Hi welcome to Freezer Meals 101 I am Christie and I'm Sharla if it's your first time here welcome
welcome Christie and I are neighbors and when she moved in we realized at one of our very first
times meeting not the very first time because she came to drop off uh like a house or like a
invitation for a housewarming for them and she had like their youngest son in the wagon oh yeah I did
he was so cute um and I was excited because they had kids and you know new neighbors are always
exciting um and then I went to the housewarming party but the first time that Christie came over
here to visit where we actually had a visit had a visit it came up Freezer Meals came up and she did
freezer meals and I did Freezer Meals and it was like what a funny kawikidink what if we did them
together yes yeah and the rest was kind of History because we have done Freezer Meals together every
month three months for like the last 10 11 years that's a lot of days it's a lot of meals so it
just naturally progressed to here we are today telling you about how to do Freezer Meals because
some people don't know so we'll tell you how to do it ironically we're not really doing Freezer Meals
today we're doing ironic we're doing spice Blends which you can freeze by the way if you didn't know
you can freeze your spices absolutely yeah and one of these actually got made because of a freezer
meal and that's kind of how this video came about and now yeah that's right and this Cajun seasoning
because in our one pot meals Freezer Meals I'm gonna put a link right there so we were doing
these one hot Freezer Meals oh my goodness they are amazing like if you make none of our other
meals like just you need to make this one like oh so yes so this cajun chicken one pot pasta is like
we're doing a mega session and we're including that in it because even though we just ate it
it doesn't matter so it's it's one of our new favorites but Christie was making this meal
and she could not find the cake you were either on a call or at an appointment and I she wasn't
here and I was doing the other one and I was doing this Cajun pasta and I'm like I know she
has Cajun seasoning but can can we show them yeah sure so here's Sharla's spice cupboard
and you know it's pretty intense in here there's a lot going on I have
one of us is more organized than the other and so one of us has decided that her new title for this
little partnership we have is director of spice management because I will go through her spices
and I'll amalgamate and make sure that like oh my goodness you're not allowed to buy cumin anymore
because she just keeps buying at me I have so much and we can't use it all it's true so I'm
looking and looking and I'm spending considerable amount of time looking for Cajun seasoning so I'm
like well look at what I have here so I quickly Googled and I'm sure this probably came from
like all recipes or I don't even know where it came from it seriously it is a very basic
Cajun seasoning recipe well and you had to adapt it because I didn't even have it we didn't have
everything and so I'm like well I'm gonna film that too so you are going to see a pre-filmed
recording this this was filmed previously of this Cajun seasoning and because she had all the stuff
most of the stuff so I'm like I'll just make my own I guess so she she finally comes in and I'm
like I have been tearing my that was also the one with the peppers yes because you didn't have the
you didn't have the tomatoes so we ended up using the peppers and that's what ended up making it
they did such a good recipe yes and so here's I'm like you don't have any Cajun seasoning
she's like of course I do look at look at look at it's like right it's right here no it isn't
did it get moved Sharla it got moved but it used to be it is oh it's right here together because
she's got lots of kids and the oldest likes to hoard this for himself yes from from the
boy whose third oldest third third boy because he'll use it all on him so he hides it back here
every time so he can't use it up on him okay he likes to use it in his hash browns and I couldn't
because when you have a large family we've got seven kids they get creative yes and about how
to keep like hide have things right yeah and so that's how the Cajun seasoning came about
and then a while back we did a video with um taco seasoning and Jamaican Jerk yeah and so
we'll put the link there yeah but people really liked it actually and we were like that's not
a freezer meal but okay I'm like wow we do make our own seasonings sometimes so we'll
do another one then when we had the Cajun one that was an accident happen we're like well
let's make a few more and we'll make another video so here we are here we are we're doing
the Cajun seasoning we have a few others that you're gonna love and uh let's get started okay
the fajita seasoning you're going to put quite a lot of cornstarch four tablespoons of corn starch
because that'll help thicken things up and make it all creamy and cohesive and it sticks nice and and
then some chili powder salt paprika a little bit of sugar oregano onion powder garlic powder cumin
and cayenne and that's all you need you mix that all together put it into a freezer bag or airtight
container and you can keep it in your freezer and then when you want to go make fajitas and we have
a really great recipe for chicken fajita sheet pan yes we also have we have a really good beef pizza
recipe that one's good too but if you want to make whatever fajita recipe you want to use you can
just use three tablespoons of this powder to every one pound of your meat strips and voila fajitas
I think we didn't put it in the instructions here but I think it would be like taco seasoning where
it'd be beneficial to have some moisture in there too yeah you know if you buy the packet it'll say
you know add in with a third of a cup of water or something so that it makes a sauce and then you
boil that water back off but in the meantime all that seasoning goodness is in like into your meat
right it's infused so um it isn't on there but I think that's what I would do if I was making these
yes and in our beef fajitas we actually have some salsa we do in there so that creates the moisture
and all of that so yeah absolutely um you're gonna die for this I didn't think that I would
it's everything bagel seasoning and you're like Christie what are you talking about you can buy
that at Costco yeah you can but it's not as good as this and it's it's by a lady named
Natalie Perry from perrysplate.com and because we were looking for like well what else can we
do and and we thought about the everything bagel seasoning and I found this one and she said stop
this is the best one you're gonna ever have you're never gonna want anything else and she's right
oh my goodness and it's so simple so I'm going to tell you about it this is her recipe if the
link is down below go click on it she's got a great site shout out to Natalie three quarters
of a cup of white sesame seeds it's okay if they're toasted they're gonna be a little
