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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Food preparation advice needed, please.
So I have been trying to make a list of things that I would like to get done in the next week or two before Charli gets here. I was wondering if you all had any advice as to some easy meals we could buy and freeze, make at the time or stuff I could make now and freeze for us for dinners in the first few weeks of being home. I was thinking that I could chop up and put together ingredients into bags that would then just need to be poured into a crock pot or Pyrex dish and thrown in the oven? Or would it turn out better to bake them now and then thaw?
BTW I am NOT a cook at all so I will need some easy recipes. I would like to start eating better and more at-home meals. Better for our health (usually) and our wallets. TIA!
Re: Food preparation advice needed, please.
We had take out about 80% of the time during the first 2 months after DS was born - that's just the reality of it (or it was for us). It got old after awhile, but there were other priorities!
However, my SIL made us a big tray of baked ziti which DH portioned into meals and stuck in the freezer. That was simple to reheat. MIL also brought a huge pot of meatballs and we just had to cook up some pasta. As you can see, I love pasta
Another thing I make and freeze is pulled pork (Dani's recipe). If DH would eat casseroles, I would have made something like that up to freeze too.
BFP#1: 01/10, M/C 6w -- BFP#2: 06/10, M/C 5w -- BFP#3: 09/10, DS born June 1, 2011
BFP#4: 07/12, M/C 5w3d -- BFP#5: 12/12, EDD 08/18/13
Decorate This
We only had people bring us a handful of meals, but we ate a lot of take out, pizza and sandwiches after DD was born.
I wold also stock up on things you can grab and eat QUICKLY - I bought a bunch of cheese sticks, peanut butter cracker packs, muffins, juice boxes and water bottles, boiled eggs, etc.
Here are two posts from Joelen at What's Cooking, Chicago?
Freezer Meals: The Preparation
Freezer Meals: The Menu
Almost anything you make can be frozen - it's just a matter of determining where in the cooking process it's best to freeze things. Some easier go-tos are: pizza dough, spaghetti sauce, ziti/lasagna/manicotti (any baked pasta dish), chili, soups (I wouldn't do cream-based ones, but any others), stews, creamy chicken taquitos, enchiladas, etc. I always have cooked taco meat and cooked shredded chicken in the freezer and ready to be thrown into something quickly. You can pre-portion marinated meats and/or veggies into freezer bags or containers, which won't save you the cook time, but will save you the prep time that comes with meals.
You could try going to Let's Dish or Dream Dinners, etc. adn make up a bunch of stuff too.
IMO the first few weeks, you'll be flying by the seat of your pants anyway and might not have any interest in sitting down for a real meal anyway.
I froze a ton of stuff prior to Bailey's arrival:
Turkey Burgers, Chicken Enchiladas, Spaghetti Sauce, Marinated Steaks, Lasagna...there's more but it's not coming to mind.
I also hit up Trader Joes and got several of their frozen meals. I didn't have to actually cook anything major besides side dishes and veggies for at least two months.
Someone's getting a little brother!
We basically lived off of Costco and Trader Joe's prepared meals.
We also had friends bring us dinners but I also did a couple of meals ahead of time and put them in the freezer. If I remember correctly I did baked Ziti, Lasagna, Spicy Chicken Pasta, and pasta sauce with meatballs.
Like SK we also did a lot of take out for the first couple of months.
I froze meals and people brought us stuff. Then MIL came and cooked - I love that woman.
I made lasagne, zucchini delight, black beans burritos, tamale pie and we stocked up on Trader Joe's frozen meals. We also kept a variety of soups on hand.
I had a freezer disaster about 2 months before DS was born so I made a ton of freezer meals (because meat had thawed out and I had to cook it and then re-freeze.)
While it was handy to have them, I feel we had a lot of waste, because they were all huge amounts of food- like if you had at least 4 adults eating them you would still have enough leftover for all 4 ppl to have it again the next night.
So my recc would be to make your own frozen burritos or other single serving type of thing (like meatloaf in muffin tin, etc.) So that way you aren't thawing out enough food for 10 ppl to eat at once.
I like a lot of the TJs frozen stuff, but it can get expensive fast.
miscarriage on 11/26/09 at 5w6d