Freezer Meals, Part 3: Put it in the Ziploc and You Shake it All Around.....

See Part 1 and Part 2 by clicking link.

On Tuesday I got all my ingredients I was going to need for my meals. I also went ahead and made my bags for each meal with the instructions. I also went through and collected all of my recipes and put them in once document. You can get them here. Here is a picture of my bags.

I also used some Glad FreezerWare for my shredded chicken and my taco meat.  Here is a picture of them.

The first thing I did Wednesday was go through the freezer and organize and throw away! I hate to throw away food, but we had stuff from 2009!!! I was shocked! I also found a couple of bags of frozen chicken that I didn't know we had so I pulled it to do my shredded chicken. There is enough of it that I will have enough for at least 3 containers of shredded chicken for soup or rice. If I have any extra raw chicken I will just freeze it to grill or whatever we decide.

Jaima from Ring around the Rosies has 10 steps that she follows to do her meals. They are below.

"1) I made a list of my recipes. I used crock pot recipes I already had, plus some of Stephanie’s!
2) Then, I made an ingredient list and went shopping (don’t forget your freezer bags).
3)To start, I gathered all of the ingredients I needed. 
4) Then, I chopped all of the veges first. Dice all of your onions, carrots, peppers, and mince your garlic. 
5) Label your bags with the directions and 
6) THEN add your meats (I trimmed my chicken breasts and cut in half to have a total of 4 pieces of chicken strips per bag).
7) Add your veges. 
8)Add your other ingredients. 
9) Let out air, seal bag, and lay flat!
10) Freeze & Rejoice!"

The more I read them the more I was not sure they would work for me. I thought I would lose track of what I was doing. Here is what I did.

1) Looked up my recipes, made my grocery list, and went shopping.
2) Printed out my recipes and cut them apart. I wrote my instructions on my bags.
3) Separate all my meat into each bag.
4) Chop my veggies and add to bags. I kind of just went by the recipes at this point and added until the bag was done sealed it and put it up. I did not add my spices because I read in another blog that sometimes the taste can be distorted through freezing. I saved the recipes and will add when I make them.
5) Freeze and Rejoice!


Here are a few pictures of some of my meals done.

Meatloaf, two meals of hamburgers, and taco meat

Some of my chicken meals

Here is what I ended up with:

• 5 packs of shredded chicken
• 2 meals of hamburger patties (5 each)
• 1 meatloaf
• 2 gallons of spaghetti sauce
• 1 pork loin marinated
• 16 Crockpot meals
• 2 packs of taco meat
• 2 Chicken meals for stove top

That is 31 meals!!! Whoop whoop!  Plus I had a lasagna that I froze last week so I have 32 meals in the freezer ready to go! I am so excited and feel a little weight being lifted for this upcoming school year.

A few tips:

1. Pace yourself. Jaima said she got hers done in a two hour nap time and I can imagine once you are well practiced you could probably do that. It took me starting at 9:00 to 4:00 to get it done. (I did run to the grocery store in the middle of the day to get something for Klint).

2. Clean has you go. I did have to take the garbage out twice while doing this, but I would finish one stage and empty and do another stage and empty. I would also spray my counters and clean after each thing I did. It makes it easier!

3. Be careful while chopping and don't slice your finger...like I did! Eeek!

I am still in shock about having that many meals in my freezers, but it is a great feeling! 

Happy freezing!

Update: A few things I learned after the freezing happened!

1. Use the ziploc bags with the zip. They are way easier and they don't leak like a couple of the bags did all over my freezer!

2. Try to be careful how you put the bags in the freezer. Our chest freezer had a really hard time keeping up, but it finally did after a day and a half!  We learned that putting the food on the bottom instead of at the top helps.