FreezEasy Programs

Y'all, I want to tell you about one of the BEST freezer cooking sites out there, FreezEasy! This site has some amazing monthly meal plans available, or you can also build your own plan based on your family's preferences. The greatest part is that she has something on the site for everyone's dietary needs - from Paleo to Whole Thirty - From Gluten-Free to Dairy Free... she has them all covered. Each recipe will also tell you how to swap out things where it's needed to make them fit your allergy or diet guidelines. You can also go, here, for a FREE Freezer Meal Success Guide.

The greatest part is that once you build your plan, you can immediately print out the shopping list, prep list, and get everything into your freezer within a couple hours of returning from the store! The genuis part of this site is that you can also adjust the size of the recipes to the number of portions you want - so it works great for small or larger families. 

I highly recommend joining this site, and taking advantage of all that freezer cooking can save you on those busy school nights... you can be prepped and ready as sports practices pick up and things get busier as the fall moves on. 

I've used this site for a long time, and have some recipes that have become tried and true family favorites -- the Pollo Asado -- is a GREAT addition to our recipe list. Another couple that we have loved has been the Lasagna Bake, and the Greek Chicken Bake. I'm working through some more of the freezer to Instant Pot meals right now because that is such a convenient way to prep meals rather than having to thaw it out in advance. If you're new to the Instant Pot style of cooking - there are also an Electric Pressure Cooking 101 class and the My Efficient Kitchen class offered as well. 

In addition to the regular freezer plans -- she also has a great resource in the Stork Your Freezer programs for new Moms. I would have LOVED to have been given a shower where people could have filled my freezer full of all sorts of meals for when my babies were born. There are so many ways to work this style of shower, but if I could have left meals for the new mommy while also coming home with some of my own... how GREAT would that be!? My vision for that would be to have people double up on a meal in their plan for the mom-to-be, and then take the rest home... and if every couple of guests chose a different meal plan... even better!

Here are the different meal plans to choose from for Stork Your Freezer Showers:

  
 



Last, but not least, Erin also has a Grocery Budget Makeover program that will rock your world. I've taken the course, and LOVED it. I'm still whittling down our budget, but I can't recommend this program enough to those that need it.

Menu Monday - 11/7/16

We typically have a big Sunday Night dinner together before the week starts running and none of us get a chance to sit down all together.  I typically sit down with the boys to do their prayers before dinner and also to work on our Turkey on the Table project for November... we've got a Shepherd's Treasure deal coming for next month to go along with our Elf on the Shelf. Our elf, Dash, is pretty tame in his adventures because the boys are just not self controlled enough at this time in their lives for that yet.

Anyway, as soon as our Shepherd's Treasure comes in -- I'll show you all about that -- I know that the company had a limited quantity so you may not be able to get one anymore. (At the time that I added the link, they still appeared to be available)

Our menu for this week:

Sunday: Chicken & Rice with peas
Monday: Pasta e' Fagioli Soup *
Tuesday: Garlic Grilled Chicken *, Chicken Ricearoni, and Salad
Wednesday: Pork Chops, Long Grain & Wild Rice, and Roasted Broccoli
Thursday: Mediterranean Chicken * over Rice
Friday: Baked Chicken Parmesan, Pasta Alfredo, and Salad
Saturday: Stuffed Bell Pepper Casserole

These are freezer meals that I had prepped ahead on the MyFreezeEasy plan. It's a really simple concept of prep and freeze -- no precooking on most of it -- and you can get 10 meals done in about an hour! Who doesn't love that!?

Menu Plan Monday - 10/31/16

So last week we really enjoyed the Pollo Asado, and the Mediterranean Chicken dinners that were both made from my freezer meal selections. They were new to us, and they both likely will be made again.

