Who’s ready to cook all day long for a month’s worth of freezer meals?
When you tell your family you’re having frozen dinner do they run the other way and only the dog looks happy? Maybe it’s time to introduce them and yourself to homemade Freezer meals. Cooking a month of meals for the freezer all in one day makes for a stress-free and often quick meal time for busy families.
Once upon a time, long, long ago, I used to make a few month’s worth of freezer meals all in one day. Not having to cook for a month was heavenly and I didn’t miss working every day in the kitchen. It has been a few years since those cooking adventures, and I was itching to do it again. Having four children all in after-school dance and sports programs, life is very busy. There are some nights that we don’t get home to eat dinner together until around 7 or 8pm. Last week when I looked around the dinner table and saw everyone eating Cheerios for dinner I decided it was time to do some freezer cooking. 🙂
I know the idea of cooking a month of meals in one day seems impossible or crazy but it can be done. For those of you who don’t want to spend the whole day cooking here is a helpful hint: For Freezer cooking you can try to just double or triple your recipes all the time, eating the one you made for dinner and freezing the others for later. This way you are constantly building your meals.
The other option is you can put on the apron, roll up your sleeves, kiss the kids goodbye, and do freezer cooking all in one day like I did. To take the load off some people even create freezer meal groups with friends, making meals and meeting to swap freezer meals so everyone comes home with a variety of meals. This would be really fun , however I have never done it myself (hint to all my friends out there).
Having a stockpile of Freezer meals is invaluable especially when you get sick for a few days or weeks, have a baby, or just have a hard day and don’t feel like cooking.
The key to Freezer cooking is preparation. If you are prepared it can make all the difference in your busy day.
Cooking Freezer Meals in a Day Process
Step #1 – Go through what you already have. Time to use up some of the food you have on hand to save yourself money. Then you can go through all the sales ads for the week and find things that are on sale or seasonal. After taking those things into consideration make your list of meals you want to make. List them all out! On another sheet of paper list each ingredient you need for each of those meals x how many items.
Step #2 – Go shopping, get all your supplies. Here is my HUGE list of freezer cooking essentials.
Step #3 – Clean your kitchen, prepare your freezer (make room), make sure you have enough dishes & pots. I like having a couple sets of measuring spoons and cups on hand.
Step #4 – Decide on paper the order in which you will cook your meals. This will help you stay focused when you are doing a ton of things at the same time.
Step #5 – Clear your schedule for a day – then cook all day long!
Step #6 – Clean your kitchen – it will be a huge mess, so be prepared….(or better yet, make your spouse do it – it’s only fair…)
I have a regular freezer and a deep freezer. This smaller freezer only held about 30 meals and the other 20 are in my deep freezer.
Here are the FREEZER FRIENDLY meals I made and quantities:
- Honey Lime Chicken (3)
- Homemade Pot Pie (3)
- Fried Rice (5)
- Slow Cooker Broccoli Chicken Alfredo (3)
- Twice Baked Potatoes (3)
- Sweet & Sour Chicken (2)
- Honey Glazed Pork Chops (2)
- Chicken Parmesan Pesto Shells (3)
- Beef Barley Stew (3) – it’s all uncooked ingredients so I can toss into crock pot and cook all day.
- Cilantro Lime Chicken Tacos (2)
- Cafe Rio Pulled Pork for Cafe Rio Salads (3) – recipe is in my cookbook!
- Homemade Hamburger Patties (3) – just mixed bread crumbs, Parmesan, garlic, and onion powder + 1 egg in large batch hamburger. Shaped into patties, layered between freezer paper.
- French Dip Sandwiches (2)
- Stirfry Meat, Veggies + Sauce (3) – I had a bag of stir fry veggies already. To a second bag added raw chicken in slices and a stirfry sauce.
- Chicken Enchiladas (3)
- Lasanga (3) – my own recipe!
