Food for thought Fridays - Dabbling in freezer cooking

I admit, I'm suspicious of freezer cooking. Too many times I've frozen leftovers, later defrosted them for dinner only to find an unappealing, congealed mess. Takeaways anyone?

Still, I like the concept. And so many bloggers out there rave about how freezer cooking has taken away the stress of dinner time and saved them money.

So I'm dabbling.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about my success with Mexican rollups. This was a happy, happy success that gave me six tasty lunches. I want to make those again, and will, just as soon as I roast another chicken.

Now I'm trying a Money Saving Mom banana bread recipe, where she recommends slicing the banana loaf when cool and storing it in the freezer in a ziplock bag. You can take out slices as you need them for breakfasts or snacks on the go. They don't take long to defrost, and I'm willing to experiment with how good they taste frozen too. Here's the recipe:

Ingredients

• 2c plain flour
• 1t baking soda
• 1/2t baking powder
• 1/2t salt
• 1/2c vegetable oil
• 1c sugar
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 3-4 bananas, mashed
• 1/2t vanilla essence
• 3T milk

Method
1. Preheat oven to 175 degrees Celsius. Stir together first four (dry) ingredients.

2. Beat together remaining ingredients.

3. Add wet ingredients to dry and blend until just combined.

4. Pour into greased loaf pan and bake on bottom shelf of oven for 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until skewer inserted in centre comes out clean. (After 50 minutes you might want to cover the loaf with tin foil, as my loaf blackened on the outside before it had finished cooking in the centre.)

5. Cool in pan for 10 minutes and then transfer to a wire rack.

6. When totally cool, slice and store in a ziplock bag for later use. (Suck the air out of the bag with a straw to prevent freezer burn.)