Friday, January 18, 2013

Freezer Cooking Chicken - Cook now, Use later

Cans of chicken are a great convenience food.  You can make chicken salad sandwiches, casseroles, soup, or even use it as a salad topping.  But it's so expensive when you look at the price per ounce.  It's no where near the price per ounce of a whole chicken or even the price per ounce of boneless skinless chicken breasts!!

Tuna is cheaper.  I can find tuna on sale for dirt cheap prices.  I tried substituting it where I could (on salads and in sandwiches)... but some things just aren't the same without chicken.

So, I tried making my own, by freezer cooking chicken.  The first time, I used a whole chicken.  But I'm all about convenience... and getting all those tiny bones out is such a pain.  Now I use bags of frozen boneless skinless chicken breasts.  I usually get them for less than $1.99 per pound.

Freezer Cooking Chicken


frozen chicken in the crockpot

Toss a bag of chicken in the crockpot, and cook all day.


When it's done, it will fall apart.  You'll even end up with a good amount of chicken broth as a bonus that I usually freeze in an icecube tray.

Take the chicken, one piece at a time, and shred between two forks.


shredding chicken

Store chicken in a freezer-safe container.


I bag the shredded chicken in 1-cup portions and freeze.  Sometimes, I chop the chicken or slice it, depending on what is on the menu for the near future.  Shredded is the most popular in our favorite recipes, so that's what I do most often.

Save some money and freeze some chicken!

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3 comments:

  1. I noticed you are using forks to shred chicken... if you have a kitchen aid mixer or a hand held mixer of any kind you can just turn it on with the chicken and it will shred almost instantly, saving TONS of time!

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  2. I have a stand mixer, but not a handheld. Do you use the flat beater on the Kitchen Aid?

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  3. When my kids were young, I used a very small food processor and made all their baby food with it, basically cooking for all and the would put each item singly in the food processor, no more buying baby food, and since we always have left overs it never costed me anything but the 10.00 I paid for the food processor. If I had more than babies could eat, simply freeze in an ice cube tray and put in snack sized plastic bags. Worked great for us. It was simple, cheap, and only took a few extra minutes.

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