I'm able to get about 2.5 kg of ground beef for a very low price – so as I am just one person I want to portion and freeze it.
Some of it I will portion into patties and freeze, but I'd like to crumble/cook most of it and portion it so I can grab it and toss it in soup, chili, sauce for pasta, etc.
Silly question but – should I cook it up with my onions and spices? Or cook it up plain and freeze – tossing in onions, garlic, spices in the second round?
Not sure which stores better and I don't want to go through the process and then have to throw anything out.
Ground beef prep for freezer – best practices?
byu/cynicalmaru inFrugal
Posted by cynicalmaru
7 Comments
I portion all of it onto a cookie sheet. You could individually bag each hand sized ball, but I do it loose and bag after it’s frozen. It defrosts better in smaller hunks.
Do you have to precook it? I freeze my ground beef in 4 or 8 oz balls wrapped in wax paper in a Ziploc and take it out as needed- in the fridge till defrosted.
Cooking sheets a good idea i preseason burgers and patty but have had issues with them angling lol 😂
I just take the meat out of the package and put it in a vacuum sealed freezer bag.
The only thing you cannot do is burger patties because it will fall apart, but meatballs still work as you usually add a binder anyways.
I vacuum pack mine raw and thaw packets of it as needed. I also freeze patties with parchment paper in between them. Getting the air out of the packaging helps a lot to avoid freezer burn and that weird freezer flavor.
We find 85g/ 3 oz precooked weighed units the handiest quantity. If precooked, one package is perfect for two burritos or two soups. Raw, we make patties and freeze them on a cooking sheet, the store in freezer ziplock bags with a square of parchment paper between patties. I reuse the parchment papers.
We buy 4.5 kilograms/10 pound rolls of 80% hamburger when on sale and freeze two rolls. That is enough for us for many months.
I normally just split it into 200~ 250 g portions by grabbing some of it raw and putting it onto some freezer paper, flattening it out, and tying it up like a present. I don’t like pre-cooking then freezing because that limits what I can use it for, and requires different storage prep that takes up more space.