20 Freezer Meals In One Cooking Session: Crazy Time Suck Or Worth It?

Meal planning had always been my secret weapon when feeding my family while working and homeschooling full time. It worked great when I remembered to do it. 

As life got busier, my simple weekly meal planning system came crashing down. This was when I started researching freezer meals. 

Disclosure: I may receive commissions for purchases made through links in this post.

What Are Freezer Meals?

For years I had heard of once-a-month cooking and freezer meals. Freezer meals are meals you make ahead of time and freezer for later.

They can be completely cooked and re-heated. Think of those casseroles your friends might drop off after surgery or after you had a baby. 

Or they may be uncooked meals that are prepped ahead of time. Think of crockpot meals or instant pot meals in one bag, and you dump everything in to cook and walk away. 

Freezer meals are most commonly called “batch cooking,” which is why I avoided them like the plague until now. 

The very idea of batch cooking an entire month of meals was overwhelming. Where do you start? What do you need? How much money is it going to cost me? How long will it take? Is it worth it?

As a working mom who is homeschooling full time, my time, energy, and money are limited. Would freezer meals be a crazy time suck or worth it?

Why I Decided To Try Freezer Meals

I already knew the power of meal planning; I even created my own printable meal planner with a 4 week quick and easy meal plan. I knew meal planning was great!

But like anything, it only works if you use it… and I wasn’t.

As of this year, we have three drivers in the house. Three drivers, three outside-the-home jobs with different schedules, and one car.  

A good plan is needed, so everyone is on the same page. Unfortunately, it also meant everyone was exhausted by the time dinner rolled around. 

If I remembered to meal plan, no one wanted to cook the meals we had planned out. 

If I forgot, I was getting burned out from making decisions.  Did I take out chicken? Do I have frozen vegies with it? Rice? Potatoes? 

Something had to give!

I decided to take a closer look at freezer meals. The idea of grabbing a bag of food (good food, not junk!) and dumping it in the Instant Pot or popping it in the oven to bake and calling it DONE! sounded perfect!

How I Discovered Freezer Meals

When I started researching freezer meals, I stumbled across Rachel from This Crafty Home. 

What caught my eye about Rachel? She has two small children at home. If she can cook freezer meals with small children, I knew that her advice was designed for busy moms! 

I checked out her freezer meal plan guides and asked a lot of questions. Would these plans work for working moms? How much time does it take? How many meals do you get? 

I knew what I was looking for. I needed:

• to cut out the overwhelm of freezer meals
• uncomplicated recipes with simple ingredients my kids (and husband) would eat
• a pre-made grocery list complete with how much of each item
• and how to cook everything

When Rachel told me she was developing a brand new freezer meal guide for winter that would fill all my needs, I knew this was the perfect time to jump in and test this out. 

2 Reasons Why I’m Trying Freezer Meal Planning Now

One of my goals for this year is to reduce the number of decisions I make in a day. 

As much as I love simple meal planning, I was still getting burned out from making decisions. 

I started researching freezer meal planning months ago. In this video, I share:

• why I choose these particular meal plans
• some adjustments we made
• how I’m using it to not only connect with my teens but teach valuable life skills
• and more! 

Winter Freezer Meal Guide

I decided to start with Rachel’s Winter Freezer Meal Guide because her guide included everything I needed. 

Freezer meals can be super overwhelming when you first start. My biggest roadblocks were trying to find out what recipes were simple and freeze well, creating a grocery list for all of the recipes, and knowing how to put it all together. 

If you are getting started with freezer meals, I recommend finding a guide like Rachel’s Winter Freezer Meal Guide. 

I am sharing Rachel’s guide with you because we loved it. I spent my own money and purchased the guide. Whatever guide or plan you choose, make sure the guide includes recipes for your family and any health or food restrictions you need. 

The Winter Freezer Meal Guide included gluten-free and dairy-free substitutions, including which type of gluten-free pasta froze well. 

While having all the recipes and itemized grocery lists was super helpful, I was super excited about the step-by-step plans inside the guide. 

What’s Inside The Winter Freezer Meal Guide

When you purchase Rachel’s guide, you’ll get: 

• A full step-by-step printable meal prep guide to get ALL the meals done in just four hours. You’ll use 10 recipes to create 20 meals!
• Complete grocery lists of every single thing you’ll need. 
• A one-month meal plan so you know what to eat each week AND a blank copy so you can make one yourself! 
• Super helpful tips and instructions based on each recipe and step you’ll take. 
• Alternative instructions to make each recipe Dairy-free and Gluten-free! 
• Cooking instructions for Instant Pot/Crockpots, or in the oven when necessary! Most of the recipes are dump recipes. You throw them in the Instant Pot, Oven, Crockpot, or Microwave and walk away. 
• A freezer inventory sheet, so you keep track of everything you have ready!

