Baby Due Soon and Need Quick Freeze Meals.

I bought the cookbook, "The One-Armed Cook" (or something near that title) It's been a lifesaver. We were able to make meals ahead and freeze for later. everything is designed so that if you had to, you could cook with one arm because you may have a baby in the other :) Good luck!

Right before I had my daughter we stocked up on meals from Let's Dish. The meals are not cooked yet, but are quick to make. Hubby was able to easily and quickly cook them. They feed 4 - 6 people depending on serving size. As long as you don't have teenage boys, you'll be able to stretch them for all of you.

A freezer meal I like is a Mexican casserole. Layer whole weat tortillas, black beans, salsa ort diced tomatos, and chedder cheese. Freeze. Cook at $350 for 30 minutes (I think, depends on size). Serve with sour cream or guacamole.

Not a feezer meal, but a pantry meal that I make in the slow cooker but no reason you oculdn't freese or bake I think. 2-4 lbs chicken breast, jar chunky salsa (12-16 oz), 1 cup frozen corn, can black beans. Serve with rice.

I like both of these because you can kind of make them quickly to suit your tastes and hard to screw up. I go to Let's Dish occasionally and buy some of the premade meals stored in small portions. I spend about $40 and get a bunch of quick meals for me and my husband and 5 year old, but I don't have 4 kids!!

Hi L., congrats on baby #! We have #5 on the way too and I have always cooked and frozen a months worth of meals for the occasion. Google "once a month cooking" and you should find tons of sites with great ideas and recipes and "how to's" on freezer cooking. There are also usually some great books about it at the library. I don't always cook and store a whole months worth of meals, sometimes just a weeks worth. I often just double every recipe I make for a while, freeze half and eat the other half. I really like ziploc freezer bags for anything like sauces, pasta, soup, etc as they are so easy to stack once they are frozen. Things that need to hold shape like meatloaf, lasgagne etc I double line the pan I will be baking them in with foil leaving enough over the edges to cover the top, assemble the food, cool, freeze and then remove, cover top with the extra foil and place in a freezer bag. I always write baking instructions on the freezer bag so I don't have to hunt them down. When I am ready to cook I just get it out of the freezer the night before, remove from bag and foil and place back in its pan to defrost overnight then bake accordingly presto its done! Good luck!

When I was expecting my twins, we did the same thing. I had no idea if I'd have time to cook or if we'd even want to bother, so we took a weekend and cooked the following:
Lasagna (since it was just for the two of us, we ended up with 6 lasagnas)
Chili
Chicken Tikka Masala (an Indian dish we adore)
Gumbo
Beef stew
we precooked chicken in the crock pot and then cut into slices and shredded some and packed and froze
we also precooked ground beef so if we made spaghetti, we would just thaw and dump in the sauce.
The only suggestion would be to make sure the potatoes in the stew are fully cooked (our weren't and we didn't know until a while later when we thawed and ate - crunchy!)

Good luck, it is definitely worth it, we just made pasta or rice and thawed the main meal.

Julie

not really anything you can make but I've heard great fhings about a place called "dinner done" where you can make a bunch of meals ahead of time and they have everything right there. A friend goes to Let's Dish and this place and preferred dinner done hands down.

Lasagne, whole cooked Perdue roaster, salmon cakes, meatloaf, ham, roast beef, and chili. I'd make up a bunch of frozen hamburger patties, that the other 4 kids could take out and cook for lunch. Or, you can buy the Tysons chicken patties and quick fries that can be microwaved. I'd also have some fruit cups, pudding packs, applesauce cups, and other healthy snack choices around that they can get on their own. As for side dishes, Dad can always throw a few baked potatoes into the microwave for 15 minutes and cans of vegetables shouldn't be too much effort, either.

Hi L.,
I'm going to send you my very best freezer recipe by personal message. However, I can't recommend the Saving Dinner website highly enough. For about $20.00 you can buy the freezer meal menu pack. Each one is a set of recipes divided by meat type. You get a full shopping list, storage instructions, and freeze day and cooking day instructions. Everything is frozen before cooking, but the ingredients are already cut up, measured, and generally combined. This way you pull out the bag, let it defrost over night and then just throw whatever it is in the skillet or oven. Fresh homemade taste and nutrition, but with bagged meal ease.

I would ask a couple girl friends to come over one night, serve them wine and all of you can chop and measure together and get your freezer stocked in just a couple of hours. My husband is in the Navy and we did this together before last time he left for deployment - we actually had a lot of fun doing it. (I just split the meals in smaller portions).

Hopefully this idea is helpful,
Lexi

Good for you for getting ready with meals. That really is the way to go for any planned major events. Here's a couple that our family likes and we've had luck in freezing. I made double the recipe so we had one for the meal of the day and the other I froze.
Bean Soup
1 can of each: black beans, white beans, navy, pinto, red, kidney
1 jar salsa
1 tbsp. oregano,
1 tbsp. basil
1 tsp. of garlic powder
3 cubes chicken buillion
1/2 bunch chopped cilantro
1 lb. ground beef
I crockpot all these for a day, adding the cilantro in the last hour and serve with garlic bread. I freeze the leftovers in a large square tupperware and when it's frozen I put it in a gallon freezer bag. When it's time to thaw or cook I just microwave it a ton.

Bowtie Lasagna
Mix the following in a bowl then dish out into 9 x 13 pan tin pan, cover with saran wrap then tinfoil.
1 box of bowtie pasta, cooked
1 container cottage cheese
1/2. lb ground beef browned
1 bottle of spaghetti sauce
top with 1-2 cups shredded cheese
Normal Bake time non frozen is 350 for 30-40 minutes.
Good luck with your 5th! That's so awesome!

You should talk to your friends and see if they are going to make meals for you. There is a great website that will coordinate it for you www.takethemameal.com It works great and it's free. Reach out for support it;s ok expecially cause you are a working mom and you have lots of mouths to feed. You can also set it up if you are having a babyshower ask the person who is doing it to do a sighn up sheet and try to get it organized that way
S.