The "Shelles" Freezer Cook Together

My little helper in the kitchen...isn't she sweet?!?!?!

Shellie has been wanting to stock her freezer with meals for her family, but it seems life keeps getting in the way. She even bought ingredients for a freezer cooking session, but life kinda spun out of control with her oldest in the hospital with a staph infection- CRAZY! He is all better now- praise the Lord!

Here is what we decided to cook: (If it's underlined, click on it and the recipe is linked up for you!) 
I put the menu up here first in case  you just want recipes, and don't want all the chatter....  ;)

Waffles

Best Ever Chicken Marinade (at least so far)

Chicken Ranch Tacos- My family actually likes these on sandwich buns and sprinkled with a little mozzarella cheese.

Mexican Chicken Casserole- We are still deciding of this one needs to be assembled the day of cooking. Layer tortilla shells, chicken mixture, tortilla shells, chicken mixture, top with cheese. Shellie made it all layered and frozen and it seemed a little "mushy."

Sweet and Spicy Grilled Chicken- Summer on the grill!!!!

PB&J Sandwiches

No Boil Manicotti- Doesn't this picture of Shellie'e little guy say it all?!?!?

P.S. This is her "picky" eater...2 thumbs up means it is being added to the next menu ASAP!

Shredded BBQ Chicken- we just took the leftover shredded chicken and dumped in Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce and froze.

Crockpot BBQ Chicken- So simple and so delicious.

Garlic Parmesan Chicken- This is my family's absolute FAVE chicken. I make it in nuggets, too.

Grilled Cilantro Lime Chicken- Another great grilling recipe for the summer.

Jo Mama's Spaghetti Sauce- This sauce is CRAZY good! I didn't use the wine just added a grape juice and a little vinegar. We like our sauce sweet; Shellie prefers "tangy." So, when I heated it up in the crockpot the day of serving, I added brown sugar to taste!  YUMMY!



We were getting ready to spend a day scrapbooking for our birthdays (our birthdays are just a few days apart.)  We got this brilliant idea to start the evening before at my house and do a little freezer cooking.  Turns out...this idea was PURE GENIUS! We already have another day scheduled.  So, if you can, get a friend and plan an evening and FILL YOUR FREEZER.  We got started about 4:30 and wrapped up around 9:30. (Cleaned up, finished, packed up, ready to scrapbook!)

What I loved about cooking together:
Our family sizes are identical, so portions were the same.
We were at my house, so when I had to stop to take care of my girlies, she could keep on cooking.  I think THAT was the secret to getting things done so quickly.
MOST OF ALL, cooking with a friend just made it FUN!"

First up, we had to decide on a menu. This was probably the hardest part, because you have to find meals that BOTH families will agree on. We both have a picky eater, as I am sure almost every family does.


Here is how we did it.
I went shopping the day before, so that was done. The morning that we were cooking, I filled a crockpot full of chicken breast seasoned with garlic pepper, dried minced onion, and a little chicken broth. I cooked that on high all day until we were ready to shred it.  I also, put the ingredients for the sauce in the crockpot and cooked that on low all day. (We later decided, that wasn't really necessary, since we both like to cook it in the crockpot the day we serve it anyway.)

When you cook your chicken in the crockpot, it is soooooo easy to shred- ALMOST effortless.

While I was getting my girls their dinner (right before Shellie arrived), I made 2 loaves of bread into pb&j sandwiches.  (That gave us each 10 sandwiches to take home.)

When Shellie arrived, we started with the Garlic Parmesan Chicken since it needed to lay flat in the freezer before freezing in bags, and of all the meals, it was the most time consuming.
After that, we just went down the list according to meat type- shredded chicken or assemble frozen, I tried to keep ahead of Shellie trimming the chicken.  (I am a tad whack-o about ANY fat on my chicken, so I trim ALOT!)

Garlic Parmesan Chicken.  We froze it on cookie sheets lined with waxed paper, once frozen transferred to freezer bags.  What  you see here, is what went in the 'fridge because my kids ALWAYS want this meal first when I freezer cook.

While Shellie made waffles, I made the manicotti. Once that was all done, we put the sauce into containers. Cleaned up the kitchen and gave each other a high five!

2 waffle irons going at the same time.

The sauce in the containers.

When we were done, we had at least 13 meals made PLUS spaghetti sauce, waffles, and pb&j. We were all smiles and feeling NO GUILT as we left to scrapbook the next day away!

Here we are the next morning, ready to scrapbook the day away!!!

Here are some other pics we took of the process:

Before I start cooking, I hang up all the recipes on  my cabinets above where I will be making those recipes. Stove top recipes bu the stove, crockpot recipes on the counter where my crockpots are...you get the picture.

 Once we finished a recipe, we moved it to a cabinet so that we could see our process- it feels like checking off a To Do List.

DONE!

Still trimming chicken....

PB&J ready for the freezer!

Mixing up the sauce for the Crcokpot BBQ chicken.  This one is great on the grill, too...just a summer FYI. ;)

the No Boil Manicotti was so easy to fill using a ziploc bag (that I "mixed/squished" the ingredients in), cut a small hole in the tip and squeezed to fill. AWESOME!

This is how we freeze anything with a marinade...dump it all in a bag. I know, it isn't a cooked meal in the freezer, but the hard part is all done, you just have to throw it on the grill, crockpot, etc...

Did I mention that the night before I was up ALL NIGHT with 9 ten year olds for my daughters big birthday...I sent her in her room to read, because she was ummmm...tired... ;) a few minutes later, this is how I found her- ASLEEP with her Kindle!

That's it for us!  Fill your freezer and bless your families (and you, too!)