Freezer Meals

Two weeks ago boneless, skinless chicken breasts were on sale for the lowest price I've seen in a long time, $1.49/pound.  Since we just moved and my chest freezer wasn't even plugged in yet, I took this as my opportunity to make freezer meals. I enjoy making a variety but it is way too time consuming (and boring) to do it alone so I invited some friends. Monday morning Charlotte, Elanor and I went to the store and filled the cart full of packages of chicken. I was rounding down while shopping because I planned on buying around 100pounds of chicken but I think I ended up with close to 120. Pounds. That doesn't really fit in a fridge with 3 gallons of milk, 10 or so pounds of cheese and all the other normal fridge stuff. Luckily one of my friends who came over stored half the chicken in her fridge.

On a Tuesday night, 2 friends (Monica and Lizbeth) came over. In about 3 hours we made chicken broccoli bake (6 meals), honey lime chicken (14 meals) and balsamic bbq chicken (8 meals). The most time consuming part of making these meals is the prep of the chicken. Slicing, dicing. Fun fun fun. Lizbeth and I also made french steak earlier to use up some of her meat.  Wednesday brought 3 friends (Melissa, Bonnie and Megan) along with 3 extra kiddos. We made party chicken enchiladas (I think it ended up being 16 meals), teriyaki chicken (10 meals) and honey glazed chicken (10 meals). The best part of doing the meals in the evening...no kids (well a sleepy new baby is easily handled). We decided the next time we get together it will be in the summer when some tween/teenage kids can come and help out with the kids.

After all those meals we made, I still had a lot of chicken left. I cooked up another 6 pounds in the crockpot and I used that to make 4 chicken pot pies and then I put filling in bags to make another 6 chicken pot pies. And yet I still had more chicken so I just put 2 chicken breasts in a freezer bag and called it a day. I will use that chicken to make some favorites.

Last Friday ground beef was on sale and it was the good kind, 97% for $1.99. I didn't go crazy with the amount I bought and I kind of wished I bought more. I went super easy this time and just divided half the amount into 1 pound bags and froze and the other half I made into 7 meatloaves. I had to call my dad for that recipe cause he makes the best meatloaf.

The next thing we are going to make are twice baked potatoes and meatballs. And one of these days I will post some of the recipes.