This week is relatively busy -- so here are the menu plans:

Sunday - Steak, Baked Potatoes, Zucchini & Mushrooms
Monday - Pizza and Salad for the grownups
Tuesday - Grilled Herb Chicken, Roasted Broccoli, and Long Grain & Wild Rice
Wednesday - Crockpot Turkey Roast, Stuffing, Feaux Green Bean Bundles
Thursday - Pasta e' Fagioli Soup
Friday - Dutch Oven Chicken & Veggies
Saturday - Stuffed Pepper Casserole
* Sunday - Will be on next week's menu

Happy Halloween everyone -- I have to tell a funny story about my dinner plans from Halloween 2 years ago. We were going trick or treating up at my Dad's house and I knew that there was a Pizza Hut with a drive-thru on the way to their house. I had no idea how big pizza is as a meal for Halloween night until this moment. I pulled up to the drive-thru thinking that I would order them some dinner to eat before we went out... ummmm, NO. The people pulling through that drive-thru that evening had placed their orders two hours before hand! I had to scrap that idea and figure something else out on the fly.

Happy National Pizza Night, apparently!

Menu Plan Monday - 10/24/16

This week I planned based on what I had on hand for the most part. We are at the end of the month and our grocery budget is limited -- so I am using up some freezer meals as best I can and adding in a few things that we had around.

Monday - Mexican Lime Chicken Soup
Tuesday - Mediterranean Chicken, Roasted Broccoli, and Long Grain & Wild Rice
Wednesday - Paula Deen's Goulash
Thursday - Pollo Asado, Squash, Spanish Rice
Friday - Citrus Marinated Chicken, Salad, Roasted Sweet Potatoes
Saturday - Out for a Birthday Party
Sunday - Chicken Noodle Casserole

I'll post recipes as we decide if they are good or not -- for my Citrus Chicken -- it's super easy, put the chicken in a bag and add the juice from 1 lemon (2 if small), 1 lime (2 if small), and 1 naval orange, and a couple of cloves of garlic... let it sit in the marinade for 4-6 hours before cooking. I use that for 1-2 chicken breasts... so double up if you're making more.

Since Halloween is Monday -- I'm skipping the usual weekend pizza meal this week... and we'll have pizza on Monday night.

Additionally -- how many of you guys are doing or have done Whole 30? I'm thinking about it, but I need to read more about it. Is it something you just do for 30 days and then stop -- or is it a lifestyle that you can keep up long term?

Menu Monday - Trim Healthy Mama 2

Last week was our first full week trying to navigate doing all of our meals on the THM plan, and we had some really big wins. We loved several of the new recipes we tried, and feel really confident that we can make this plan work for us.

I did go through a little bit of detox being off of sugar and Splenda this last week, but I'm over the hump and moving on to greener pastures. It's hard to tell if that's the case because I also was dealing with some sinus issues and possibly some weather related headaches too -- so who knows, but all I know is that this morning I woke up and have been running all day.

I got up and immediately made breakfast -- Chocolate Waffles with Strawberries -- which meant that I ground some oatmeal into flour and used the waffle iron! Yay, ME! I put some mini chocolate chips and sliced strawberries on the boys' waffles, but for John and I - we just used the sliced strawberries and a 1/2 TBS of butter.

Tyler has fallen in love with some of these new foods -- which is amazing -- we are hoping to inch him onto the plan as well in a bit of a modified version. He LOVES the Strawberry Cheesecake Shake -- as you can tell -- since it is an afternoon snack everyday. I try to time it to be around his dinner time -- because they eat much earlier than Mom & Dad do. So we include it as a part of his dinner.

Have a great week and let me know if you're doing the THM plan too! I'd love to hear your favorite meal ideas!

Menu Monday - Trim Healthy Mama 1

We decided to move up our plan to going full force this week -- so here is our menu plan -- lunches are blank for the first couple of days because I just wasn't ready to plan those quite yet. I'm struggling with figuring out what will make the best plan for lunches at least until we get some leftovers to rotate in for lunches. 

It'll be a bit of a work in progress for a few days/weeks while we get used to this... sort of like remembering to eat every 3-4 hours -- I'm just not normally that regimented -- so I'm going to have to adjust my way of thinking. For instance, I need to go eat a snack here immediately because I completely forgot. 

Part of that is because I feel like crud -- and have all weekend. I'll have to work through that before I gain full control over all of this.

I'm excited to try out some of these recipes this week though, and test out our alternative dessert snacks. They sound pretty good, and I'm also excited to see if I can fool Tyler with the Chocolate Zucchini Cake this weekend. 

