Freezer Cooking. Freezer Bag?

[gate_pourri]

I am stuck home today in the snow and figured I'd make a few freezer meals for the winter (chicken soup, pasta sauce and Pork/onions). I don't have much time to cook on weeknights and have an unhealthy (and expensive) addiction to take out. My question is: do I need to cool off my food before I put them in freezer bags? Can I throw the food in hot and throw it immediately into the freezer? Hot, but throw in the fridge first?

I've never done this before. Help!

 

[powellrj]

Yes, the food needs to cool before you put it into the fridge or freezer. If you don't let it cool, it will bring the temperture of the fridge/freezer down and can ruin the food already stored in there.

 

[Imzadi]

It can also ruin the fridge/freezer as it will suddenly have to work twice as hard to cool.

Here's a thread where wo talked about making "boil-in-bag" meals. All you have to do is take out of freezer & toss the whole bag in boiling water and reheat. It doesn't even mess up the pot. Do read the precautions & use the right, non-melting, Foodsaver type vacuum sealing bags if you plan on doing this.
Boil-in-bag meals

Otherwise, if boil-in-bag is not your thing, Reynolds has these new Handi-vac gadgets to vaccum seal their freeze bags so you won't get freezer burn. Those bags can NOT be boiled later though, only the Foodsaver type can be.

 

[mudman]

Definitly cool first, I don't like the idea of the plastic bag leaching chemicals breaking on my food.

 

[LindaG4458]

Definitely cool first. I use the Foodmaster vaccuum sealing system because I like to boil the food in the bags. The cleanup is easier. Anyway, I once bagged some hot baked beans, then froze them. When I put the bags into the boiling water the seal let go and our dinner was floating in a pan of boiling water. It happened with all three bags from that batch of beans.

Now I chill them overnight before bagging and freezing.