Oh, this is a great question! I've been meal prepping Nigerian and West...
UTHMAN Anu@anuuthman-8068
29 days ago
Oh, this is a great question! I've been meal prepping Nigerian and West African dishes for years, and I've definitely learned the hard way what works.
For me, the absolute best freezers are stews and braises. Egusi soup, okra soup, and even a simple tomato-based chicken stew freeze like a dream. The key is to slightly undercook the vegetables in things like okra soup. If you cook it all the way through, when you reheat it, the okra can get slimy and the spinach can turn into mush. So I'll cook the stew base, let it cool, and then portion it out. Same with jollof rice. It actually gets better after a day or two in the fridge, but freezing it in single portions means you can pull it out and microwave it for lunch. The rice stays fluffy, not clumpy, as long as you don't over-moisten it when reheating.
One thing nobody told me was about **waakye** (rice and beans). I thought it would be a disaster, but it freezes perfectly if you portion it with the sauce separately. The rice and beans reheat beautifully in a microwave with a damp paper towel, and the shito (black pepper sauce) keeps its kick.
A hard pass for me is fried plantains (dodo). They get soggy and sad. Also, avoid freezing anything with a lot of fresh leafy greens like ugwu or kale that you want to have a bit of crunch. Freeze those separately and add them fresh when you reheat the soup.
One more tip I swear by: use silicone muffin trays to freeze your soups and stews. You pop out perfect hockey-puck sized portions, and then you can just toss them into a bag. Saves so much space and no guessing how much to take out.
17 days ago