- Pulled BBQ Pork for buns (2) – slow cooked pork roast, shred and add bottle of BBQ sauce
- Chimichangas (2) – shredded chicken, spanish rice and cheese added to large burrito, and folded. These are bagged up so they can be fried.
Grand Total = 50 Meals all cooked in one day
I also made homemade breakfast burritos – using hash browns, bacon, eggs and cheese. Those will be perfect for some quick breakfast meals.
Making a ton of freezer meals all in one day can be extremely rewarding and save you a lot of time.
P.S. I have tons of beginner information on getting started and even tips for advanced freezer meal cooking in my new cookbook called Seriously Good Freezer Meals. Please head on over and order yourself a copy! Inside there are menu plans and 150 of the BEST ever tasting freezer meals I’ve ever created. For reals.
And if you love freezer meals consider joining my private facebook group called THE FREEZER MEAL CLUB. I’d love to have you join us!
—> See MORE of my Freezer Meals recipes here.
And if you do happen to do your 50 freezer meals in a day cooking marathon, take some pictures and share them on instagram with me! Use hashtag #50freezermealsinaday and tag me @happymoneysaver. I absolutely LOVE to see you do your freezer meal cooking!
About Karrie
Food is my love language. But so is saving money. So I like to combine the two a lot and make thrifty make ahead and freeze meals to save time. Because life is busy, and freezer meals can come to the rescue for all of us. And yes, they actually CAN taste good. Read more...
Comments & Reviews
Charity says
Thank you for posting this! I am happy to say that I went grocery shopping and bought ingredients for 34 meals on this list!!!! I was shocked I only spent $222.22 on everything I needed…..today I have started and I have got 2 menu items completed and cooling to go into the freezer! Beef Berley Stew and the Honey Lime Chicken…however….I don’t know how well we’ll take to the Honey Lime chicken….it seems too sweet/citrusey. But we’ll see! 🙂 I’m off to make up some more freezer meals!!!
Thank you so much for your hard work you put in to this!!! I sure hope you put up another menu soon!!! 🙂
Bridgett zaidi says
How did you freeze the sweet and sour chicken and orange chicken? Fully cooked?
Jennifer says
this is what I’d like to know too!
Karrie says
I have done it both ways, I like frying all the chicken up first and then freezing with the sauce in a separate bag. It just saves so much time. But I also have done it where I have dipped the chicken in flour and then frozen in the bag so all I had to do was fry it. Works either way but I prefer the chicken already done.
Judy says
How long will these meals last in the freezer? I don’t want to wait to long to cook them and have them expire.
Melissa says
It depends on the dish…Here is what I found from the book: Don’t Panic More Dinners in the Freezer.
Meals
Meat and poultry, cooked, in sauce:s 5-6 months
Meat and poultry, uncooked, in sauces/marinades: see raw meats
Pasta dished: 2-3 months
Side dishes: 2-3 months
Spaghetti sauce, chili, soups, stews: 5-6 months
Quiche or egg dished: 3 months
Raw Meat
Chicken: 10 months
Fish: 2-3 months
Ground Beef: 3 months
Pork Chops, ribs: 2-3 months
Roasts beef: 7-9 months, pork 4-6 months
Steaks beef: 7-9 months, pork 2-3 months
Turkey parts: 4-6 months, whole 6 months
Baked Goods
Muffins: 3 months
Pizza Dough: 5-6 months
Quick breads: 2-3 months
Yeast breads/rolls: 2-3 months
Desserts
Cakes: 2-3 months
Cookies: 3-4 months
Frozen desserts: 1-2 months
Fruit pie or pie filling: 6 months.
