I'd like to make extra food to throw in the freezer but am limited on my baking dishes. What do you use? The tin foil bakeware? Or do you bake your items and then store in food saver bags?

It just depends on what I am freezing. I try and buy large quantities of meat when it is on sale. I will seperate it out, wrap up really good in foil and than put in heavy duty freezer bags. If I make a double batch of chili, spagetti sauce, etc. I will put it into a freezer bag and flatten it out. Than freeze it flat, than when it is froze, I can stash it upright to save room. If I am freezing a casserole, I will use the disposable pans, wrap it up really well with foil and than put it in a freezer bag. Plastic container also work well. I have used butter containers or ice cream containers in the freezer before too. I will only use my baking dishes if I know it is a meal that I am going to cook up in the nest day or too. I think the key to freezing any food is to make sure it is wrapped/sealed really well.

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I don't freeze anything in their original baking dishes. When I do chili, soup, stew or any sauces...I just cool it off a bit and then put it in gladware type containers. They stack really well and you can use them again and again. If I buy meat in bulk, I put meal size or individual portions in freezer bags, squeeze out all the air and then freeze. Sometimes I'll even add marinade to the bag before sealing, which works out well.

If I make something like lasagna, and make an extra one to freeze, I will often use a foil type baking pan or I'll cut it up into individual pieces before freezing.

Another thought on the disposable pans. I know I have reused them before. I did this when I was using them for baking bars, cakes, etc. I think that if you first put down foil and than put your meal in that these could for sure be reused. The foil might help them hold up better when washed since there would be no baked on food that would require soaking or major scrubbing. I think I will try and remember to pick up some and give this a try. I had a few square pans leftover from Christmas baking and these did work great for casseroles for dh to heat up when I worked late. But I didnt think to keep them and just tossed them out.

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I use plastic freezer containers for precooked meals or zip lock freezer bags for veggies out of the garden, soup, etc. with all of the air I can squeeze out of them. I really like the freezer containers but I also like the ease of how the baggies stack if you get ALL of the air out of them.

I have found with tin foil you get alot of freezer burn. Yuck!!

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A Family of 5's quest to forget the Joneses.

An idea I saw somewhere was to line your glass or metal pan with foil before filling/cooking. After freezing, you can remove the food from the pan, bag and store in freezer. When you are ready to reheat, put it back in the original pan and cook.

I read about this idea, too, and thought, "How clever!" This way, you don't need to have a bunch of baking dishes, nor do you tie up your baking dishes in the freezer.

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Attaining financial freedom is like eating an elephant . . . it takes one bite at a time.

I don't really freeze casserole type things, but if I did, I intend to try the "line your pans with tinfoil" method.
i freeze things like cookie dough and meatballs, and I just spread them on a cookie sheet, freeze, then put in a tupperware or ziploc. Otherwise, I am freezing leftovers and I use gladware

I've also frozen individual portions of leftovers in empty containers of yogurt, cottage cheese, sour cream, etc. The large yogurt containers can hold enough for an entire meal. I label them with a piece of masking tape. When it's time to reheat, I run a little warm water on the container to loosen up the contents, dump it into a microwave-safe bowl and defrost and reheat (you can just reheat if it's a single serving).

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Attaining financial freedom is like eating an elephant . . . it takes one bite at a time.

I use ziplock baggies the most,(I find these to be the most space saving) but also use empty containers as well, depends on what it is.