More Freezer Meals

So I did another one of my cooking relays where I bought certain ingredients and used what I call a "tag team" method where I use one ingredient in more than 1 of the meals and while cooking one thing, I am prepping the next. I think this is just how you have to do it to save on time.

Here's a summary of what I cooked today: (I'll go into details in a later post)

• 4 meals - Pot Roast w/egg noodles
• 3 meals - Lemon Chicken thighs w/rice or w/veg
• 2 meals - Turkey Meatloaf with sun-dried tom & feta w/veg
• 2 meals - Chicken Enchilads w/black beans & cheese
• 10 individually wrapped sausage, egg & cheese wraps
• 1 pot of chicken stock - Chicken & Rice soup and Chicken Noodle soup
• 4 frozen chicken breasts

Because pot roast in a crock pot is a set it and forget it meal, I prepped that first. Whether you make a small batch or a big batch, it still takes hours and you still have to buy a BAG of carrots and BAG of potatoes. Utilize your time wisely and cook the vegs while they are fresh by making a large batch. Yes, that parsley is from my garden! Normally I buy baby carrots so there is no prep but today, the whole carrots were on sale and the larger carrots tend to be sweeter anyway especially when I knew I'd be using them for various meals.


Then I moved onto the chicken stock. I bought a whole roaster for $6, cut the breasts off and froze them for future use. Cut the legs off for Chicken Enchiladas, but boiled them in the stock to avoid dirtying another pot. Remove excess fat and skin and discard before cooking. Added a potato and carrot (from pot roast ingredients) for flavor.


I'll go into details later, but using the chicken drumsticks and thighs from the whole roaster (see above), I turned it into Chicken Enchiladas. Take the meat off the bones, combine with taco seasoning, cheese, black beans (leftovers) and tortilla wraps. Arrange and freeze. I put the beans on the outside on one half of the dish because I'm not sure whether they will sit well with me when I'm nursing. We had 2 enchiladas for lunch today as well.

Lemon chicken thighs - I read this recipe on Simple Recipes. I love lemon chicken and Keith is a big fan of chicken thighs. Dark meat is always an economical choice too. This package was $4 and makes 3 meals (for the 2 of us). I removed the skin because it's too fatty. I threw in the rest of my bag of carrots from the Pot Roast that I couldn't use up. Roasted carrots are nice and sweet and nutty. While that baked, I moved on and had lunch.


Straining the chicken stock. You could simmer it a lot longer and after straining, dump everything (the chicken bones and other ingredients). I stopped because I was tired of cooking and I wanted to salvage some of the meat. This was my favorite part as a kid. My mom would let me go to town on the carcass and I'd dip the meat in a mixture of soy sauce, hot sauce and seasame oil.

Back to those Lemon Chicken Thighs - Some of the thighs were much larger than others. The large ones I put in one container with some uncooked, sliced zucchini assuming when I go to reheat the chicken, the zucchini will cook. The smaller ones, I put in a container with some leftover rice I had and diced tomatoes. The moisture from the toms will recook the rice in the oven nicely. The zucchini provides a vegetable which completes the meal.

On a different note, I wanted to make meat loaf and this Turkey Meat Loaf from Giada is to die for! I had feta cheese leftover from a salad I made and sun dried tomatoes left as well which I wanted to use up. A little over a pound of turkey $3. I baked it in a shallow aluminum tray. Allow to cool. There's enough for 2 meals, so I cut it down the middle and put it in another tray. Sliced it for easy reheat and added frozen peas into the tray. That will make for one complete meal as well. I like rice with everything so I'll probably cook some rice in the rice cooker if the meat loaf by itself isn't enough.

More to come...