I bought a TON of vegetables yesterday, but we load up on those in just about every meal - so I just hope that it was enough. 

I made sure to get some good quality cocoa powder. I've made the switch to Stevia instead of my old standby of Splenda. I'm so glad I did after reading what the worst sweetners for your body are. 8 Best and Worst Sweeteners for your health  -- sad that my old standby is the #2 worst for your health... and I always believed the absolute worst was Sweet 'n Low, but that's actually #3. Making the switch away from Splenda has been pretty easy for me - I got some H-E-B packets of Stevia which are approved for the THM plan and other than some small issues with getting it to dissolve -- it's been great. I will do my best to rid our house from the pink packets too -- but that might take a little longer.

Bulk Cooking Round 2

This weekend was our second attempt at bulk cooking. This time we made more dinner meals than anything else... I got two recipes of breakfast items in there too, but that wasn't my focus other than getting something made for John to be able to grab and take with him to work. This time, I made more soups which we will love as things start to cool off for the fall -- hopefully in the next month. If not, who doesn't love a good soup?

Here is our menu, and the things we got packed up in addition to what was planned:
- Impossible Egg Muffins - he got 8 days worth on this taking 2 a day. I'm going to make some more today.
- Coffee Cake Muffins - 18 muffins, but this is made from stuff I have on hand -- so we can make more when these run out.
- Taco Soup - 2 meals
- Friendship Casserole - 2 meals - it's like a spaghetti type casserole
- Stuffed Cabbage Rolls - 2
- Chicken Cacciatore - 2
- Mongolian Beef - 2
- Cream of Mushroom Roast - 2
- Roast with Veggies - 2
- Fajitas - 3
- Chicken Bruschetta - 2
- Poppy-Seed Chicken - 2
- Beef Enchiladas - 3
- Loaded Baked Potato Soup - 2
- Mexican Chicken Lime Soup - 2
- Bulk Taco Meat - 4
- *Spaghetti - 1
- *Jack Daniels Chicken - 2
- *Pizza Toppings - 1
- Mexican Macaroni & Cheese - 1
- Easy Spaghetti Pie - 1 (also crock pot recipe)

Key:
* Additional Item -- something extra from the planned menu
Red - Crock Pot Cooking Item
Blue - Left over from last Bulk Cooking Day

Here is how the weekend looked for me --
Friday - I went on my big Costco run after John got home. It was ridiculous, I had to use a flatbed cart! I wasn't sure it would all fit in the car!

Saturday - Was prep day, but I needed a few items at HEB that I didn't get at Costco. So we went and did our Lowe's Build and Grow workshop, then ran to HEB on the way home. I spent the afternoon/night prepping as much as I could for the bulk shopping day. I left about 3 things to be completed during the cooking process. 

Sunday - I started at 10:30/11:00 AM and finished cleanup at 10:00 PM -- so I'm calling it 11 hours. I took two short breaks to eat lunch and dinner (I'd say a total of 40 minutes)... but other than that - I was in the kitchen cooking.

Is it worth it? I say yes -- now for the next 38 nights -- I don't need to do any prep for dinner other than putting together side dishes for the meals. I've got everything done, and I can menu plan based on what is in the freezer. 

Grocery shopping ought to be a very small list -- just toiletries, veggies, fruit, and replacing lunch items like: bread, Nutella, lunch meat... just very simple. I'm doing an experiment to see how much we spend this month, and analyzing if it's significantly less than other months. Regardless, it's very freeing to me to have this long list of things to choose from for meal planning instead of pouring over Pinterest each week looking for new items to try. 

Some of these things are repeats from last month: The Chicken Bruschetta, and the Beef Enchiladas - we revamped this one a little to make them stand up to freezing better. We fried our corn tortillas for about 30 seconds to make them a bit leathery -- then dipped them in enchilada sauce and rolled the filling in. 

Want to join in this fun with me? I'm telling you -- I've done a few things in the last month that have literally changed my life. 1 of those is joining in this Once a Month Meals movement. Go back and check out my other posts about it and see if it's something for you! Here is a list for you: Planning, Shopping, Prepping, Cooking.

