Today my son Andrew and I decided to make up a couple of freezer meals. We made Chicken Dressing Stuffed Shells! Very simple and yummy! This is what we did...
1- box Jumbo Shells
3- cooked and shredded chicken breasts
8 oz bag of Mozzarella Cheese
1/2 bag of Herb Seasoned Stuffing or a couple of boxes.
Cream of Chicken Soup
Cream of Mushroom Soup
Fix the stuffing per box or bag directions. Mine said to add chopped onion and chopped celery. I added the onion but I didn't have the celery. We cooked and shredded 3 boneless chicken breasts, let them cool completely. Then added the bag of shredded cheese. Mix this well. You really just have to mix this up with your hands to get it mixed well.
Cook your shells until they are just pliable, drain, and let cool.
Take your chicken mixture and stuff the shells full. Fill your pans but make sure that you spray your pans first so nothing sticks. At this point you can cover with foil and put in the freezer. We decided to go ahead and finish one up and bake it for supper tonight.
So to go ahead and bake one or when you thaw a pan out to bake just simply mix a can of cream of mushroom soup and cream of chicken soup and spoon over top of the stuffed shells. Bake covered at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Take out, uncover and sprinkle with mozzarella cheese. Put back in the oven long enough to melt the cheese and then lightly brown it.
Here is the finished dish...ready to eat!
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I'm not even sure what these are called but they are so yummy! My mom always made them for us and she still does. They are one of my favorites. I made a batch tonight for Richard and the boys. So easy and simple.
Only 3 ingredients! Ritz Crackers, Peanut Butter, and Almond Bark.
I ended up using 3 of the sleeves of crackers and one whole package of almond bark, that made about 45 of them. Just make up a bunch of peanut butter and crackers while your almond bark is melting.
We like a lot of peanut butter in ours.
Once your Almond Bark is melted, dip the peanut butter and crackers in the chocolate and put them on parchment paper or wax paper to dry.
A very quick and easy little treat!
We all love them so they will not last long!
Lots of yummy chocolate goodness!
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I was gifted a box of BANANAS! So not to let them go to waste, I started baking....and baking....and baking.
Here is the box of bananas that I started with.
I started with the best of the bananas and loaded the dehydrator. In the photo you can see the banana chips in the jar. That jar was one dehydrator full. I have the second batch in the dehydrator now and I will have one more batch after that. If you have never tried dehydrated bananas, they are sooooo good. A yummy little snack.
This is where I have stopped for the day. 4 loaves of banana bread, 4 loaves of chocolate cinnamon banana bread, 4 loaves of strawberry banana bread, 2 mini loaves of strawberry banana bread, 5 mini loaves of banana bread, and 1 chocolate cinnamon banana bread (that Hunter started eating) and a jar of banana chips and more in the dehydrator!
All of the loaves will be wrapped and put in the freezer and will last for months. I may also give some as gifts. All of these are so tasty with some powdered sugar icing drizzled over the top.
Let me tell you how simple the Strawberry Banana Bread is. You take a simple STRAWBERRY CAKE MIX, mix it as the directions state then add a cup or so of mashed bananas (I think I added about 4 mashed bananas) and bake as the cake directions. I just baked mine in loaf pans. When you get ready to serve you can drizzle with some icing.
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I went grocery shopping early on Saturday morning as soon as we got home, I started on my freezer meals. Here is a photo of 21 finished meals that went into the freezer!
I mixed up a couple of pounds of meatloaf mixture...
I ended up putting them in the mini loaf pans. Sometimes we only need a tiny meatloaf and if I need more then I will bake a couple of them. You can either bake them ahead of time or just freeze them raw. I do it both ways but these are frozen raw. I ended up with 6 of these.
I covered them with some sauce and covered them with foil and into the freezer they went. Just thaw and bake!
I made 7 more Tater Tot Casseroles...this is before I added the cheese.
I added a good thick layer of cheese, covered with foil and into the freezer they went!
Also 5 more Baked Spaghetti's!
Also I forgot to take a photo of them but you can see them in the complete photo here....Ranch House Crock Pot Pork Chops. They will just go in the freezer and then cooked in the Crock Pot. I ended up with 3 of those.
I also had a package of boneless chicken breast that I split up into 4 packs of 2 chicken breasts each. Those will be used for various meals.
After a few hours of work everything was finished and in the freezer! Then I decided that we would have one of the baked spaghetti's with some garlic toast for supper.