heavier flavor but that's okay uh it's whatever you want you're gonna add minced onion minced
garlic black sesame seeds now if you can't find them because sometimes it's kind of a specialty
item if you have a really good International Food section at your grocery store you might
be able to find them but if you can't it's okay you can you can add more white seasoning or white
sesame seeds in this and that's okay you're gonna add five tablespoons of sea salt flakes
now she goes off on quite a tangent about maldon sea salt flakes they are a company in England who
process sea water and make it into these flakes and they're kind of like the best one and maybe
they're the only one I don't know you can buy it on Amazon I had to go to the Italian
Center here in town because it's kind of a specialty grocery store to even find it
and she said the reason you want to use them and and she's right is if you used a kosher salt
it's a little heavy it's a little um too crunchy and it doesn't feel nice in your mouth when your
teeth bite down onto it but the sea salt flakes are the right size and they're a lot lighter and
they're Pleasant to eat and then it's not going to all sink to the bottom that's the other thing
everything in here oh I'm not quite done we have two tablespoons of poppy seeds so everything
that's in here is roughly the same size the poppy seeds are a little bit smaller but when you mix
it they stay mixed nothing really settles to the bottom and that's why it works so you can she has
a whole list of things that you can have this with obviously like I don't have everything Bagels at
home right now so I have just been making bagels with regular cream cheese and then sprinkling the
everything bagel seasoning on it that's how I've been eating it but you can add it to eggs you can
add it to avocados or avocado toast salads smoked salmon lettuce wraps sandwiches popcorn which is
super interesting to me I haven't done it yet roasted vegetables Sushi bowls and pizza crust
boom that's awesome it is awesome I have a video somewhere it's an older video it's like
a kid-friendly snacks and I made these like little hot dogs wrapped in those Pillsbury
Donuts like you know the little but they're topped with everything bagel and my kids really like them
and in on our website so I will put a link down below to this we have everything bagel breakfast
muffins and they have the everything bagel seasoning and some bagels and then you make
like an egg mixture and you know like it's this muffin that whatever totally so yeah yeah lots
of uses I'm so glad we did this one I'm so glad we found this one I love this stuff I can see
isn't it great when you find someone that's like passionate about something passionate about her
Bagel seasoning but she's right and she's like an expert on it like she's become like you know
we might be the freezing meal experts but we're not the everything experts so we need to seek out
like everything no we love her this is this is great stuff so good job Natalie shout out to you
and that brings us to our homemade Cajun seasoning the one that Christie had to make because she had
no choice I had I didn't know I had a choice but I mean it happened so the recipe originally called
for smoked paprika but I didn't have that so she used regular paprika and it tastes amazing like
this so either way smoked or regular paprika some again it was supposed to be fine kosher salt which
I did not have so we used regular salt and that's okay this is just an example of how it's okay to
like you know improvise freezer meals don't have to be perfect they just have to be done you just
have to get them in your freezer absolutely so if and this whole recipe was a good example of how
to improvise totally and because of the whole we didn't have the roasted Peppers we live um in the
country both of us and so when we are missing an ingredient for a recipe and we're like oh I forgot
to buy mushrooms or I forgot you know whatever it is it's not like we can just like pop into
the store because you know on a good weather day we're at least 10 minutes from the closest store
but it's Canada it snows a lot so on you know when the roads are bad we're at least 15 minutes from
the store and then that's each way so it's like half an hour and then the time in the store so
you're not gonna go and waste all that gas and you know go all the way there to get one green pepper
or something so we've gotten to be really good at searching through our pantries searching through
our fridge and improvising and figuring out this will work other things we're omitting but honestly
sometimes we call them happy accidents this is a total happy accident so she didn't have the fire
roasted peppers for the Cajun pasta the Cajun Chicken Pasta but she had oh the fire roasted
tomatoes yeah but you had spicy pepper Tomatoes yes and why I don't know but we don't know but I
have we have no recipe that planned for them I've never heard of them before I thought they looked
interesting in the store and I thought I like to invent recipes yes she does you might you might
have figured this out by now and so I was like I'm gonna someday make something like this and so
we're like let's put them in and then it was it it made the recipe it was as good as the everything
the recipes that you don't want to mix those I bet you could put this in that I bet you could
be cooking Bagel seasoning in the Cajun pasta I'm gonna do it next time anyway carry on okay
sorry sorry I digress I digressed here we go Cajun seasoning for real this time paprika
salt garlic powder pepper well actually you're gonna use black pepper and white pepper so I
got to this point in the recipe and I thought there's no way there's no way I'm just gonna
have to double the black pepper and I started digging darned if she didn't have some I don't
know if it's ever been to open it's Blue Ribbon it is old it is you guys like she had white pepper
people and so I got to put it in there carry on uh then we've got some onion powder oregano cayenne
and Thyme mix all that together put it in your freezer bag and you can toss that in your freezer
or of course if you're in the middle of making a recipe that needs cajun soup it just toss it in
um so what's funny is uh we're pretty passionate about our Freezer Meals and
it doesn't matter what you're doing there's a story behind everything there is so we thought
this is going to be like a really really short video yeah sorry it's like three
spice Blends and done but you know there's stories son hiding the cages and me being so
excited about finding white pepper and then the happy accident with the spicy pepper tomatoes
so good so really good so thanks for joining us today we're gonna put a video right there to
um some kind of like Blends that we made that help you get your recipes started so call them Recipe
Starters you can't KFC seasoning uh yeah yeah so you can check that out over there and yeah
we just appreciate you being here you know do the things like comment subscribe join the club join
our Facebook group we're like all the things we appreciate you guys have a good day happy cooking.