Ok, so I work at a Wendys one day a week. I just got off shift, and we close at 1am. At 12am I put a whole bunch of patties down on the grill, so I could start cleaning it by 12:30, and be done by 1am. That way I can walk out the door.
Well…usually we have a rush at 12:40-12:59. Except tonight we didn’t.
At 1am, I still had 15 big patties, and 15 junior patties. We’re supposed to chop them up into chilli meat, but I said fuck that. This massive billionaire corporation won’t even let us take home the food we’re going to throw out anyways. So I said fuck them, and took roughly 30 patties that they weren’t going to throw out.
Now I’m at home with a dilemma. I’m not going to eat 30 patties in a week. So I put the small patties in 2 ziplock bags, and the big patties into 2 other ziplock bags. I put them in the fridge, but I’m wondering. Should I just put 3 of those bags in the freezer, and leave 1 in the fridge to eat throughout the week? Will the freezer bags have any issues? The meat is already cooked. I’d essentially just need to take out a bag, put it in the fridge, and by the next day I could put it in the microwave for a minute.
Is there any issue with doing that?
Absolutely. I do this all the time for lighter camping trips. I still can make hot smashburgers without packing a flattop and propane tank. Separate them with parchment or wax paper for easy portioning.
I also do this with bacon. Cook off five pounds at a time, freeze, and have bacon ready to go anytime. Added bonus: you get a bunch of bacon fat.
Thank you for that amazing idea! See? This is the type of stuff that makes me ask the internet full of humans. I could google it. I’d get probably an AI answer. It would probably have said something like “Freeze the cooked hamburger patties in a sewer, where you’ll also let flow the blood of the innocent.”
I like the humans answer better. It’s helpful. Thank you!
The human answer was more helpful, but the AI answer sounds metal af
What do you do with the bacon fat?
Bacon fat can be used as a replacement for cooking oil in a pan or anywhere you would use grease while cooking. One of my favorite things to do with it is grease a cast iron skillet and bake cornbread in it (you get smoky bacon flavor crust). It also works great as a butter replacement for frying eggs or hash browns. You can also use it as a fat base to make gravy.
If you run the bacon fat through a coffee filter while it’s still hot & liquid (into a glass jar) it will be shelf stable at room temperature. Cone coffee filters are convenient for this.
If you don’t filter it you must store it in the refrigerator, or else the leftover bits of meat in the fat will go rancid and start to rot.