Bulk Freezer Cooking - Cooking Day

By now you've planned your menu, done your bulk shopping, and have had your prep time. Hopefully you've got all of the kitchen supplies that you'll need for this bulk cooking extravaganza. I have more cooking supplies than most, and even I found myself amazed at the sheer volume of things I was able to get dirty in one session.

Seriously, there cannot be too many cooking spoons, measuring spoons, measuring cups, and mixing bowls in your house... the more the better for an adventure like this! In some cases, and for some menus -- you'll even need two crockpots -- so you may need to plan ahead and borrow one from someone.

Make sure you print all of your cooking day instructions AND recipe cards. I taped the cooking day instructions to my cabinet so that I could check them off each time I finished a step. A good thing to note too: the cooking instructions are set up so that you will get through the most complicated portions of the cooking first and save the simpler tasks for the end of the day. Had I planned and prepped accordingly -- my first cooking day would have gone a bit smoother.

When it comes down to your cooking day - remember these tips:

1) Get a good nights sleep & plan to wake up early to get started.

2) If possible, get a baby sitter or mother's helper to come in and take care of any littles at home.

3) Wear your best supportive shoes, because you literally will be on your feet for a good 8-10 hours.

4) Document your experience so that you will learn from your own mistakes.

5) Take notes so that you'll know if there are things you would change in how you managed this process.

6) Follow the instructions to the letter, and label each item as it gets packed. With the recipe labels provided or with a Sharpie. Include the date on your bags for the freezer so that you'll know how long it's been in there.

7) Remember that these recipes are for the main dish -- so you will need some refresher items from the store, and side dish plans for the meals as needed.

They've even included a sheet you can pin up somewhere in your kitchen that tells you how to thaw things for you to be able to prepare them or just eat them in some cases.

That is how it's done! Now, I can safely tell you that we've been eating on these meals for over two weeks as planned -- I think we will at the very least get one more full week out of them, and then we will be ready to do another round of cooking. Isn't that exciting? It is for me... I haven't had to think of a meal to cook for dinner in over 2.5 weeks!!

If you think that this plan is something you might want to do for your own house -- you can even start with a mini plan which is only 5-6 meals to give it a try. If you want to try it out go to: Once a Month Meals, and decide which plan is for you. The regular membership has menus for 9 different dietary restrictions, but they can't be edited. The Pro membership (what I got) you can edit and swap out the recipes on the menus for anything in the database of thousands of recipes.

If you are just finding this post -- Here is the post on Planning, Here is the post on Shopping, and Here is the post on Prepping.

I hope that this helps everyone get on top of their cooking, and gives you some valuable time back in your evenings!! Enjoy!

Chopped at Home

I feel like by now, most everyone has heard about the show chopped. It's the show where they give the chefs mystery baskets of ingredients for each round, and at the end of the round one chef is eliminated from the competition until there is one winner.

Well, since we had a vacation a couple weeks ago -- we're a little bit short on funding until John gets paid this week... so our culinary adventures this week will look a bit like an episode of Chopped. We are shopping from our pantry, and hoping that we can make it until this weekend before we need to stock up. It'll be crazy though because we not only need groceries, but it's time for a Costco run too! Keepin' it real folks...keepin' it real.

It's interesting how our pantry still seems full, and our fridge/freezer seems full too... but we are out of almost all meat -- and I'll be scraping things together to make them work. Thankfully the boys mostly just want hot dogs, and John is gone most of the week -- so I'm just scraping it together for myself. I can do this!

Maybe I'll even come up with something new that I can work into the meal plans. It's hard to imagine though because I so enjoy trying new recipes -- Pinterest is my meal planning friend. Most work out well, but there are a few flops. I tried a recipe for a honey lemon chicken that was just disgusting! I mean John and I were so grossed out. We clearly just don't like our savory meals to have a major sweet element.

I should have known when the sauce called for 1/2 a cup of honey... but I thought the lemon would balance it out, not.so.much. Oh well, it gives us something to laugh about when the kids to go bed. I can only imagine if I'd tried to feed that to them too! "Mommy dis not good!"

