I have a wonderful Mom. She did a lot of great things for the four of her children as we were growing up – and still does today! One of the best back to school time memories I have is of Mom baking cookies for our school lunches.
When we were a couple weeks away from the start of school, Mom always asked us what our favorite cookie recipes were. Over the next couple days, she’d bake a double batch of those cookies and package them up for the freezer. When school mornings rolled around, as she packed our lunches, we could pick whatever homemade cookies we wanted for our lunch. We’d pull them straight from the freezer and they would be thawed by lunch. Brilliant!
Now that Nathan is starting Kindergarten this week (gasp!), I’m starting the homemade cookie freezer mission with my kids too.
If you haven’t thought of this easy trick, I’m here to share it with you. Your kids will love you for the special dessert choices, and you will love the time you save by freezing cookies for lunches!
Here is exactly how to freeze cookies for school lunches.
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Start by baking your favorite kind of homemade cookies. Nathan requested classic chocolate chip and then I suggested (my childhood favorite) zebra cookies.
Here are some of our favorite homemade cookies that freeze great! I know because I have frozen all of them in this exact way in the past.
- Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip Cookies
- Chocolate Chip Shortbread Cookies
- The Easiest Roll Out Sugar Cookies
- 5 Ingredient Cake Mix Cookies
- Softest Coconut Macaroons
- Soft Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Zebra Cookies
Once you have baked your cookies, allow them to cool completely. Then, decide if you are packaging your cookies as ones or twos. Since Nathan is in Kindergarten, the larger cookies (like zebra ones), I wrapped as one. I made smaller chocolate chip cookies and packaged them as pairs. If your kids are older, you will probably want to wrap your cookies in pairs.
If wrapping as pairs, place the cookies back to back. You want the bottoms to touch so the outsides show on the top and bottom. This keeps them from drying out and from getting smashed.
Place your cookie pair in the middle of square of seran wrap. I love the Sam’s Club (Kirkland brand) plastic wrap! It is the highest quality wrap I have found for the price. It also comes in a big roll which will last you for awhile – even with wrapping lots of homemade cookies.
Anyway, back to wrapping. Place your cookies in the middle of the plastic wrap. Fold one long side over and then the other long side. Then, slightly twist the short ends before folding them under the cookie.
After you have wrapped your cookies in pairs, place the packages in a large gallon bag or empty ice cream bucket in the freezer. This works especially well if you have an extra freezer with plenty of space to store homemade cookies.
Repeat with at least 2 or 3 different kinds of cookies! Just remember that the more you bake now, the less you have to bake in the weeks to come!
Side note: If you don’t already have one,try the medium one for perfectly sized cookies every time. It will make all your cookie baking so much easier! I have 3 different sizes in my set and use them all the time for muffins, pancakes, cookies and mini-muffins. If you want to just start with one, try the medium one for perfectly sized cookies every time. Cookie scoops are one of my favorite kitchen tools!
This was our back to school project last week. Every day, Nathan and I made a different batch of cookies for the freezer. We will now be set for quite some time! It was a fun kitchen activity for both of us, and now he has lots of special treats for his school lunches.
Whether you freeze cookies for lunches or not, it is still an easy way to freeze cookies. I love that it keeps them portion controlled and you can get out exactly what you need!
Thanks again to my Mom for teaching me this handy freezer cookie trick! Do you ever freeze cookies like this or in a different way? Do you have any other packing lunch tricks? I’d love to know if you do!
