muffin for me. Beep, beep, beep on the microwave and that’s it.
I don’t drink coffee; I just don’t want to spring into action quite so fast.
(I miss the days when I had one sweet babe who would drink a cup of milk and watch an episode of Mr Rogers first thing in the morning. I gave me 30mins every morning.)
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I can’t find the ‘flash freezing’ method that you were talking about. Can you share that with me? I’d love to be able to make and save these for other days.
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Jessica Fisher Reply:
July 12th, 2010 at 1:42 pm
I’ll have to write a post of flash freezing next month. Simply place the scones or rolls on a tray (greased or lined with parchment or plastic wrap). Freeze until firm. Then pop them off the tray and store in a freezer bag in the freezer.
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baked oatmeal is great and you can make it up the night before. I usually make a double batch in a cake pan. It can be breakfast or a snack or dessert. It can be eatten hot or cold…in milk or on a napkin. It includes eggs and we like a lot of them in ours to give it a bit of a custardy taste. It can also be made with splenda etc . Sugar is not needed for volume as it is in cake. We’ve even taken this on the road. Just google amish baked oatmeal.
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I finally tried your basic pancake recipe…it made exactly 24, which is WAY too many for us (my 2 boys are only 5 & 3), so I laid them out onto a cooling rack in the freezer and now we have pancakes for at least a couple of weeks. Not only were they VERY delicious, they also defrosted & reheated very well.
Thanks so much for all your great ideas!
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I was trying to get your raspberry blueberry scone receipe, but could not get it to come up. Help!!
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Jessica Fisher Reply:
July 12th, 2010 at 4:59 pm
@Terri Hill, I fixed the link. Sorry about that!
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I have a question for anybody that could answer it:
What are your thoughts on making muffins ahead of time, flash freezing them and then keeping them frozen until I want to use them?
I love the idea of making mixes but I have a 3 month old baby and mornings can be a little hard to throw baking into the mix. I was thinking of making muffin baking a rainy activity for my three year old and me. Thanks in advance for your answer.
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Jessica Fisher Reply:
July 12th, 2010 at 6:55 pm
@Kelley, you can do that. And I don’t think you need to flash freeze them. I did a vlog on how to get the air out of the bag. That should work absolutely fine. I just prefer the taste of fresh baked. But, I do bake quick breads ahead of time and wrap and freeze. Go for it!
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Kelley Reply:
July 12th, 2010 at 7:08 pm
@Jessica Fisher, Thank you! Storms are coming our way tomorrow so I think I may have solved our stuck inside blues! I am really learning a lot from this blog.
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Amy @ Gospel Homemaking Reply:
July 12th, 2010 at 8:21 pm
@Kelley, I freeze muffins without baking them. Then, we can have fresh baked muffins with no early morning work! I usually line the muffin tin with muffin papers, but you can also simply grease the tin. Fill with your muffin batter, cover with plastic wrap, and freeze for several hours. When completely frozen, pop them into a freezer bag. I bake them (frozen) at 375 for 35 to 40 minutes.
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I have learned so many tricks and tips from your over the last few months since I found your site. Most recently I got breakfasts under control by making mixes and adding breakfasts to my meal plans. Thank you!
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