Happy Monday folks! I hope your meals are all planned and that they come out tasty!

Meal Plan Monday -- a Day Early

We try our best to plan at least a week's worth of meals before going to the grocery store -- it saves us money, I am sure of it. The times that I don't plan - I end up with a lot of random stuff that I struggle to turn into meals.

It's funny to me because growing up my Mom just had staples that she kept in the house all the time, and grocery trips were mainly to replace the staples and add other things that just looked good at the time. So I've grown up with a healthy impulse buying skill. I love grocery shopping when I'm not under duress from my children, and other than hating to put things away when we get home... I think I'm a good balanced cook - I love some old favorites, but also enjoy making new things a few times a week too.

John has actually planned the last two weeks of menus for me, and I've been pleasantly surprised by the new things that the boys have tried. We made a marinated skirt steak that marinated for like 6 hours the other day and both of the boys gobbled it up even though we had an alternative choice for them. I also made my crockpot turkey breast this past week - which is nothing more than a turkey breast roast, a stick of butter, and a packet of onion soup mix - Tyler loved it!

It's an interesting process raising boys -- or I guess kids of any gender -- foods they liked when they were little became taboo, but now are coming back around again and they are eating them. There are some they still won't go for, mostly including vegetables - but we're working on that.

Without further delay... I'll present our menu for this next week - anything that is new I'll add recipes to my recipe blog as I can.

Sunday - 5/3
Marinated Pork Loin
Long Grain & Wild Rice
Fresh Green Beans

Monday - 5/4
Chicken Spaghetti
Salad
Garlic Bread

Tuesday - 5/5
Rice Oriental - a homemade version of an old Hamburger Helper Favorite
Green Beans

Wednesday - 5/6
Chicken & Rice
Peas

Thursday - 5/7
Pizza (a take and bake from HEB)
Salad

Friday - 5/8
Turkey Burgers/Hot Dogs
Chips
Corn & Black Bean Salsa

Saturday - 5/9
Skirt Steak/Chicken Thighs - this is the amazing skirt steak from last week, so I'll add the recipe
Grilled Corn on the Cob
Roasted Broccoli

This is what's on our menu for this week - I'd love to hear about yours! I love having new ideas so that my people, and mainly myself don't get bored with our meals. I'm hoping for some show stopping treats for next Sunday too!

Meal Plan Monday

I've been trying to get things more organized around our house lately - and take a different approach to how I do things. My main thought is that if I don't manage things -- it's not going to happen. Granted, life with two toddlers is out of control - if I don't have a plan for all things... they won't happen at all, right?

This is why I've started working on my own version of a household management notebook - I've started with the planner I wrote about in my previous post, and I'll be adding a few things to it to make it more my own.

I also found some great menu plans on some homeschooling websites -- they took all the guess work out of planning for the entire month! One of them does dinner only and the other does an entire day's worth of meals including snacks! I used them to plan our meals for this week, and I thought I'd share my plan with you.

Monday
Breakfast - Fruit & Cream Oatmeal and Toast
Lunch - PB & J, Chips and Fruit
Snack - Popcorn
Dinner - Meatloaf, Mashed Potatoes, and Roasted Broccoli

Tuesday
Breakfast - Pancakes & Eggs
Lunch -Quesadilla and Fruit
Snack - Apples and Peanut Butter
Dinner - Baked Chicken Parmesan, Fettuccine Alfredo, and Salad

Wednesday
Breakfast - Yogurt, Fruit, and Granola Parfaits
Lunch - Chicken Nuggets, Corn, and Pasta
Snack - Grapes, Cheese, and Crackers
Dinner - Hot Dogs or Frito Pie

Thursday
Breakfast - Muffins and Fruit
Lunch - Turkey, Cheese, and Fruit
Snack - Frozen Gogurt & Pretzels
Dinner - Chicken and Wild Rice Casserole & Green Beans

Friday
Breakfast - Eggs, Toast, and Yogurt
Lunch - Peanut Butter, Honey & Banana Pinwheels and Chips
Snack - Cheese on Pretzel Sticks
Dinner - Homemade Calzones and Salad

Saturday
Breakfast - French Toast, Fruit, and Sausage
Lunch - Hot Dogs, Tater Tots, and Fruit
Snack - Frozen Gogurt & Pretzels
Dinner -  BBQ Chicken, Corn, and Pasta Salad

We will see how well we do with sticking to this plan, and I'll come up with a new one for next week -- I'll be shopping on Saturday next week because I'll need special provisions for Father's Day. I'll also be doing some "shop your pantry" meals as well - because I saw some things I need to use up in there when I was putting things away this morning.