Carole says
Last December whenever I made a meal that I knew would freeze well I would double it and put a portion in a freezer container. I then gave a box of assorted meals to a friend for Christmas. Most popular gift EVER. 🙂
Cassie says
I LOVE the convenience of freezer food! We have three kids (4, 5, and 6) and both of us work full time (and side jobs as often as possible) with a 25+ mile commute from our home to work, so ANYTHING convenient is often utilized. UNFORTUNATELY our convenient routes are not always the healthiest, and I hate the guilt of using pre-packaged, high fat and high sodium foods (or worse- FAST FOOD!!) in place of real, whole ingredients. I like to cook extra meat, or extra bread or extra beans and soups, but never thought of making a full meal specifically to freeze and reheat! We’ve been limited to our tiny fridge top freezer (that’s ALWAYS TOO FULL!) but we now have access to a full sized stand up freezer! Now I have menu ideas buzzing around in my head instead of plans of frozen pizzas, microwaveable meals, etc!! I’m super excited to get started on this!!
LaToya says
We did this at the end of my pregnancies planning for new baby…just made things easier having meals made. Thanks for the reminder. Not sure we have the time or the freezer space to do so many, but definitely could do some.
Laura says
Thank you for sharing this! I’m really new to cooking and freezing ahead but as life gets busy I know I’m going to need to start doing it more. I’ve been freezing chili, tamales, doughs and breads. I have a question about freezing pasta though.
Are there any tricks to keeping the noodles firm? If so what are they? I’ve done some frozen soups with noodles and it was horrible, does pasta hold up better?
Liz Beasley says
If it is a pasta in a soup, do not freeze it, just add to when cooking/reheating. If its a casserole type, cook the pasta about half way done, same with rice, there should be enough moisture in the meal to finish cooking the pasta or rice while cooking the meal to eat.that is my experience!
shannon says
Maybe I’m dumb or something, but what do the numbers mean that are next to each menu idea?
Kelleigh @ Kelleigh Ratzlaff Designs says
It means she made (3) Three or (4) Four of that particular dish. 🙂
Leigh says
Is that made the recipe (3) times? or does that recipie have a yield of (3) meals?
Alison Jefferies says
I think she made the recipe 3 times because if you add all the numbers it comes to 50. The first recipe said 3 and had 4 chicken breast, so it would yield 4, not 3.
Jan says
Great sounding recipes! I did something similar last year at the beginning of January. In my job we work 60+ hours a week during January so the beginning of the month I spent a weekend making freezer food. I’m a soup person, so I basically made several kinds of soup, chili and a large pan of lasagna. Since I live alone I made the lasagna then froze it in individual portions. The only soup that didn’t freeze well was the potato/cheese. Something about freezing the milk based soup with the cheese already in it just didn’t work. The potatoes turned to mush and the consistency was very grainy. The other soups – chicken/rice, beef barley, ham and bean – all came out great.
Christina says
Everything looks so good! I’ve been dabbling in freezer meals – I love saving time during the week! I just have one quick question – how did you freeze the fried rice (in a bag or foil pan)?
Karrie says
I have done both – this time I ran out of 9×13’s so I bagged them. I do like warming them in the oven though so I will prob micro for a few minutes on defrost and add to a 9×13, cover and bake.
Erin says
I have been wanting to this for a long time, but my husband has this idea that all the food will be dry and old. Does the food taste better fresh or is it the same?
Karrie says
I find that it is pretty close to the same. I think of course fresh is best, but for all the time I save it is worth that little tiny bit of difference. Maybe try once to double or triple one of your recipes, freeze it and then after a week make it again with your frozen one and see if you or he notices the difference. 😉
Melissa says
Melissa
I always make extra when I make Chicken and Dressing I cover & put it in the freezer then I take it our and vacuum seal it in the container when I thaw it and cook it taste just like I had made it fresh. I highly recommend a vacuum sealer if you want it to taste fresher.
Mindy @ The Purposed Heart says
Hi Karrie! This looks like such an awesome freezer meal menu 🙂 I’ve never done a freezer cooking marathon before, but I think that you may have just inspired me to give it a try! Thanks for sharing the link to my homemade pot pie too 🙂 Have a great day!
Karrie says
Thanks Mindy, you have just gotta give this a try – its so awesome!
Catherine Morton says
This is one of the better menu’s I’ve seen. I will be doing a variation of this based on what I have in my pantry : ) I’ll post back. This was a lot of work for you to put together. The menu is the hardest part. Thanks!
