Freezer Love

Thursdays for me are always a kind of no man's land. By Thursday we've finished up all the food that I cooked for the week, and I don't start cooking for the weekend until Thursday night after Henry is asleep. In a former life, before I had Henry, and before my husband started working (he was a student when we were first married), Thursdays were the perfect night to go out to dinner. Though I love Henry dearly, he is not the best dinner date, so instead on Thursdays I now scramble around to find something somewhat balanced and healthy to feed us.

That's where my beloved freezer comes in. I know some people are skeeved out by freezing food, but I am totally the opposite. I will try and freeze anything. Tons of leftover rice from Chinese takeout? Freezer. Rotting bananas on my counter? Freezer. Too big a bag of shredded cheese to eat before it goes bad? Yup, you guessed it - freezer! Freezing my leftover food helps with some quick fixes on busy nights, and definitely helps to save some money.

But, on top of just freezing my rotting/leftover food, I also cook for my freezer. For example, when I make a big pan of macaroni and cheese or a spinach quiche, I almost always cut the leftovers into individual portions and stick them in my freezer. Typically I then kind of forget about it, and then on desperate nights I am elated to find a home-cooked dinner that just needs to be heated in the microwave. Luckily for me, that happened today. A few months ago, I made a big batch of "Addictive Sweet Potato Burritos" that I found on www.allrecipes.com. I then wrapped each burrito in foil, and stuffed them in a bag in my freezer. Today, as I was searching for something for us to eat, I stumbled upon the very last one. I stuck it in the microwave for about 3 minutes, and then Henry and I got to enjoy a delicious meal! I meant to take a picture of the burrito for the blog, but Henry and I were pretty hungry, and the burrito was finished before I even got the camera out. When we find something we like to eat, we don't let anything get in our way!

Again, here is the link for the recipe: Addictive Sweet Potato Burritos. I altered the recipe slightly and used canola oil in place of vegetable oil, and a 1 pound bag of dried black beans instead of 6 cups of kidney beans. I thought the black beans would be a better contrast to the sweet potato, and using the dried beans cut down on the sodium and the cost. I also used regular mustard since I don't have dried mustard, and I used about 15 8-inch whole-wheat tortillas since I didn't have any 10-inch ones. Oh, and I used low-sodium soy sauce to help cut down on the sodium as well. They were a little time-consuming to make, but since they made 15 burritos that I was then able to freeze, it was well worth it!

Happy and (mostly) healthy eating!