Save money with smart food storage

Ground beef: divide it up.
When it comes to ground beef, buy several family-size packages at a time. The last thing you want to do is toss eight pounds of beef in the freezer as it is, even with the help of the trusty microwave. It is ridiculously hard to get a large block of meat thawed. I usually cook ground beef as soon as I get it home, or form it uncooked into hamburgers or make meatballs or meatloaf that go into the freezer. Extra Tip: Freeze meatloaf right in the pan in which you’ll bake it. I like using a Bundt pan because the hole in the middle allows the meatloaf to cook more quickly.

I cook it up too in bulk if I have time that day, and once it's browned and drained, I add lots of green peppers and onions to it. When it's all done I split it into meal-size portions and put in freezer bags, dated and labeled. I use this mix for taco, spaghetti bolognese, chili, hamburger helper, etc. Those precooked bags are a blessing on a busy day because you can cook them from frozen as is.

Anything I know I won't have time to cook up right then or the next day gets broken down into meal-sized bags too for days when I'm not pushed for time and can thaw it out overnight. I never freeze those giant packs in one big lump.

 Always check the bag when you're buying chicken in bulk to make sure it says "individually frozen", cookiefan. It makes the bag much easier to split up. If it's not you'd have the same problem where they are all clumped together. If you buy fresh, freeze them spread out on cookie sheets first before bagging them. They will then be the same as the "individually frozen" bags you buy. I've got a chest freezer which makes that easy to do when you have that amount of space.