Robyn Scott says
So excited to try this. I’ve never done my own freezer meals.
Leah L says
I am SO excited to try this! Let’s hope I have as much motivation as you!
LIANNA WADE says
Do you bake the lasagna & pot pies before freezing?
karrie says
Hi. No I do not bake them first. For the lazanga I don’t personally like the no boil ones- I never get it right…its either too dry or not cooked enough. I boil the noodles..and make my lasanga like normal. Then I cover it in foil and freeze. For the pot pies I make a homemade pie crust, put it on the bottom of the 9 x 13 pan..add the filling, then add a pie crust on top. Cover with foil and freeze. Bake frozen or thawed at 350 for 1-2 hours depending on how frozen it is.
LIANNA WADE says
Thanks so much and I dont like the the no boil noddles either for the same reasons. I cant wait to try the recipes.
Glenda says
Never heard of thT type I just skip boiling the normal noodles as long as they are covered with sauce it comes out righy
Judy Kaiser says
Just a little hint: if you don’t like the no boil noodles but don’t want to mess with boiling them, just get large cookie sheets out, place your noodles in a single layer and cover with warm water. Let sit for 10-15 minutes (while prepping your meat and cheese mixture). Drain water and begin assembling your lasagna. Works great!
Charlene Esquivel says
Thank you for that! I will have to try this.
Buffy says
I have been just using the regular lasagna noodles and not even doing anything with them, just using them dry like the no-bake ones ( I saw this in a cookbook and was skeptical) but they turned out just as good as if I took the time to cook them first! Not dry at all, and I don’t have to spend twice as much on the no-bake kind! Hope this helps!
Marla Baldwin says
Okay, I’m older and have been cooking for my family for 45 years…..I never-ever boil the lasagna noodles-never-ever.I do everything the same as you do it….I bake the same time and temp.& use the same ingredients. I use regular dry noodles and add a cup of extra water or swish a cup of water in the jar of the “good” *spaghetti sauce I am using and add it at the very end of the layering process….cover and bake……it comes out perfectly cooked and no mushy noodles.Talk about an easy perfect family meal!
* good sauce= I really like the natural tomato/artichoke sauces.
Susan Peittersen says
That is the best idea ever!
Kattah says
Ooh, great idea! Thanks for the share. 🙂
Susan says
Great idea! Thanks
Tara says
I have a silly question, for the chicken recipes (sweet and sour chicken), would you cook it fully and then freeze it or dont cook the chicken before freezing?
Happy.MoneySaver says
You can do either way. For some of the recipes I will cook it fully and then freeze it like the chicken strips. For the sweet and sour chicken I like to cook it fully and then heat it in the oven again.
Hallie says
I was just wondering how long meals stay good in the freezer.
Happy.MoneySaver says
About 6 months…if they last that long! 🙂
Angell says
For the sweet and sour chicken, if you fully cook, then freeze, does it come out as crispy? And this means you go through the whole recipe – fry, bake and all then freeze? I am so in need of doing some freezer meals. During the school year it is so hard to come in after a long day and cook some of the meals that take so long. I also have a daughter who just started college. I would love to bring her and her roommates some freezer meals that just need to be thrown in the oven. They are all already missing home cooked meals 🙂
Happy.MoneySaver says
It is still crispy but not as crispy as straight out of the oil. It’s one of my favorite freezer meals!
Michelle says
Thank you for sharing! This menu looks soooo YUMMY! Much better than other menus I’ve seen for freezer meals. I will definitely be trying this! 🙂
Karrie says
Hi Anna, I usually just grab one out and stick it in the fridge in the morning or the night before, so it thaws in the fridge all day. Of course on some of the meals you don’t have to thaw, like Lasanga for example. You could just stick it in the oven frozen and bake – but it would take 2 hours instead of 1 hour. If you thawed it it should only take an hour or so.
My breakfast burritos I just stick in the microwave frozen to heat up.
