Meals to Freeze in Preparation for Baby

One of my favorite sites is weelicious! She has many freezable recipes.

http://weelicious.com/category/freeze-well-recipes/

There are over 12 pages, but you have to scroll all the way to the bottom to see the page numbers!!

I didn't read everyone's replies, some are long so sorry if I repeat...

Lasagna and spaghetti sauce freeze really well (meat or veggie)

Veggie soup (easy and cheap during the summer months)

Chicken casserole (bread or bread crumbs, cooked chicken, your fav. from sour cream, canned chicken soup, or canned cream of mush., celery, etc. and your fav. veg., carrot,broccli,squash) mix it all up and freeze, then sprinkle cheese on top before oven

Crock pot, crock pot, crock pot: This morning I put still frozen chicken legs in and cooked on high for 4 hrs, drained and added bbq sauce and turned down to warm. Fixed cole slaw durning nap time and put in fridge and steamed corn on the cob at dinner time. Had dinner on the table at 530.
Yesterday I did the ole pot roast standby. Cheap cut of beef, diced onion, potato, and carrots. I often cut everything the night before and mix with marinade of choice in bowl in fridge then dump in pot the next morning. I put every kind of meat, still frozen in my crock pot (chicken and turkey of any cut or whole) beef and pork (chops or loin). You just need to know the temperment of your pot and make sure you don't overcook and dry out meat.

Congratulations and good luck!

Sweet and sour meatballs. The recipe is in the Betty Crocker cookbook.

The key to freezing is do not freeze the meat and the sauce together.
Assemble meatballs, bake in oven until 3/4 cooked, then cool and put in freezer bags. Make the sauce on the stovetop, cool, and pour into a separate ziploc bag. When it is time for dinner, Start a pot of rice. then you put the frozen sauce (bottom) and meatballs (top) together in a separate pig pan on the stovetop and heat until hot. Serve over rice.
I usually triple the the recipe- at least. That way we can have some the night I make them, and save the rest for the freezer.

You can even just make the sauce and use it to serve over foster farms prebreaded frozen chicken chunks. I like this sauce as I dont typically like the taste/quality of the orange sauces they use in the frozen chicken .

If you dont have the Betty Crocker cookbook I can send the recipe, just shoot me a note tonight.

Freezing raw chicken:
Keep your freezer stocked with boneless skinless chicken breasts. You can still take these out by noon or 1 and have them thawed by 5. the secret is to put them in a salt bath. Put a bowl of tapwater in the kitchen sink. Add 1/2 C salt. stir. Add frozen meat(remove from tray if possible, if not, place tray facing you)- cover completely with water. Sometimes I remove the ice cold water after an hour and put in room temp tap water/salt again. The high salt water content keeps bacteria in check.

If you remove and wash the chicken from the grocery trays as soon as you get home. .you can place them very FLAT in ziploc bags, and they will thaw in a salt bath in an hour.

Freezing already BAKED chicken/steak:
If you are going to prebake and freeze meat like chicken or steak- I always like to salt bath it for an hour or two first before I PARTIALLY bake it and freeze it.. The salt helps the meat retain it's moisture, so that it wont be all dried out from the freezer. Undercook the meat for the same amount of time you think it will take to reheat it . (if it is a thick cut, thaw it an hour before heating.)

Cajun chicken chunks:
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salt bath several breasts.
Place in pan and coat both sides with cajun seasoning.
bake just until no pink inside (foster farms will always tend to look pink tinged even when done)
Cool and cut into chunks. Wrap tightly in celophane. Put in ziploc bag. (Double wrapping helps avoid freezer burn tastes) Label/date with black marker.
Use in chinese chicken salads, chicken salad sandwiches, or add to fetuchini noodles with a jar of Ragu garlic alfredo sauce. Sprinkle with parmagian.

Milk and egg based sauces don't freeze well. You can get an idea of what freezes well by looking at what is available in the grocer freezer section.

You will find good advice and freezing tips in a 'meals from the freezer' type cookbook. Try Amazon.

This yummy fruit salad mixes together in less than 3 minutes:

Watergate Salad
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40 ounces good brand crushed pinnapple, with juice
8 ounces cool whip
2 cups mini marshmallows
2 small boxes instant pistachio jello

chill for 3 hours.

K.,

First congratulations! Second, while I don't have many good freezer meal recipes, I would suggest you look up social suppers. you can go in and create the meals and freeze and cook later. I am a FT working mom of 2 and it is great!! You can modify the recipes to your like/ allergies as well.

Hope that helps.

Almost anything can be frozen - you would be surprised! As long as you cool everything properly and seal it up you shouldn’t have a problem. As for the egg casserole I would bake it first then cool and freeze. Remember when you are heating things that have already been cooked you just want to heat them up not continue the cooking process so when using a microwave be sure to use the 50% power setting. And label everything with content and date! Feel free to pm me for recipes - I have hundreds that I cook for my clients all the time. Enjoy baby number 3!

First, I don't know about freezing raw eggs, but my inclination is no. I've seen recipes where you assemble everything else, freeze and then use fresh eggs on the thawed casserole before cooking so maybe that will help.

I second the idea to prep foods to use in crock pot recipes ahead of time. Browning meat before putting in a recipe for the crock pot always adds another layer of flavor. Brown some chicken breasts (or pieces), pork chops, ground beef, stew meat, etc., and freeze for when you need them for easy crock pot recipes. There are tons on both allrecipes.com and recipezaar.com that are great.

