Frozen Foods to Fill the Freezer -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

Frozen Foods to Fill the Freezer  -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

Well the blog, Powders to Pack the Pantry  -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients was so popular, I thought you might like to see what a "Puree Chef" keeps in a stocked freezer.

Just make it easier, I will post them in this order - Protein, Vegetables, Fruit, and Starches. This is the list order that I go through when I have to restock, so that if I think I will run out of room, I leave off Fruit and Starches, because I'm rather have them fresh anyway - except tater tots. 

I keep them in the freezer for the times when I A) burn the meal and have to start over; B) discover the fresh has gone bad in the refridge; C) out of season, and I use it all the time;  or D) only use a small amount at a time, and it is not economical to buy fresh.

SAUSAGE
Frozen, fully-cooked sausage are a staple to my breakfast.  I pour hot coffee into my Vitamix, so adding a frozen sausage cools off the coffee. I buy chicken, because my wife asked me to do so.  With six years of being the spouse of a Cancer Treatment Survivor it is the least I can do, so she doesn't open the freezer door and see "PORK" on a box.  I buy pork sausages fresh instead, and use them right a way.

VEGGIE BURGER
The brand changes depending what is on sales, and the time of year.  I'll add this to my veggie chili in stead of meat.  I grill them in the summer-time.

FISH STICKS
Usually fish is sold in large pieces, so if I just want fish by myself, I end up with too much leftover.

EDAMAME
This is my cross-over from protein to vegetables.  It is hard to buy fresh, shelled edamame, and I add just a few at a time, so frozen is the way to go. 

CORN
This is more for my daughter, because it seems every dish gets a little corn sprinkled in it.  If I share a meal with her, I will get corn in my puree.

PEAS
By now you might have seen that most of my foods are Organic, and have the Cascadian Farms Label. General Mills has made a move towards healthier foods, so I purchase Cascadian Farms to support that move - besides they are available through Amazon.com.  
Peas are another of my daughter favorites, so we add a lot of peas to meals.

SPINACH
My wife is constantly buying fresh leafy vegetables - spinach, kale, Spring Greens.  So, frozen spinach is relegated to those rare times we run out - like when the "fresh" has gone bad.

 STRAWBERRIES
Yes, I do make smoothies.  Usually at night, when my daughter ask me to make one.  Frozen berries help to keep the smoothie cold, and she likes her smoothies very thick.  So after I make her one, I take my half of the puree, and add hot water and protein powder.

BLUEBERRIES
Boy, do blueberries spike in price out of season.  Between my dried blueberries in the pantry, and the frozen in the freezer, I'm covered for my breakfast blueberries.  Besides, my fresh blueberries tend to disappears from late night snacking thieves in my house.  I deliberately by too many fresh berries in season, for just this issue.

MIXED BERRIES / RASPBERRIES / BLACKBERRIES
WARNING - I need to mention that seeds can be an issue with tummy-tubers.  These are always the frozen fruit that disappear first in my house.  It is a given, that when my daughter helps put the groceries away, there will be a night-time request for a raspberry smoothie.

HASH BROWNS
Great to had as a thickener, when you run out of fresh cooked potatoes.

FRIES

I mix off between sweet potatoes, and Idaho potatoes, depending on the meals planned for the week.  My wife prefers sweet potatoes.

RAVIOLI

Raviolis are easy to quickly cook up and puree.  Typically I make them for lunch because tomato sauces at night can be a heartburn problem.  Found a kale and bean version at Costco

TATER TOTS / HUSH PUPPIES

Who doesn't love tater tots. They make the house smell great.

WAFFLES

Some morning, you just can't get motivated to make fresh waffles.  Other days, someone has eaten all your fresh eggs, or hard-boiled them to take them to work.  Good problem to have.

ICE CREAM

Just kidding.  I don't keep ice cream anymore, because the late night thieves make it disappear. Now, I keep fresh cream and puree with flavors I like. 

Also I will say, Yasso frozen yogurt have been known to fall into the grocery cart when I am shopping alone - oops! They support the Oral cancer Foundation walk in Boston, so I support them too.

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My Ninety-Fifth - Stir Fry -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

My Ninety-Fifth - Stir Fry -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

Dedicated to Van Ny is one of my favorite foodie friends who always post great pics of feasts on Facebook

I wife's favorite bring home food in "Szechuan Spicy Bean Curd".  Tofu is not a popular world in my house - not sure why, but I roll with it. My daughter is more of a "Vegetable Lo Mein Noodles" gal. I usually choose something to puree out of the appetizer menu like chicken fingers or Peaking Raviolis.

