Freezer Meal Adventure

So since my new work schedule is starting up this week (I will work later in the day so I won't be home till we're usually eating) I decided it was time I should start something I've always been curious about...freezer meals. I've read so much about this and know a bunch of people who tend to do it right before a baby is born so that they don't have to worry about throwing meals together with a new baby in the house, which honestly I didn't think to do until it was too late so I didn't get to try it (luckily it worked out for us).

I have wanted to try freezer meals since I like meal planning and having things ready to go and this seemed like the ultimate way to have that done, but for a long time. Plus, this way, all Larry had to do was take things out of the freezer to thaw out, maybe pop it in to the oven for a bit, and voila! Dinner is done. I spent a good portion of October researching what was needed (Are there only certain meals that work for freezer meals? How long do they last? What's the best way to start?). Turns out this really isn't as hard as I thought.

I have been wanting to organize our recipes for a while now so this was a great time. I first sorted them into category (i.e. breakfast, lunch, dinner, desserts, snacks, etc.), then by main ingredient (beef/turkey, chicken/pork, no meat) and then I wrote down the days of the month and essentially did a month long meal plan (rather than a week or two). Knowing each one should last us three days and that Thanksgiving and Date Nights were still in the mix we only needed 8 recipes (Can you believe it? Eight for a whole month? Easy peasy!). Since I wanted to see if we could cancel out some of the recipes in our stash (maybe two were just too similar and we only needed one. Maybe one just didn't have enough flavor) I figured I'd take a couple from each "main ingredient" stack to mix it up and help with getting rid of any.

After grocery shopping (which we've decided in the future should be a click list order rather than going to the store ourselves) our ingredients looked a little like this:

Luckily we have two skillets and crock pots and almost two of every pot in a set so it was nice to use one, wash it out, then while it was drying I'd use the second one.

**A side note for me, I can't eat leftover cubed or whole chicken. One time I was cooking chicken (cubed) and apparently one single piece didn't actually get cooked so when I ate it I could taste how raw it was immediately (it was COMPLETELY pink on the inside) and ever since then when I eat reheated chicken (even from restaurants) it tastes raw and I'm unable to eat it without wanting to throw up. So I can only have shredded chicken. That kind of complicates some things as I have to mess with chicken recipes to make it work with shredded chicken, but it's also nice because I just cook chicken in water (or chicken broth) in the crock pot all day, shred it at the end of the day and then throw it into the rest of the ingredients for the recipe and it kind of turns into a casserole type dish.**

**Another side note for me, I used to hate casseroles. I just hated the word. I hated what people threw into them. They were just plain YUCK! Then I actually tried one and loved the idea of mixing a bunch of yummy things together and cooking it, probably with some cheese on top. Now they are my favorite things to make and eat!**

Cooking only took a couple hours and then I just put things into containers, labeled them with what they were and how they needed to be reheated (add 1C of mozzarella cheese, cook at 350 for 20 minutes...that sort of thing) and packed them away. Like I said, easy peasy! I'm hopeful that they don't taste like reheated dinners, but we'll find out this next month. So far I'm loving the convenience. Sure I have to spend a whole Sunday doing laundry, cooking, dishes, and tidying up the house, but if it means dinners will be ready when I'm home and we can actually sit down as a family to eat (yes, I'm old school in actually wanting that), then it's totally worth one busy Sunday per month to accomplish this!

One thing I didn't realize is that old school shows (like Home Improvement or even Leave It to Beaver, I think, for example) show freezer meals packed away when the mom's have to leave and I never realized those were freezer meals. They were labeled the same way I did mine and I never put two and two together. I also never realized how much those mom's did to stock their fridge like that for their husband and children...and not once did they get a thank you. I don't think they even understood what it took, luckily Larry saw how much I was cooking and all the prep work I did so he got it. The only negative to him was he had to smell all the yummy meals that he had to wait to eat haha.

Anyways, maybe I'll do an update next month to say how well these worked out and if I'd recommend doing them again. Until then...bon appetite!