Keeping essential foods to always keep in your freezer is one of the smartest ways to save money, reduce food waste, and enjoy nutritious meals whenever you need them.Frozen foods are a convenient option for busy households, as they are preserved using modern freezing techniques that help to retain their flavor, texture and valuable nutrients. Whether you're looking for bread, herbs, or ready meals and vegetables, having the essentials in your freezer ensures you can have quick and easy breakfasts, lunches and dinners at the ready.
Why Every Kitchen Should Have Freezer Essentials?
Keeping freezer essentials on hand helps you prepare quick, nutritious meals while reducing food waste and grocery expenses. A well-stocked freezer also ensures you always have convenient ingredients ready for busy days or unexpected guests.
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Frozen foods have come a long way, bringing vibrant vegetables, luxury ready meals and airy pastries to our plates with maximum convenience. The freezing process locks in essential nutrients, while frozen foods are often better value, too. From juicy berries to delicious dumplings, here's our rundown of the foods that are actually better when frozen.
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Bread
From fluffy pittas to crisp baguettes, it’s always worth having some extra bread kept in the freezer for emergencies – especially as it’s recognized as one of the world’s most wasted foods. For best results, varieties that can be cooked straight from frozen should be used, such as ready-sliced loaves, bagels, and naans, all of which can be toasted, warmed up in the oven, or grilled.
Roast potatoes
With a perfectly crisp exterior and a fluffy interior, it’s hard to beat the humble roast potato. The brand Aunt Bessie’s first sold frozen versions commercially in 1999 in the UK, and now you can buy all kinds of gourmet versions, ready to eat in about half an hour. If you're making your own, a great hack is to freeze par-boiled potatoes so they’re ready to add straight to a roasting dish with hot oil.
Açai purée
If you’re a fan of smoothie bowls, stashing açai purée in your freezer drawers could be game-changing for your morning meals. Açai berries are a superfood packed with antioxidants and numerous health benefits, from improving cholesterol to possessing anti-cancer properties. They’re hard to find fresh in most countries, but you can find them in frozen purée form in some major supermarkets or health food stores.
Spring rolls
The secret of a great spring roll is a crispy outer shell that gives way to a gorgeously succulent and moist filling. Herein lies the challenge, as leaving uncooked spring rolls for days in a chiller cabinet causes that all-important wrapper to soak up moisture. Buying frozen is the perfect solution: you get the right quantity for your needs, a perfect crunch on consumption, and a back-up supply on ice for when you're tempted to cook up a few more.
Ready meals
Ready meals have come a long way since someone invented the first TV dinner in 1950s America. These days there are all kinds of tasty gourmet options, available at the click of a button. Considering the short shelf life of your average fresh ready meal, it makes perfect sense to store them in the freezer – after all, it only adds a few extra minutes onto the cooking time.
Falafels
A Middle Eastern staple made with chickpeas and spices, these flavour-packed spheres taste delicious when stuffed into warm pittas, squashed inside toasted wraps, or tossed over leafy salads. Check the frozen aisle of your supermarket, and you’ll likely find these plant-based favourites. You usually find falafels pre-cooked, so you just need to reheat them in the oven or air fryer.
Pizza dough
Using ready-made dough cuts hours from the pizza-making process. And, since local artisan stores only stock oven-ready yeasted dough from a chiller in a tiny slice, frozen is your best friend here. Baking your base will give you a far superior result to a ready-made frozen pizza. If you'd rather make your own dough from scratch, it freezes brilliantly, too – wrap or put in an oiled bag after the first prove.
Herbs
The extremely short shelf life of delicate fresh herbs makes them a commonly wasted ingredient, but luckily you can buy frozen herbs from most supermarkets. The texture is obviously different from fresh, but if you prepare them in the correct way, the flavour should be almost identical when you add them to pasta dishes, curries and sauces. You can dry-freeze coarse herbs such as rosemary and thyme by removing the stalks and keeping them in an airtight plastic bag, while softer herbs benefit from being chopped and frozen as ice cubes.
Okra
While fresh okra is delicious, it’s not always the easiest – or most affordable – vegetable to find in supermarkets. Instead, opt for frozen, and you can still reap all of the nutritional benefits and make the same tasty recipes at home. It comes either whole or chopped, and doesn’t lose its taste, texture or shape. Frozen okra works great in stews, curries and rice dishes.
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Cooked chicken
Deli meats have a notoriously short shelf life, making the kind of chicken strips you might use in a sandwich or salad a tricky option to manage in your fridge. Did you know that cooked strips of chicken breast are cheaper per kilo and keep for months in the freezer? Maybe that's why analysts at Kantar found that cooked chicken is among the fastest growing frozen categories.
FAQs
1. What should NOT be left in the freezer?
Top freezer foods that can be bought cheaply include bread, vegetables, cooked chicken and herbs, pizza dough, ready meals, berries and falafels and spring rolls.
2. Can frozen foods be as healthy as fresh foods?
Yes. The frozen foods are frozen soon after harvest or preparation, and many have most of their nutrients.
3. What is the purpose of freezing for reducing food waste?
Freezing is a way of prolonging the shelf life of food so that they can be utilised when required rather than discarded because they have gone bad.
4. What are the quickest frozen foods to prepare for a meal?
A great choice for quick and easy meals can be ready meals, cooked chicken, pizza dough, roast potatoes, spring rolls and falafels.
5. Are there any benefits of homemade foods being frozen?
Absolutely. These foods are all good choices for freezer storage in airtight containers or freezer-safe bags: homemade bread, pizza dough, herbs, cooked chicken, soups, and cooked potatoes (par-boiled).
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