But now that it is Chinese/Korean New Year and we are headed into the Year of the Cock, I thought I should highlight "stir fry". The Second dish that we all agree on are stir-fried vegetables

To start with, back in the 80's, I had my large Chinese wok, like every other foodie.  It was easy to cook up vegetables quickly and made the house smell delicious.

Five moves later, the wok disappeared, and was replaced with a large saute pan, because I no longer had four roommates in an apartment in Somerville, MA which made me fell like I was preparing food for an army.

Now the number one reason stir fry made the list is because of poop.  Yes, Poop.  Most of the recipes on this list are terrible about constipation.  One of the biggest topics that are not talked about during cancer treatment is opioid induced constipation.  There, I said it.  Now there are a number of drugs you can take, but by the time you take them, you are already in pain - don't go there.  So, stir fry gets more vegetables going through the system.

Alright, back to talking about the fun side of stir fry.  There are four parts to a great stir fry - 1) protein, crisp vegetables, ginger, and starch.  For a good puree, you can almost skip the starch.

RECIPE
one cup of stir fry
one cup of tea/green tea

RICE
Stir fry rice is the "American Pancake" of Asian Food.  It is really just there as a filler, and used to soak up the syrup . . . Ginger Soy Sauce, is very thin and tends to sink to the bottom of a plate.  With puree you don't have that issue - so you can mostly skip it.

PROTEIN

Pick what you like best.  I like beef and dark chicken meat, my ladies like bean curd.  Easy enough to make a veggie only stir fry and cook the meats on the side.  I feel that a traditional stir fry is 3/4 vegetables and 1/4 meat.  Works for the puree too.

Yes, it feels weird to go into a supermarket and buy 3 large scallops.  But they are still great it a stir fry, but I wait until summertime and cook them out of the grill.

VEGETABLE

Cabbage.  Got to have cabbage.  There are dozens of types of cabbage, including broccoli. Cabbage is great because it remains firm when you flash cook it.  Just remember that you need to blend the puree longer than you might think.  Don't worry cabbage can handle it.

Root vegetables, like carrots, are popular too. You don't even have to cut them fancy, unless you are sharing them with others

Traditional Chinese vegetables puree fine - bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, or pea pod.

GINGER

MUST HAVE GINGER.  Ginger is a good cancer fighter, but might be tough on a sore mouth.  But for tummy tubers, I do enjoy a good ginger burp.  Ginger also helps you stay warm.  Ginger tea is popular drink in my house in Winter.

Happy Year of the Cock

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My Ninety-Fourth - Chicken Tenders -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

My Ninety-Fourth - Chicken Tenders -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

Never eat alone.  That was always something I preached at work.  Meal time is really important for bonding humans together as family.  Meal time for survivors of Cancer Treatment, can be a lonely, lonely time.  Etched in my children's mind is "Dad sitting in a chair with a blanket wrapped around him, a mug of puree in his hand, watching 'American Chopper'".  Sitting at the dining-room table was not a fun place, and I should have spent more time there.

I now sit at the dining-room table whenever my daughter comes home after dark, and I have prepared a warm meal.  It may not coincide with my eating schedule, but it is important for me to be there.

Eating the same food as your children is important bonding too.  Nearly every society has some form of Chicken Tenders.  The more research I do into chicken tenders, the more I realize they are just meat-pancakes.

Pancakes are really boring eaten plain.  Chicken tenders are really boring eaten plain.  For pancakes we add butter, syrup, and fruit.  For chicken tenders we add dipping sauce.  Tenders are just a way of eating dipping sauce without letting others be judgmental.

The best thing about chicken tenders, is nearly every restaurant serves a version.  And you can always bring them home and use them for other meals.  I find that to-go chicken fingers are great to any vegetarian dish I have made for my daughter. Always thinkin'

RECIPE
one tablespoon of dipping sauce per cooked chicken tender
Warm water to thin

BATTER/BREADING
OK, I made the assumption that we are not sauteing the chicken tenders.  We are either baking or deep frying them.  This is important because the starch coasting is important to thicken the puree 

DIPPING SAUCE

Most dipping sauces in America are vinegar-based.  This can be painful to sip if your mouth has sores. Whether you hand make them or pour them from a bottle, the most popular ones are:

Honey-Mustard

BBQ

Ketchup

Ranch

Sweet and Sour

Spicy Peanut

Salsa

Nacho cheese

Guacamole

Marinara

VEGETABLE

Yea, I tried to make this a complete meal, and I just couldn't match up a lot of vegetables that would go with it except tomatoes or avocados . . . I'm not worried though, because this is more about time shared with others.

