Freezer Meals

I am going to talk about freezer meals. It is kind of intense, so just take it one thing at a time. First off, you need to decide how much you want to cook.

Do you want to make enough meals for one week, two weeks, a whole month?
Do you want to cook all in one day or split it up over a few cooking sessions?
Do you want to cook alone, with your spouse, or with friends/family and split the cost?

Think of how you want to do it, then decide what your family will eat. Gather any recipes that you love and you know your family will eat. You can freeze pretty much any meal there are just a few rules for some things:

Meat: freeze raw to use later. We have a grocery store up the street from us that I love to buy ground beef from. They usually have the cheapest prices and they come precut in about 1 lb. squares, so I just bring them home, put them in a sandwhich bag and then I can fit four squares in a one gallon freezer bag. When buying ground beef, I never buy less than 85/15 (fat content). This is usually the one that is on sale the most often. I will just cook it and drain it and then run water over it to get out as much of the fat as possible.
Chicken I won't buy unless it is less than $1.79/lb. Lately chicken breasts have been huge so I will cut them into quarters to make it easier to bag and use later, then I put them into 1 qt. freezer bags. I will also buy legs, thighs and quarters when they are on sale and put them in my crockpot to cook, then the meat comes off so easy and you can shred and freezer that for burritos or chicken soup. You can do the same with turkey, ham or roasts. And don't forget to save the stock to use in cooking or as a base for soups.
Meat you can also cook and freeze. Or if you have meat that is raw that has been frozen that you need to use, you can cook it and refreeze, but don't refreeze raw meat, it will not be good later.

Pastas: Do not cook pasta thoroughly when freezing it. You only have to cook it half the time because once it is in a dish and freezing and thawed, it will absorb more moisture as if it has been cooked the full time. If you thoroughly cook pasta before freezing it turns into mush when you thaw and cook it.

Veggies: Save money and freeze your own fresh veggies (especially ones out of your own garden). Just know how to blanch them so they freeze well. There are some veggies that don't need to be blanched, they can just be frozen: mushrooms, onions, peppers are a few. I always save some pumpkins at halloween (that we haven't carved) and cut them up, cook, puree and freeze then I always have pumpkin for cookies, cakes or bread that I didn't have pay much for.

Fruits: Most fruits you can just peel and throw in the freezer, in a freezer bag, of course. Use these in fruit cocktail, jello, smoothies or just to thaw and eat.

If you have food in your fridge getting old or bad, use the proper method and freeze it to use later, then you won't waste a lot of food.

Also, anything you see frozen in the store you can do yourself.

Try to plan your freezer meals around sales, you won't spend as much. I also love shopping at Smith's because they always mark down meat when it is a couple days from the sell by date. I am very choosy when I do this and only buy meat that looks good that I myself would eat. Then I will just bring them home and put in the freezer or cook immediately and then freeze. Also buy totillas and bread when on sale or clearance and freeze. We have a Sara Lee outlet here where I buy bread for 60 cents to a $1 so I will buy about 10 at a time and double bag and freeze them, then I always have bread on hand and don't have to pay over $2 a loaf and run to the store for just that, and end up buying more.

I know this is a little overwhelming, it is to me to sometimes. So maybe start out by just making a few meals at a time or if you make dinner every night just double it or triple it and put one or two meals away for another day. I do this a lot and mainly with lasagna. It's just as easy to make two or three at the same time as you are making one.