Cooking with Bulk Meats

One thing we’ve done for many years is cooking with bulk meats – whether it’s turkey, ham or even brisket.  It’s a great way to make many meals at once saving money and hours in the kitchen.  For a turkey, I will roast it like I would for Thanksgiving, carving the meat into 2-3 cup portions, package it and put it in the freezer.  The bones are used for making turkey broth (which I then can for soups later).  I’ll then use the meat for various turkey dishes (turkey pot pie, turkey soup, turkey tetrazini, etc.).

With ham, I purchase the butt portion (the shank is too fatty and a whole country ham is a complete nightmare for me).  I cut a diamond-shape pattern in the skin, coat the ham with brown sugar and pour 1/2 can of coke over the ham.  Once it’s fully cooked, I cut it up into 2-3 cup portions and put it in the freezer for later.  The ham bone is used in a pot of beans and the ham slices/chunks are used later for meals like ham, peas and rice; macaroni & cheese with ham; ham soup, etc.

With brisket (our family favorite), my husband makes his super secret rub and smokes the brisket on the pit for about 10 hours.  Once it’s tender, we slice it and freeze it in meal-size portions.  For some meals we’ll make baked potatoes and pile on the chunks of brisket or we’ll add it to beans.  Sometimes we’ll  simply make BBQ sandwiches with chips and pickles.  It’s all good – no matter how you slice it.

The key for us is time management.  It may take a lot of time up front to cook the meat, but once it’s done and put away in the freezer, dinner is mostly prepared and ready for any night of the week.  All I have to do is re-heat the meat and make the sides.