I purchased her Winter Freezer Meal Guide because I was brand new to freezer meals, and I wasn’t sure it would work. However, I am kicking myself for not getting the bundle that included all the guides. You can find it if you scroll down on this page.

What You Need To Create Freezer Meals

After purchasing the guide, I made a list of basics I needed for creating freezer meals. We all know having the right tools can make a massive difference in getting something done or giving up!

Freezer Meal Cooking Supplies

• Freezer Bag Holders
• Freezer Bags Extra Large (I have since started using reusable bags, I like these ones)
• Aluminum Foil Casserole Pans
• Sharpie
• Kitchen Scale
• Sharp Knife, Peeler & Cutting Boards
• Measuring Cups & Spoons
• Bowls
• Compost Bowl
• Sneakers
• Kitchen Mat 

The last two are super important, especially if you have a bad back or knees. You’ll be standing for a long time. My daughter thought it was great; she got to wear sneakers in the house! 

Quick story about these bag holders. I ordered the blue ones during a Black Friday Sale. They were not scheduled to arrive in time, so I ordered this green set.

The blue ones arrived the day before we started. Worth every cent!! I only had two; having 8 would have made life easier. I am so glad I ordered the second set.

Freezer Meal Shopping Tips:

One of my main concerns was the cost of buying all of the ingredients at once. I’m Canadian, and our grocery prices are different from those in the USA.  Those plans you see on Pinterest boasting a month of meals for $150.00 doesn’t fly here.

At the time, my husband had been handling all the grocery shopping. I needed to have a solid plan to convince him to try this out with me. 

Now that I had the guide and basic supplies, the food was next. Buying enough food for 20 meals, I knew would save us money in the long run, so we set aside money each week a few weeks before we went. We aimed for double the USA price.

I printed off the detailed grocery list Rachel provided and went through what I had on hand first. It turns out I needed to buy pretty much everything except three spices! We usually replace spices as we run out, but for some reason, I didn’t! 

One bonus of freezer meals was spending more time with my teen. As busy working moms, we need to get a little creative when we want to spend time with our kids. 

When tackling this project, I asked my daughter if she wanted to help me shop and cook. We had a fun date for shopping. We planned our trip during a slower time, had our list, and divided and conquered. 

There was one problem I didn’t anticipate! 

Homeschooling In The Grocery Store

So fun fact. In Canada, we measure things weirdly. We do our body weight in pounds, but our grocery items are in milliliters, grams, kilograms, etc. Let’s say my kitchen scale got a workout the day we cooked!

When the shopping list said, “12 cups of sliced mushrooms,” we had to figure out the math for how many boxes of whole mushrooms that might be. 

And since I didn’t anticipate this problem, we ended up doing a lot of math right in the grocery store aisle! It took us 2 hours to get groceries!

We rewarded our hard effort and brain work with a coffee and treat! 

Tip: My daughter had the brilliant idea of writing down what we had purchased this time and doing the math ahead of time. 

If you are a homeschool mom, take your kids to the grocery store with you. I’ve always said your kids can learn a ton from cooking but they need to learn the shopping skills too! Even if you aren’t buying for an entire month, they can learn valuable life skills such as price comparison, budgeting, and math. 

20 Freezer Meals In One Cooking Session

What was it like to cook 20 meals in 4 hours? It was a lot of fun and tiring. 

As a beginner, I assumed it would take much longer. However, working with my teen, we got it done in just over 4 hours. That includes two visits from my mom (about 20 minutes each), a snack break at the halfway mark, and doing the dishes. 

We cooked with a full sink of soapy water and took turns washing up as we went. This is not necessary, in fact, we had an empty dishwasher waiting that we filled up at the end. Doing dishes as we went helped lower our anxiety by keeping the clutter down. 

My daughter created a music list for cooking, but we ended up talking and laughing instead, playing music for the last 30 minutes. 

Rachel’s plans are created to be done in two 2-hour cooking sessions or one 4-hour cooking session. I wanted to do the 4 hours because I was worried that I wouldn’t feel like doing the 2nd half later if I stopped. 

4 Freezer Meals Cooking Tips: 

Looking back over the 4 hours, here are some things I learned while preparing 20 freezer meals. 

1. Prepare Ahead

We set out all the food on our table except the ingredients that needed to be kept cool. 

We sliced and measured the mushrooms ahead of time and the carrots. The plan called for frozen sliced carrots, but our store didn’t have any. So we peeled, cut, and measured fresh carrots. 