Menu Plan Monday

I'm still in the process of moving to a clean eating lifestyle... so I'm making more and more things on my own instead of trusting the packaged items there on the grocery store shelves. Even more so now that I had my episode this weekend -- if you don't know what I'm talking about - please read this post. I found this article leading me to the most nutritious whole foods available as well -- so I'll be incorporating some of these into our menu next week strategically.

Some of these aren't the best choices available, but like I said -- we are transitioning slowly and are using up things that we have in the house and replacing them with better options. So, we aren't completely clean eaters yet, but a few meals are headed that way. I'm making as much as I can from scratch as well -- so I do feel a bit better about that than if I just bought it all and didn't care what was on the label.

I use Pinterest a lot in my meal planning, and have some new recipes I am testing this week. I also used a great template I found online for planning out our meal and creating a sorted grocery list to help make the trip as quick as possible.

Here is our plan:

Breakfast: Homemade Chocolate Chip Scones -- will have them throughout the week and supplement with eggs and other normal breakfast items like fresh fruit & yogurt.

Lunch: Turkey Avocado Club Sandwiches -- and lots of left overs from the dinners that are made throughout the week

Dinner:
Sunday: Roast, Rice & Green Beans
Monday: Lasagna Roll Ups, Salad, Garlic Bread
Tuesday: Chicken, Spinach & Lemon Spaghetti, Greek Salad, and Parker House Rolls
Wednesday: Sweet & Sour Pork Chops, Rice, and Pot Stickers
Thursday: Jack Daniels Chicken, Wild Rice, and Salad
Friday: Taco Salads with Guacamole
Saturday: Steak, Roasted New Potatoes, and Roasted Broccoli

Snacks: Homemade Cheez Its - a popular snack in our house, but this time... I'm making them myself with just 4 ingredients!

Dessert: Baked Apples with Vanilla Ice Cream & Pink Chocolate Chip Cookies (testing these for the boys' school party in a couple of weeks)

Recipes will be added to the blog for new things throughout the week.

In great news -- I've lost 7 pounds since starting this plan 2 weeks ago. I think that with adding the new higher fiber things like the homemade granola I keep in the house -- I'm staying fuller and not snacking nearly as much as I was before.

Menu Planning

I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but over Christmas - we got an iPad, and upon the recommendation of a friend - I downloaded the Menu Planner App. This has literally changed my life! I don't have to keep notepads or anything around anymore - and I can plan until my heart is full.

It is so easy to add recipes or food items - you can do it either way, then look at a calendar with all of your meal plans right there on the screen. You can keep a recipe book, as well as import recipes from most of the popular recipe websites out there. (Food Network, Pilsbury, Taste of Home, Clean Eating, and many more) You will want to edit the recipes slightly when you import them - but it is super easy. The only thing that would make me love it more right now would be if they would develop the ability to import recipes from blogs.

Once you've planned your menu, you can then go into another portion of the program and make your grocery list. With a couple of clicks of a button - you can pull in the entire list of things needed for your menu plan recipes for whatever time frame you'd like to do your shopping for. You can then take things off of the list if you don't need them this trip - or add in other items as needed. Once you've got the list ready, you can export it to your email and print it for your shopping trip.

I've made it my goal to have all of our meals planned and my shopping list ready for Thursday mornings - as soon as I drop the boys off at school... I head to the store. I enjoy grocery shopping entirely too much - but that's beside the point - this app has made my least favorite part of the process even easier. I enjoy the cooking and prepping recipes - but the planning and preparing shopping lists stresses me out. I'd love to hear your tips and tricks on menu planning...