Freezer Meals: Part One

Since I joined Pinterest a year ago, I have been wanting to make freezer meals. As homeschooling has begun taking up more of our days and as we have been busier with activities outside of the house I have been searching for Crockpot Freezer Meals.

I chose this post to follow and made 3 of her 4 recipes.

Why did I chose her post?
1. Since it was my first time, I liked that there were only a couple of recipes.
2. The recipes were fairly basic and easy to follow.
3. They actually had ingredients that we are not allergic to (although I did have to modify some).

What did I make?
Mediterranean Pork, Teriyaki Chicken, and BBQ Chicken
Each recipe made two meals for our family of three but they look rather small so if you have a larger family and decide to use these you may want to put all the ingredients in one bag/recipe.

How much money did I spend?

All of our items from the grocery

I spent $32.59 on ingredients and freezer bags.
Since I made 6 meals that comes out to $5.43/meal.

I chose to do it this week was the meat we needed and the freezer bags were all on sale. I was able to purchase all the meat for just $10 and freezer bags were on closeout for 50% off.

How much time did I spend? 
55 minutes. (40 minutes of food prep and 15 minutes of cleanup)

Meal One: Mediterranean Pork - 10 minutes prep

Meal Two: Teriyaki Chicken - 20 minutes prep

These look different because I chopped the carrots for one and shredded them for the other

Meal Three: BBQ Chicken - 10 minutes prep

Honestly, I was shocked at how quickly this went!
I realize that it would not take much time in the morning to throw one of these meals into the crockpot, but it was really nice to do all of the trimming of the meat and chopping of the vegetables in one session. Plus I only had to clean my kitchen once!

Any tips for others?
1. Wear comfortable shoes. I kept reading this online and it really helped as I don't generally stand it just one place for an hour.
2. Label the bags before you put ingredients in.
3. Pour sauces in first so you can press all of the air out of the bags easier.

I am glad I...
1. Ran the dishwasher this morning. It made cleanup SO easy! The only thing I had to handwash was my food processor.
2. Used the #1 tip from above and wore my comfy shoes.
3. I did this as soon as we came home from a grocery trip. I think it saved time because I didn't put everything away just to get it out another day.

I wish I...
1. Would have paid attention to #3 above because I did the sauces last and it made a mess! Oops!

Our family will try these recipes over the next week or so and I will write a follow-up post with how many servings came from each recipe and how we liked each one. Stay tuned!