Just some freezer meal ideas! This is so much easier for me not to mention it also saves money in the long run!
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Breakfast Bombs! These are one of Richard's favorite breakfast meals. I usually make several of these at a time and put them in the freezer as freezer meals. I always plan my meals ahead so when I plan on fixing one of these, I just take it out of the freezer the night before and put them in the fridge. These can also be microwaved but remove them from the aluminum pans first. So lets get started!
I made 10 of these but could have easily stretched it to 12. These are so easy, just add what you like. This is what I used...
18 eggs, scrambled
2 lbs sausage
10 hash browns
1 can mushrooms (2 cans shown, but I only used one)
cheddar cheese (this is actually Fiesta Blend and I bought a huge bag for other stuff too so not all of this was used on these). LOL!
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I used 10 of these mini loaf pans. 5/.88 cents. If you want to be really thrifty you could reuse these.
Make sure to spray your pans so nothing sticks.
I fried my hash browns. Richard likes them a little crispy. You could also bake these. I should have just used my griddle but I didn't want to dig it out.
Dump the 2 pounds of sausage in a large skillet.
Fry it and drain well...
Dump all 18 eggs in a bowl. If you don't like a lot of eggs you can use less.
I added a tiny bit of milk, salt and pepper.
Eggs are all finished and in a bowl...
Now to start assembling them...
Start with the hash browns. Put them in the pans first. They are a perfect fit!
Put a good layer of sausage on top of the hash browns. I just split up the 2 lbs of sausage in the 10 pans.
Evenly distribute the scrambled eggs on top of the sausage.
Add the mushrooms...
Completely cover with cheese! When these are heated up, the cheese will melt and sorta drip down through on everything else. At this point, just cover with foil and put in the freezer!
To reheat all you do is...thaw them in the fridge the night before and heat in the oven at 350 for about 10-12 minutes or until the cheese is melted. Everything is cooked ahead of time so all you are doing is heating it up and melting the cheese. You can also remove these from the pans and microwave them.
Now we will break the cost down.... Now these babies are filled to the top so unless you are a hearty eater you could stretch these to 12 or more. I ended up with 10! The cost of food for 10 of these breakfast bombs was $19.44. So divide that out and it comes to $1.94 each! That's not a bad price at all for a good hearty breakfast! The last time that I made these I used less eggs and no mushrooms and the cost of those came to $1.64 each so you can see the price will vary a little depending on what you put in them.
When I fix these, I usually make Richard a couple pieces of toast to go with them. Having these already made and ready to heat up sure helps me out when I am fixing him breakfast at 4:30am before work.
UPDATE... This was this morning when I took it out of the oven. The cheese was melted and it smelled sooooo good. He usually just dumps it out of the little pan and into his plate.
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What's for supper? Richard asked for soup beans so I just popped open a jar and heated them up! So fast and easy when you can them.
Richard likes soup beans, fried potatoes, and cornbread crumbled up in a big bowl with some diced onion mixed in.
This is such a quick mean for me to fix when I already have the pinto beans canned and the cornbread in the freezer. Basically all that I have to do is warm the stuff up and fry some potatoes.
I usually just eat the beans and cornbread but he like fried potatoes so that's why I didn't fix a lot of them. He also likes them crispy so they are in the process for frying here.
The beans get so thick in the jar that you have to "rake" them out with a spoon. I add a little water to thin them a little. I love having them in the pantry.
So that's what we had for dinner and I didn't have to work for hours preparing it.
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Fix the stuffing per box or bag directions. Mine said to add chopped onion and chopped celery. I added the onion but I didn't have the celery. We cooked and shredded 3 boneless chicken breasts, let them cool completely. Then added the bag of shredded cheese. Mix this well. You really just have to mix this up with your hands to get it mixed well.
Cook your shells until they are just pliable, drain, and let cool. 
Take your chicken mixture and stuff the shells full. Fill your pans but make sure that you spray your pans first so nothing sticks. At this point you can cover with foil and put in the freezer. We decided to go ahead and finish one up and bake it for supper tonight. 
So to go ahead and bake one or when you thaw a pan out to bake just simply mix a can of cream of mushroom soup and cream of chicken soup and spoon over top of the stuffed shells. Bake covered at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Take out, uncover and sprinkle with mozzarella cheese. Put back in the oven long enough to melt the cheese and then lightly brown it. 
Here is the finished dish...ready to eat! 
