Freezer stash - what's in yours?

[ScottishJill]

I make bento for just little old me so most everything I have in them has to be able to be frozen so I can make a batch and store it away. I have been making up some stuff today - tamagoyaki, various onigiri and inarizushi, and some baked char sui bao. There's usually a bag of pot stickers or goyza in there too but I'm always looking for new ideas.

What do you keep in yours?

[smoke]

I'm bored enough now to post, but many miles away from my own freezer.

Off the top of my head, the only thing that's ready-to-go in there is some chicken drumsticks that I pre-cooked, and an assortment of vegetables that can be put into reheat bentos.

I do have an assortment of pre-breaded white protein that is easy to cook up in the frying pan, as well as some bacon and sausages that can be sliced and cooked from frozen. (The pre-breaded stuff is from a program that helps families that are too rich for food stamps, families that do use food stamps, and it also serves as a fundraiser for food pantries.)

After that, I think there is only room for some meat that needs thawing before I cook it.

Then again, I usually have time to deal with cooking. Though I think I would like the space to cook once and pre-fill the freezer with more convinience food.

[Megs]

Oh my God... I keep so much stuff...
My parents freeze a lot of veggies so usually have the following: green/yellow beans, cauliflower, broccoli, carrots, pea pods and brussel sprouts. This is great if I just need a little filler, and I just grab a few out of the bag and toss the rest back in the freezer.
I like to make mini Gladware containers of curry (without rice) after we have a meal of curry at home. One of the little rectangle containers is the perfect amount for hubs and I in a bento. I also make and freeze meatballs. I like making my own so that I can season them different every time. This last year I froze my own edamame (which hubs prefers to store brand). I still have lots on hand, though!
From the store, I keep a bag of pot stickers and a bag of pre-cooked shrimp. Also, I got some little frozen strudel bites the other week (they're for hubs, though).
There's more... I know there's more, but I just can't think of them off-hand...

[gfbentomom]

Mine changes from time to time. It's low right now. Currently I have some homemade meatballs from a 1/2 pound of ground pork that was left after I used the rest to make something else. They'll be warmed up and sauced with sweet and sour type sauce before adding to the bento. Going into tomorrow's bento, from the freezer stash, are homemade breaded chicken fingers-uncooked- that I'll deep fry in the morning. Today I pulled out some sliced bread for grilled cheese sammy(we bake our own from a gluten-free mix and it stays fresher if frozen). Today I made banana bread that will be sliced and frozen. This week I'll be baking individual pizzas that will go in the freezer for daily lunches, an upcoming field trip, and any last minute invites. Shredded cheese has been waiting in the freezer to go on the pizzas, as has homemade pizza sauce that was frozen in icecube trays so that I can warm up just the amount that I want. I also have homemade chicken broth that was frozen in ice cubes. That goes into an "instant" chicken and rice soup for the thermos. I simmer it with rice, chopped carrots and chicken and seasoning in the a.m. for a quick fresh lunch. We had some bosc pears that were getting overripe so I chopped and simmered in a bit of water and froze in individual serving containers-no need for sugar. They were sweet enough. I'll just add a container to the lunch bag and let it defrost or not on it's own by lunch-all the happier DS will be if they are still frosty. Home seasoned inari skins are in there too.

Lots of homemade pesto and some Italian meatballs for DH.

[pauline]

Right now, my freezer doesn't have a lot pre-made foods, some bento supplies. I've got some frozen raw sui mai, fish sticks, frozen garlic bread, some frozen pizzas. I've got two meals of pasta with chicken & vodka sauce that I froze when I made a big batch. Everything else needs to be assembled/made into a meal or bento.

[PixelxBento]

-pasta in single serving cups
-edaname
-chicken nuggets
-misc. veggies
-pita sandwiches (chicken marsala)
-gyoza
-shu mai
-falafel balls
-lemon grass spring rolls
-shrimp

etc.

[ScottishJill]

I like the idea of the curry portions... and falafel. And spring rolls. We're pretty daft on curries in my house but I never thought to freeze the leftovers. I forgot to add that I also keep loads of veggies in the freezer and have some cooked shrimp and haggis samosas in there at the moment too.

Edamame is a funny one here - we can get podded soy beans in the freezer section but only in really big supermarkets and there isn't a hope of getting them in the shell. I also have problems trying to get any purple veggies, we had purple sprouting broccoli for a month or two but the great Edinburgh public apparently didn't take to it enough for the supermarket to keep stocking it.

[eventamy]

I store a lot of leftovers in the freezer, it's easy to grab something, especially for my daughters!
So right now I have:
Rice (brown, basmati, jasmine and sushi)
Onigiri with salmon inside
leftover bean stew (2 kinds, 1 with kidney beans, 1 with white beans)
Pasta (tortellini, small shapes and linguine)
Veggie burgers
veggie chicken nuggets
small servings of veggies (steamed broccoli, corn)
roasted/marinated tofu slices
leftover snacks from Super Bowl (small spanikopita triangles, mini quiche, crispy dim sum (shrimp), little honey glazed chicken bites for DH).

I'm making myself hungry just by typing this and thinking about what's in there! I guess it's time for a nice freezer bento!

[Pangolin]

I have frozen "silver rolls" - (steamed bread rolls), Naan, and mixed frozen veggies. since most of our bento are made from dinner leftovers, and the chest freezer is mostly full of frozen chicken and food for the critters, there's not a lot of space for bento staples for us!

However, since we eat rice for dinner at least a couple nights per week, there's almost always leftover rice to do something with. I've also been known to cook up ramen noodles in the morning to drop in a bento. There is almost always cheese in the fridge, along with fresh fruit.
We also keep nuts and dried fruit around to fill in spaces in bento and tummies.

I have a block of paneer that I need to do soemthing with, so I may cut it up and fry it, and then re-freeze it to drop in Indian sauce leftovers...mmm...

[ScottishJill]

I added some sticky orange chicken pieces to the stash tonight and will be making some falafel on my next day off... the store bought ones here aren't up to much! I usually have some homemade yogurt flat bread (very similar to naan) in the freezer too... I make them when I have plain yogurt going out of date