Crockpot type freezer meals are best thawed the night before in the fridge, but everything else I just take out in the morning to thaw in my fridge. Good luck!
Anna H says
I have done this twice now. I have found many great recipies on Pinterest. I print out things that look good, make my shopping list, then cook! I save my printouts and after I make each meal, I decide if it is a keeper or not. I love to have a few meals that can go directly from freezer to oven for those days that seem to get crazy. I also have made soups that can be popped frozen into crockpot on low and will be perfect when I get home. I am so happy that I have started doing this, I feel that my family is avoiding a lot of unnecessary chemicals. I also find that it is much easier to make a big pot of stock or sauce when you are committed to being in the kitchen all day. My grocery budget seems to be lower with this as well because I am not stopping in for a few things as often.
Jessica Darr says
Just woundering do have a grocery list for all these recipies? Like a long list I can print off?
Karrie says
I will have a nice big list for you in my upcoming cookbook. Stay tuned!
samantha says
Do you have that list yet
Happy.MoneySaver says
It will be in my upcoming cookbook! 🙂
Shara Bailey says
Good Morning,
Is your cookbook done yet? I would really LOVE a shopping list. I’m happy to Paypal you some money for it. After all, its all your work 😉
Happy.MoneySaver says
Not yet but it’s coming!!! 🙂
Shara Bailey says
Can I buy a shopping list off you, and you can email it to me?
Kim says
Is there a way I can get your list? Kimberlyhokenson@yahoo.com
Anna D says
I’m eager to try this.. but are there thawing instructions?? I’d hate to make all these meals and have them ruined because I thawed or warmed the meal up wrong. Thanks!
Kelli says
Good job! 50 meals done is awesome. You definitely gave me some good ideas for helping to stock up our freezer meals, those recipes look delicious. Thank you for posting!
Karrie says
You’re welcome Kelli – Happy freezer cooking!
doxilady says
ONLY 1 thing forgotten to truly save money on step 1. CUT THOSE COUPONS!! LOL I have done this for YEARS,, a years worth of groceries only run us about $3,000 It IS WORTH IT..Thanks For Sharing!! 😀
Angelina says
How in the world do people make the coupons work. Can’t find coupons for the food we purchase. It is all for the nasty canned stuff that has too much salt added. When purchasing fresh foods you just can’t find coupons. If I went with the coupons that we get I would have a pantry full of crap I would never use.
Cindy says
I agree Angelina. Use to love couponing, but now can’t find any good ones for the food I actually buy. I believe they have cut way back on giving us the good coupons!
Leslie says
I agree…there are no coupons for fresh food. And in California, there is actually a state law that forbids stores from doubling coupons!
Mrs. Paula Synnott says
Go check out the Manufacturer’s web sites for all the products that you buy. They usually have coupons listed and printable there. Also call the companies for the products that you purchase and give them feedback on there products and they will send you coupons for those products. I do it all the time and receive coupons in the mail every week.
Kayla says
I coupon.. but mostly for household things and the money i save (which is a ton!!) I can add to my grocery budget.. because i agree, there arent any good food coupons anymore.
Amanda says
I see that the last comments were from last year, but I wanted to say that if you have a Kroger affiliated store (I have a Dillons here in KS) they send mailers with coupons in them and there are always fresh produce coupons in them. For fresh produce, dairy, deli and the meats/seafood sections. Just thought I’d let people know in case they didn’t yet. 🙂
S.R. says
Agreed! I usually have no use for coupon items. Mostly junk I would never eat.
Laura says
Meijer gives coupons for money off of your produce products!
Glenda says
I make breakfast quiche and turkey patties as my breakfast freezer meals. I use to do this also years ago and have been wanting to start doing it again. I cook two weeks at a time 3 meals a day so I think first making a meal plan is needed before starting to cook.
Janet says
When I make pancakes or French toast for my kids, I make extra, let them cool and freeze them in sets of two. I use small freezer bags and separate them with parchment paper. Then they can pull them out and put them in the toaster!