Even then Melting Pot Restaurant has a version of Chicken tenders

although you have to cook them yourself . . 

COMMENTS
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My Ninety-Third - Creamy Pesto Sauce -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

My Ninety-Third - Creamy Pesto Sauce -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

One of the major nutritional pieces of advice, my Nutritionist at Dana Farber gave me, was to add a lot of Olive Oil and Coconut Oil to my diet, when I was worried about losing weight.  I dropped this advice in the back of my mind, when I didn't have to add on weight anymore, and was I was more about maintaining a healthy diet.  Back then, I would actually tip the bottle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil right over and pour it down my stomach peg. Usually about 30 ml.

Pesto Sauce is a favorite summer time sauce when our basil plants are in full growth.  It is another recipe that fell off my list once I reached my acceptable weight.  Time to bring it make onto the list, because it is so easy to make fresh.  This past summer, we had a drought, and my garden suffered.  This year should be much better.

This is an ease meal to plan with my vegetarian family.  Except, I just went to the pantry and discovered all the pasta has been eaten . . . 

Creamy Pesto Puree is also great for keeping you warm in the dead of Winter, which is right about now.

SMALL BATCH PESTO SAUCE RECIPE: 
1 cup fresh basil leaves - use fresh
2 Tablespoons cup freshly grated Romano or Parmesan-Reggiano cheese (about 2 ounces)
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
tablespoon pine nuts
garlic clove
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
(Optional leave or two of Spinach

Typically, when I pour off the extra sauce from the blender, what remains to the right amount to make a Creamy Pesto Pasta

RECIPE
Remaining Pesto in the blender (2 Tablespoons prepared pesto sauce)
1⁄4 cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon butter

2 Tablespoons Parmesan cheese, shredded
1/2 cup of cooked hot pasta
Warm water to thin

OPTIONS
Cooked chicken tender
2 Shelled medium to large shrimp
One large sauteed scallop
extra Spinach
one sprout of cooked broccoli 
Stock of Aparagus  
dash of Sun-Dried Tomato sauce


MEAT
Most creamy pesto recipes have some kind of "white" meat of seafood . . . I'd puree lobster in it too.  You don't need a whole lot of meat in this recipe.

PASTA

Angel hair??  Bow-tie??  Tortellini?? Doesn't matter what pasta you are going to use unless you are using a stuffed pasta like tortellini or ravioli.  Ravioli's work well because the stuffing is usually soft already

CHEESE

Just remember that Parmesan, Romano or Parmesan-Reggiano cheese is a very dry cheese and will require extra warm water.  Especially, is you buy the cheap stuff that has sawdust - but that is another story.

VEGETABLE

Add a piece of veggie.  Hide a piece of veggie.  Either way, the puree is going to come out green, so green vegetables work best.  More importantly,  We expect the puree to be green.

SERVE WARM

Cold creamy pasta is a lot like cold eggs - YYUUUUCCCKKK.  On the flip-side they can also burn your lips if they are too hot.

I'm a big fan of Food Network Recipes

Last Night Guy Fieri, reminded me about pesto.

COMMENTS

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My Ninety-Second - breakfast sandwich -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

My Ninety-Second - breakfast sandwich -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

Every time I drive by a McDonald's or a Dunkin Donuts, the car pulls over to the right.  It dawned on me that a lot of us are used to having our daily breakfast sandwich before we headed off to work.  Then Cancer Treatment forced us to stay at home, and we lost our routine.

When I went back to work, co-workers were still bringing in donuts, which I pureed with my portable blender at work.  But what I really wanted for breakfast was something savory, because I was so tired of all the sweet smoothies I was eating. UGH, one more banana smoothie . . . . 

Whether is is an Egg McMuffin, Taco Bell Grilled Breakfast Burrito, or a Belgian Waffle Breakfast Sandwich they all have protein, starch and grease/fat.  All the important parts of a good puree.

RECIPE: 

One sandwich - quartered
(makes a little over 2 cups of puree)
2 cup warm water/coffee ( sandwiches tend to be very dry, so keep an eye on how much liquid you add)


EGG
They all have egg in common.  Scrambled egg some times sink to the bottom, but with all the starch, the egg tends to be suspended better

MEAT

There are all kinds of meats available from hams, to turkey sausage, to steak, to chicken . . . which add plenty extra protein.