Beef or pork roast with root veggies in the crock pot and a salad is one of the easiest meals ever. Just brown all sides of the roast, cut up the root veggies, freeze in separate containers, then when ready too cook, add some seasonings (i.e., dry soup mix, Lawry's, Dale's, salt, pepper and herbs, etc.) and at least a cup of some form of liquid (wine, broth, water, cream soup, etc.) and voila, crock pot dinner in about 8 hours on low. Regarding the veggies, I'm not 100% sure about whether or not you should parboil or blanch root veggies before freezing. I know you can buy bags of frozen stew veggies at the store so they can be frozen. I usually just freeze the meat after browning and then use fresh veggies on the day of cooking. I try to use smaller versions (baby carrots, small, baby or fingerling potatoes, small or pearl onions, etc.) so all I have to do is clean, peel (if desired) and toss in the crock pot.

Boiling chicken to shred, freeze and use later in chicken salads, soups, casseroles, etc., is a great shortcut too. You can also roast or buy rotisserie chicken for this purpose. I'm the only one in our family that actually likes rotisserie chicken as is, so I usually eat a chicken breast off a rotisserie chicken the day I buy it (while the rest of the family is having pizza which I don't really like) and then I remove the rest of the meat for a stir fry the next day for the family or I freeze it either in pieces or shredded to use for meals later.

I also recommend keeping bags of frozen veggies on hand. Microwaving those with some seasoning takes almost no effort (no cleaning or chopping needed) and provides a healthy side.

Meat sauce for pasta dishes is easy to freeze as are most soups. Taco soup is a great one to freeze ahead.

My family likes sandwiches so I try to always have sandwich stuff in the house for when I don't feel like cooking. My 5 & 11 year old kiddos love "making dinner" by making noodle soup and sandwiches for everyone. :-)

I also try to have salad stuff available all the time for a quick side or even for dinner when I add thawed and warmed grilled chicken or steak strips or taco seasoned ground beef. I always keep block or shredded cheese in the house too, which freezes and thaws very well.

As you can see, I'm not really one for freezing a whole casserole so much as I make sure I have all the components of a meal easily accessible and prepared as much in advance as possible to make getting meals together fast on days when time is short.

Hope this helps and congratulations on your new little bundle of joy to be!

Blessings,
N.

Something you might do is cook and freeze ground hamburger so that it is easier to prepare for taco salads or spaghetti. I found that with a few of my babies, I couldn't eat certain foods (anything with tomatoes in it for a couple), so I might hesitate to make too many things ahead of time, although the rest of your family could eat it, I guess. You can also cut up things to be able to throw things in a crockpot for soup/stew for dinner. If you have everything all ready, then the prep time is very quick. I don't like most casseroles, so I have a hard time coming up with those types of ideas.

Here are some of my favorites. In fact, I just made a few of these up for a friend that just had a baby.

White Cheese Chicken Lasagna - http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/White-Cheese-Chicken-Lasagna...

Baked Ziti - http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Baked-Ziti-I/Detail.aspx

Crockpot Mexican Chicken - http://www.wikihow.com/Make-Crockpot-Chicken-Tacos
Great for tacos, quesadillas, salads, etc. I usually freeze use 1/2 and freeze 1/2.

Enchiladas
1 lb. ground beef
1 1/2 c. salsa
1 pkg frozen spinach (thawed & drained)
2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp salt
8 oz cream cheese, cubed
1 pkg tortillas
1 can (14 oz) diced tomatoes
8 oz. shredded cheese

Cook ground beef & drain. Add 1/2 c. salsa, spinach, cumin, salt & cream cheese until melted and heated through. Spoon ~ 1/3 c. filling into tortillas and roll up. Place in lightly greased 9x13 pan. Combine tomatoes & remaining salsa. Pour over enchiladas. Freeze at this point. When ready, thaw enchiladas & back @ 350 for 25 to 35 mins or until heated through. Sprinkle w/ cheese and heat until melted.

I echo the other moms...the crockpot will be one of your best friends! Good luck!

Lasagna always freezes well, our favorite recipe is the one on the back of the Barilla box. Chili does too. And never underestimate your friend the crock pot, it's so easy to just dump everything in there in the morning. As far as egg casseroles I think they'd freeze ok if there's not too much added liquid in the eggs.

Find you local Social Suppers or something similar to that and purchase few meals for you and your family. They aren't expensive and you can usually purchase several and get on free. Check into it. Congratulations on your third. Good luck and God Bless.

Yes, just cook the egg dish first, cool and freeze. You have some good tips already, but I thought I'd mention the kraft foods website. It has TONS of super quick and easy casserole recipes. Most of them are pretty tasty. Also if you're in a real pinch, those frozen Bertolli meals are super delcious! I think Bird's Eye makes a cheaper version called Viola and they are good too. Good luck and congrats!

K., have a barbecue or just grill the chicken, meat, and pork in big quantities (4 trays of chicken may be more like drumsticks, and tights etc.,3 trays of pork and 3 trays of red meat..etc...) and then freeze the pieces of each kind of meat in plastic bags, like 3 pieces by bag. You will have half of the meals ready there. Having frozen corn, green beans and peas will complete the meal. Potatoes and rice may be also a good addition to the grilled meal. I hope this helps a little.
Have a safe delivery and congratulations!