What I've been freezing lately

Yesterday, I received a comment from a subscriber who asked if something was wrong with their Substack because it showed my most recent post as November of 2025. I let them know that nothing was wrong; I just let this year get away from me and never got back into the swing of writing. Creating video content does take a lot of time, but I know it’s not everyone’s preferred method of consuming media.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want this newsletter to be, and I often overcomplicate things, which leads to ADHD paralysis, and then nothing gets done.

So I hope you’ll forgive me for just popping back in after months of silence. It wasn’t intentional. And I think this style of casual update on what I’ve been cooking and enjoying is appreciated, but I guess you’ll let me know.

Yesterday, I shared a video showing a few Chinese takeout favorites that I batch-cooked and froze some of. My best friend’s husband has been going through chemo, so I’ve been cooking quite a bit for them as well as for Doug and me. So some of this just went straight to them, some was for our dinner, and then some went into the freezer. But of course, after sharing the video, I was asked for the recipes, so I said I’d share them here.

If you read through these recipes and notice some ingredients you don’t have or aren’t familiar with, I also just shared a post about what Chinese pantry ingredients I keep on hand.

I cooked all of these recipes in a wok, but if you don’t have one, you can use a 12” skillet. This is the wok I currently have, but I do want to upgrade to this higher quality one since the one I have is on the cheap side, and it feels like it.

These aren’t all my original recipes, but I have tested them for the freezer and found they all work well. When it comes to freezing veggie sides, I like cabbage and carrots if they're lightly cooked; this way they still have crunch when reheating, even after freezing!

The first veggie side I wanted to make is stir-fried baby bok choy.

The baby bok choy fits so well inside the 1/2 cup Souper Cubes trays, and even after freezing and reheating, the bulb still has some crunch.

For this next recipe, I used two different recipes I found online to figure it out. The first was from The Delicious Life, and the second was from CJ Eats. They were both very simple, but one uses Chicken Powder and the other calls for Mushroom Boullion. I went with Mushroom Boullion to keep it vegetarian, but if you don’t have it, you can substitute it with Chicken Boullion Powder.

The recipe also calls for Taiwanese cabbage, which is a flat-headed cabbage that is sweeter, but if you cannot find that, just use green cabbage.

Next up, I wanted to make vegetable lo mein, but I could only find chow mein noodles. So vegetable chow mein it is. If you’re looking for fresh noodles, I highly recommend the brand Twin Marquis. Sometimes I can only find them frozen, but just thaw them in your fridge and use them within a few days.

This recipe is adapted from Cassie Young’s Chicken Lo Mein recipe.

Lastly, the protein I made for this prep is a chicken and onion stir-fry. This was my first time making this recipe, but I misread one of the ingredients and added too much dark soy sauce, so your final dish should NOT be this dark in color. However, it was still delicious, so I’m including it here. I found this recipe on Tiktok and it’s by the creator Victor Wokmanyama. I also scaled this recipe up for meal prep, so pay attention to the serving sizes if you want to make a large amount.

I hope you try out some of these recipes, and let me know what you’d like to see more of over here on Substack!