If your children are helping, make sure they have good knife skills. There was a lot of chopping. 

2. Be Organized

We printed off the step-by-step plan and checked off each step as we went. As there were two of us taking turns doing things, we kept on track and avoided mistakes. 

This proved true when I discovered we had 2 cups of carrots left and no instructions to use them. I missed a step earlier and found it as it was not crossed off, whew! 

By the way, print off ALL the pages. I missed the last one and we had a good laugh over pretending to quit before we finished!

3. Read the instructions all the way through before beginning. 

My daughter read the step-by-step plan in the morning while I worked, and I reread it while I ate lunch before we began. 

When creating the pasta dish, we let the pasta cool too long. It ended up being one solid hunk of cold pasta -ew! I missed the part about when to add it to the dish. Oops! 

4. Plan on buying dinner.

At the end of 4 hours of chopping, slicing, and dicing the last thing I wanted to do was cook dinner. When we planned our cooking day, my husband wisely asked if he could bring home dinner.

At the end of 4 hours, we loaded up the dishwasher, kicked off our sneakers and I vowed to never leave the sofa for the rest of the evening!

Don’t Want To Cook For 4 Hours?

Not everyone has the time or energy to set aside a full day to prepare meals. I totally get that!

Here are a few meal planning ideas of what you can do instead:

1. Batch cook.

Batch cooking is when you double a meal that you are cooking and freeze half of it for later. Save the meal for a busy day next week, and bam! You’ve just gained an hour in your schedule.

2. Plan simple meals

For months our go-to meals were simple dinners. We didn’t even use recipes. We would choose a protein (my husband wants meat with his meal!) and a carb like rice, potatoes, or pasta and veggies. That’s it.

It was easy, simple, and perfect for getting the kids involved in dinner.

3. Use pantry meals

Pantry meal kits are great to have on hand for days you need quick and easy meals.

While not always healthy you can add veggies and salads to balance them out. Sign up to get my guide which includes simple recipes and a shopping list.

4.. Use a quick and easy meal plan

If the goal is to get dinner on the table with less fuss, you’ll want to check out the Weekly “Quick & Easy Recipes” included in my practical meal planner.

This 4-week set of menu plans includes 32 recipes and 4 shopping lists.

Each weekly menu plan includes 6 main course recipes, plus 1 breakfast and 1 dessert recipe. Each week consists of a food prep list for the week to help you get organized. Plus, each weekly plan comes with a handy, printable shopping list to take the guesswork out of going to the grocery store.

And yes, they are all kid-friendly and kid-tested.

Remember, meal planning only works if you use it! So pick a plan you will actually use.

20 Freezer Meals In One Cooking Session: Crazy Time Suck Or Worth It?

So, after 4 hours of cooking and many loads of dishes, do I think it is worth it?

I decided to try freezer meals to accomplish 2 things:

• remove the decision of dinner from my plate
• connect with my daughter

I’m not sure if I mentioned but the winter meal plans came with a pre-made meal plan and a blank one for you to use. (Shown in the image below)

Another decision I didn’t need to make. I printed off the pre-made plan and stuck it on my fridge: Ta-da, dinner planned next week.

Can I just say writing my grocery list for next week was amazing?? Not a single food for dinner is on the list since I picked up some things with my big order and the rest I had.

Instead, it is all breakfast, lunches, and pet stuff! I’m already saving time and money!

I asked my daughter what she thought of the whole experience. She said shopping was a little stressful because we did math during the COVID restrictions which was hectic. The cooking was fun!

She is also planning on making pull-apart garlic bread for our freezer meal next week. I’ll take that as a good sign!

Bonus Of Freezer Meals:

We were planning on starting the Freezer Meals on a Monday and using them for 4 solid weeks.

But… like always LIFE had other ideas. I ended up needing to drive to pick up my husband. That “one car” problem hits again. When I got home, I really didn’t feel like cooking dinner until 8 pm, so I pulled out the one freezer meal you pop in the microwave.

I think I fell in love a little in fact, I might be hooked for life. Seriously, 10 minutes later, dinner was served. #gamechanger

Are You Ready To Try Freezer Meals?

As a working mom who is homeschooling, you make a million decisions a day. Removing even one can make a huge impact on your energy and life.

As much as I love simple meal planning, I was still getting burned out from making decisions and trying to cook after a long day.

Sound familiar? I encourage you to check out freezer meals for your family. I loved using Rachel’s Winter Freezer Meals because she did all the hard work for me. She now has many guides out, you can see the different options by scrolling down to the guides.

You might also like: Easy Ways To Save Money On Your Grocery Budget 

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