CHEESE

A little cheese is great.  Which is why it needs to be served warm.

NOTHING HEALTHY

OK, I'll be honest, I don't think there is anything healthy about a pureed breakfast sandwich, but that is hot the point.  Yes, I never puree a sausage, egg and cheese on a toasted bagel in front of my wife. (but that is what 6 AM is for . . . )  And adding vegetables, will not make it healthier.  So know that this puree is all about love. And who doesn't love salty ground meat microwaved with pre-made egg paddy and a pre-sliced cheese on a toasted piece of overpriced bread. YYYYUUUUUMMMMMM!

Fresh local eggs are key
Buy Local

COMMENTS
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My Ninety-first - savory crepe -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

My Ninety-first - savory crepe -100 Meals You Never Thought You Would Eat Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer patients

According to Wikipedia there are plenty of other names for crepes:

The names for thin crêpes in other parts of Europe are:

·        Asturian: frixuelo

·        Bosnian: palačinka

·        Breton: krampouezh

·        Bulgarian: палачинка

·        Cornish: krampoeth

·        Croatian: palačinka

·        Czech: palačinka

·        Estonian: pannkook, ülepannikook

·        Faroese: pannukaka

·        Finnish: ohukainen, lätty, lettu or räiskäle

·        Galician: filloas

·        German: Palatschinke

·        Greek: κρέπα (krépa)

·        Hungarian: palacsinta

·        Icelandic: pönnukaka

·        Kazakh: құймақ (quymaq)

·        Latvian: pankūka

·        Lithuanian: lietiniai blynai

·        Polish: naleśniki

·        Portuguese: crepe

·        Romanian: clătită

·        Russian: блины (bliny)

·        Serbian: палачинка

·        Slovak: palacinka

·        Slovene: palačinka

·        Spanish: crepes

·        Turkish: krep, akıtma

·        Ukrainian: млинці, налисники (mlyntsi, nalysnyky)

·        Welsh: cramwyth

There was a comedian when I was a child, who had a joke that everything he made in shop-class became an ashtray.  And every crepe that I try to make becomes a pancake.  I just don't make them thin enough.  Also you need to make several crepes at a time because the first one is always messed up - which makes it a perfect candidate for the blender.

Originally, I was going to make this recipe about seafood crepes - something I have not had for 7 years - before I had my first stomach peg.  It just fell off my radar.  Now just because my crepes become flapjacks is no reason for it to be forgotten.  Most supermarkets now offer pre-made crepes.  Although is you make great crepes, you can remind everyone that the protein to starch ration is better.  There is also nothing like fresh from the farm eggs . . .

Crepes are also a great option at a breakfast brunch buffet because they are easier to puree in a portable machine.  Many hotel buffets will happily puree your brunch for you.

The beauty of a crepe is that there is more protein and less starch between the eggs and meat.  And the secret is that most stuffings have a lot of fat between the oils and the cheeses.

RECIPE: 

One stuffed crepe
1/2 cup sauce like bechamel or hollandaise
1 cup warm water
(makes a little over 2 cups of puree)

or Dump in the blender:
1 crepe
1/2 cup of stuffings*
1/2 cup sauce like bechamel or hollandaise
1 cup warm water

(makes a little over 2 cups of puree)


*MEAT
I'm partial to seafood stuffing with a nice sherry flavor.  However, the list of stuffings read like a list of omelette options.  In theory, that is exactly what we are doing here.  Scrambled eggs tend to clump up at the bottom of a cup unless a lot of starch is added.  So you can treat a crepe like an omelette wrapper.

Although most of the world would use crab meat and shrimp for a seafood crepe, in New England we would substitute lobster and scallops - just sayin'.

*VEGETABLES

Normally, the pain about adding vegetables into a crepes is that you have to cut them up into very small pieces - pureeing solves this issue.

CHEESE

Most crepes have a soft cheese as an ingredient.  Great as a thickener and a protein.  To me, a cheese crepe is really blintzes.

SAUCE

A creamy sauce is key to a tasty crepe - just like a pancake is only there to sop up maple syrup.  And a waffle is just a polite pancake who will hold your syrup politely.

Fresh local eggs are key
Buy Local

COMMENTS
Please add your comments and suggestions to my blog.  Nice to see people from around the globe reading my blog.  Please follow you want the latest recipes.

FACEBOOK

I have created a companion page on Facebook called: 100 Meals Pureed - Recipes for Head and Neck Cancer Survivors.  Sometimes it is easier to share a FB page than send a blog address.