Freezer Cooking (with friends!)

Awhile back, I hosted a Prep.Freeze.Cook party with some friends.  It was super fun, but at about $12 a meal, not something my budget could do every month.  Enter: my friend Amy.  She decided to take the concept and adapt it for a smaller group of friends and do the shopping/prep ourselves.  This month I invited myself to her house for the “party.” :)  William held down the fort and Miles and I headed over on Saturday morning. How it worked was a week before the party, Amy sent us an email with different shopping lists divided up.  We each picked a list to buy.  It also had a few items that needed to be prepped ahead of the cooking day.  Here’s what my list looked like:
SHOPPING LIST E

• PREP ITEM - 32 medium sliced green peppers
• 64 oz white vinegar
• 4 bottles (16 oz each) zesty Italian dressing
• 8 limes
• 7 jars (4.5 oz each) or 28 oz of minced garlic
• 1 bottle (12 oz) of ketchup
• 64 freezer bags
• 8 cans pinto beans, rinsed and drained
• 8 cans black beans, drained
• I also decided to pre-label all the bags to save us some time on the morning of

Every arrived and unloaded all their goodies.These 2 guys were adorable together and were so great throughout the morning.
Again, each group of ladies tackled one meal at a time.  We simply found the indreitent on the massive table of food and dumped it into a gallon freezer bag.  Once all the bags for that meal were done, we sealed them and put one meal in each lady's laundry basket.

Here was our list of the 10 meals that we prepped (can you tell we're big chicken fans?):
Taco Chili
Black Bean Chicken 
Meatballs
Coconut Lime Chicken
White Chicken Chili
Chicken cacciatore
Creamy Italian Chicken
Italian Buffalo Chicken
Crock Pot Aloha Chicken
Crock Pot Philly Cheese Chicken
All in all, it took us only about an hour and half for everything.  And even better, the total was $89.52 for all of it!  Definitely worth doing a little of our own prep work to get our cost down.Amy has a full run down of the meals with links to the recipes.  I can’t wait to make this a monthly (or bi-monthly) tradition!

our new menu plan

I am pretty excited about the new menu plan we’ve been using at our house!  It’s no secret that meal planning and prep is not my strong suit.  I do it because my family needs to eat, but I don’t enjoy it.  A few months ago, several ladies in my Mom2Mom group shared that they were using a new service called Fresh 20 that emailed them their menu plans every week, along with their grocery list.  They offered to send me a couple sample weeks to see if I liked them.  I loved it.  I simply printed my list, went shopping and knew that I had what I need for the next 5 dinners.  Out of the 10 dinners we tried, 8 were hits.  I love that they use only 20 fresh ingredients and a few pantry staples. 

I went to buy a year's subscription when I found out the current groupon (my referral link) going on was for EMeals.  (here’s the direct link to the groupon)  It’s the exact same premise as Fresh 20 just a different service.  I also enjoyed that it was Dave Ramsey endorsed.  I was blown away that you can choose from 10 different plans - classic, clean eating, simple gourmet, paleo, low carb, low fat, portion control, natural and organic, gluten free, and vegetarian.  We are currently in week 3 of the portion control plan and I’m very happy!!We have really liked the meals and Owen is actually eating them!  I mean seriously, he ate curried chicken and broccoli tonight.  And didn't even ask for yogurt. :)  I feel like all the hard work of hunting down new recipes is done for me and I simply print my grocery list and go.  I like that EMeals gives me 7 meals a week instead of 5 like Fresh 20, although it usually takes us a week and half to 2 weeks to get through one menu plan. I like to add in a few of our old favorites, a leftover night, and a fend for yourself night or 2.  Here’s a sample of a week if you want to take a peek.

I would say this idea is great for you if you don’t love menu planning.  And if you don’t have a super picky eaters as your spouse. :)  But I’m a big fan.  Let me know if you have any questions or want to try a week before committing!