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Freezer Cooking

Monday, September 24, 2012


This week was rotten… it was wet, muggy and dreary. The weather had me feeling down and out by the end of the day and it is all I could do to manage to get home at the end of the day, let alone cook! So as a result my kids ate out way more than I wanted them to and we spend way more on food that what was in the budget. Weight Watchers is not going well with all this eating out and frankly, we could use the money for better things like a trio to Disney and potential shopping trip to the states for mama and her lady friends!  So on Saturday I planned, shopped and cooked. Just over $200 and 4 hours later my freezer was stuffed with 25 meals and all but two are slow cooker meals. I spent a few minutes meal planning using Eat at Home, My Baking AddictionMartha Stewart and my own recipe box and then edited my grocery list. Can I just say how much I love Ziplist? All I had to do was add the recipes to my recipe box and then add to my list. Once I had everything decided on, I edited the list to remove everything that I already had and combined ingredients. Made shopping SO MUCH EASIER! Oh and I also love my Food Saver...you need one if you learned to cook from a Newfoundlander and have no idea how to cook for less than 12 people at a time...

This is what 18 meals vacuum sealed and ready for the freezer looks like! (I made more on Sunday)

Here’s what I made:
  • Stew- divide root veggies and your favorite seasoning between bags (I made three) and stew meat vacuum seal and you’re done. (add broth on cook day)
  • Roast- one roast went in a bag with potatoes and carrots, one went in a bag by itself. Divide a package of reduced sodium onion soup mix between the bags (or use one eat) and salt and pepper, seal and done!
  • Chicken stir fry (add sauce when you get home and serve over rice)
  • Chicken Shwarma
  • Veggie enchiladas (I used 8oz fresh baby spinach, chopped, 14oz fresh peaches and cream corn, and part skim mozza cheese. I added some chili pepper and a dash of cayenne to kick up the spice)
  • Pork and apples (this will be my first attempt at these in the slow cooker...everyone but the rice and nuts are in the pool...I hope it turns out!)
  • Slow cooker lasagna
  • Pumpkin spice muffins (I made half the recipe- used 1 egg, 2 egg whites, 0.5 cups splenda brown sugar baking blend and 0.5 cup sugar. I added 0.5 cups of applesauce and did not increase the oil- perfect little muffins!)
  • Pumpkin Pie Spice
  • Apple pear crisp
  • Pumpkin brownies* (no frosting on ours)
  • Triple chocolate chip cookies* (I added 1 cup oatmeal, used 1/2 whole wheat flour and threw in whatever chocolate chips we had kicking around!)
{*These were made and frozen to give me a head start on Super Mario’s birthday party…Oh Pinterest will have me drove with that child’s dreams and wishes for his party…so my own fault but I don’t think there will be a 6ft lego Mario at his party…much to the little man’s chagrin! Maybe searching Pinterest for Mario party ideas while he's on my lap wasn't the best idea I ever had!}

So I was exhausted but I figure at about $8.50 a meal for the four of us I did pretty good. I just need to add some fresh veggies with each meal and a way we go! I still have a ham and rice dish to make but I ran out of steam. Maybe I'll just make that for supper tomorrow...tonight we're having Veggie enchiladas and no dishes to clean!

I just figured out another good thing about this...I took a Sharpie and wrote what it was, how to cook it and what to add. So in the event I am not around to throw something in the slow cooker G should be able to do it no problem and my kids will eat something other than scrambled eggs and toast (I appreciate that you feed them honey!)

Time to let go

Sunday, September 16, 2012

I admit that I blinked and the whole summer was gone. I tried to make sure that we got plenty of family time in and that we went on the appropriate number of beach trips but it wasn't enough.

I am not ready for Fall. In a desperate attempt to hold onto summer, Saturday night I invited a few friends over for a campfire thinking that the glow of a fire, warmth of friends and to goodness of a s'more or two would keep the inevitable from happening. Instead of a warm night and a long smoldering campfire, we got eaten alive by mosquitoes, roasted a few marshmallows so that the kids were momentarily distracted from pleading to play Mariokart Double Dash and at 8:04pm it began to rain (and I am very publicly admitting that Jeff was right...it was going to rain at 8pm... I told him he was crazy).

So this morning, after a night of downpours, thunder and lightning, I gave it up and decided to embrace fall. I made pumpkin pancakes for breakfast (so delish and only 2wwpp each) packed the kids up and headed to the corn maze at the Masstown Market. What a great time! They had play structures, bouncy obstacle courses and a bouncy pillow that were all adult friendly so we got to actually bounce along with the kids. I think the Dads had a bit more fun with the pillow than the kids did!
 
 

The corn maze was a hoot and the kids ran through the paths looking for letters and punching their cards. I was amazed we didn't really get lost but we did have a Navy man and a transportation expert leading the way.




 
 
And then we played for another bit before heading over to the market. I got a whole weeks worth of produce (and then some) for under $60! I have our menu plan done and tomorrow night will be cooking time. Lots of fall veggies and fruit this week.

So as much as I hate for summer to be over, I guess Fall isn't such a bad thing...Next weekend we plan on going apple picking and out for a cruise on Theodore tugboat while the weather is still decent. I did come home and move all the summer clothes out into the bottom drawers for next year (yes I buy seasonal clothes a little big for one year and they are the perfect fit the next...got to make the most of my resources!) and made sure the fall clothes was in easy reach. Maybe the change of season will be good for us....I guess I'll have to let go of summer to find out.




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