Filling My Freezer Round Two: Armed and Dangerous

Okay, let me just start by saying that I was so blown away with Round One that this turned into an obsession of epic proportions! Oh man. And then I will say this. I had a weekend set aside this time (YAY me!) but then I got invited to see Beth Moore with a free ticket (YAY friend!) that same weekend. SO, once again, I ended up starting my OAMC on a Sunday afternoon (like 6:30pm). Why not put it off another week, you ask? By the time the big surprise party for the hubby came around the weekend before, I had depleted my supply of breakfast and lunch items. That means a whole week had now gone by of impromptu grocery store runs right before bed, eggos, etc…. I was SO stressed out EVERY day because none of my meals were figured out and I felt awful going back to feeding the kiddos mystery meat every day - meaning Steve was running to the store again because we didn't want the same mystery meat each day.  I got back from this amazing, refreshing conference and wanted nothing but rest! But I knew that I would go to rock bottom the next morning if I didn't get it done. So there we were. My lovely cousin came to help with the big shop and cooked with us that night which was a ton of help too.
All of this to say - after going to bed at 1am the night before, I hadn't showered. There are no pictures of this amazing cooking event. There should be. It was a beautiful process and I should have taken pictures. The thing is - when you have three people cooking a hundred meals at once, the kitchen doesn't look picture worthy. I think the pictures would look like junk even though the food looks amazing! Just picture the food in your mind. Here is the breakdown!
I spent $320. I know. Quite a bit more than last time, but I think I have 2+ months of breakfasts in this, not just one. This also includes restocking my pantry with bags of flour, sugar (white and brown), etc. Oh - and this includes a pizza meal from the walmart deli for cooking night (two pizzas and breadsticks!), all of our fresh fruits, etc.. The only thing not included is one pound of flank steak which I have to pick up from the butcher because none of the grocery stores have it and this amazing looking recipe calls for it and I now have all other ingredients for it. Oh - and this dollar amount includes ingredients for a huge amount of mixes - I am taking up making my own mixes for pancakes, waffles, muffins - preparing the dry ingredients ahead of time and freezing because they have whole wheat flour, then adding wet stuff when you go to make it. Here is what else we made for the money:
1. Individual Mac-n-Cheese (a big hit from last time - double batch again!)
2. Homemade Pizza Dough (onceamonthmom.com): New this time. Excited to try this one! She has ideas for grilling pizzas on her site, which I've never tried before, and I am all about trying new foods all of a sudden ;)
3. Burritos (onceamonthmom.com) with cilantro lime rice (twopeasandtheirpod.com): New this time. The burritos made 14 instead of 8 and still look huge, so that was awesome. And they smell delicious when you cook the filling, so you know they are going to taste yummy. You make the rice fresh on the night you serve the burritos, so this weekend when we pull out the burritos we will test that recipe - excited to try it!
4. Poptarts (onceamonthmom.com) - big hit last time, double batch again. This time used all natural filling, no added sugar, etc. Feeling much better about that ;)
5. Tacos in a sleeping bag (onceamonthmom.com) - YUM! These are incredibly easy and honestly, the grown-ups that tried them (dipped in salsa and/or sour cream) liked them just as much as the kids. Double batch!
6. Pizza Croissants (onceamonthmom.com - again, big hit, double batch again! Used chunk pepperoni this time to trick Eden into thinking it was hotdogs instead of mini pepperonis and it worked!
7. Banana Sour Cream Bread (GoodCheapEats.com/allrecipes.com) added chocolate chips! This made four loaves and WOW, this is the best banana bread I have ever had. Coming from a girl that doesn't eat bananas, won't touch bananas to make the bread (Steve did it!), it is incredible. This is a snack item in our freezer. Definitely a keeper!
8. Sour Cream Noodle Bake (pioneerwoman.com) - Repeat! SOO yummy, adding more green onion and tons of garlic! 2 8x8 pans!
9. Meatballs/Meatloaves (goodcheapeats.com) - repeat, so good and so versatile! We make this into 2 meatloaf meals (1lb each) and the rest into meatballs (bagged by meal size). I pull out a bag of meatballs and put it in whatever sauce to heat them up. So easy and the sauce soaks that flavor into them too.
10. Roasted Vegetable Pasta (onceamonthmom.com) - OMG!!!! if you try anything, try this one!!! We had this last night and it is quite possibly my new favorite pasta! Incredible flavor, and the veggies are amazing, even after being frozen! Peppers, asparagus, tomatoes and mushrooms all fire roasted and garlicky! YUM. Check it out! Oh - this made 3 giant freezer bags full, and each is one meal's worth.
11. Frozen Fruit cups (onceamonthmom.com) - basically its like little yummy cups of fruit frozen in fruit juice. This recipe wouldn't work as a popsicle -its too slushy - but its YUMMY. Its a great summer snack or even a breakfast on a hot lazy day on the deck! The kids gobbled them up. It made 24.
12. Upside down baked oatmeal (thepieholeblog.blogspot.com) OMG. These bars are SO good. And if you skip the chocolate chips, they are actually really good for you. The website lists weight watchers points. I don't care for baked fruit, so I put in a sprinkling of mini chocolate chips. I added maple flavoring and vanilla and they are incredible. I made a double batch and I am going to make another double batch to have more in the freezer. I could easily do that with the groceries I still have. This made 24 breakfast bars.
13. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins (goodcheapeats.com) - new this time! I love baking (can you tell?) I wanted to have more snacks on hand, especially with Josiah out of school, but with Delia eating solids too now, I want to have things in the house that are made - not the cheez-its ;) So I'm loving these, which I made into mini-muffins, more portion appropriate for my kids. I also used half apple sauce instead of all of the oil and half brown/half white for the sugar. They are amazing. Josiah requested these instead of his packaged snack for school his last week! We got about 150 mini muffins from one batch!
14. Breakfast Cookies (onceamonthmom.com) - repeat, doubled the double batch! Kids love them, and I love them too. Two of these make the perfect breakfast for me. Sometimes Eden eats four, but thats on a really crazy day ;)
15. Corn dog muffins (onceamonthmom.com) repeat, doubled the recipe. We all enjoyed these (yep, I love corn dogs!). I cut the hotdogs pretty small for the girls, I add a tiny bit of brown sugar and extra milk to the recipe… so yummy.
16. Pizza Casserole (onceamonthmom.com) new! I added garlic, some onion salt and extra oregano to this. We used Wacky Mac - not only is it fun for the kids, but its veggies! ;) We are having this tomorrow and I am excited - I know they are going to love this one!
17. Apple Chicken Nuggets (onceamonthmom.com) new! I know, it sounds odd, gross even. These are seriously good. I mean SERIOUSLY good. The only one that didn't eat them was Eden and she is currently not eating much of anything, so I'm not giving that much weight at all. Steve and I and Delia loved them. Josiah said they were "pretty okay". He thought they should come from a bag ;) But he ate them right up! The flavor was so great. This made like 30 or 40 nuggets.
18. Whole wheat Freezer waffles (goodcheapeats.com) new! goodbye eggos! We made up a bunch of these and put them in freezer bags separated by wax paper. Then you can heat them in the toaster oven or toaster (or microwave for Delia).. Pretty good stuff!
19. Mexican Verde Casserole - (onceamonthmom.com) repeat! 2 8x8 pans, and again, this was delicious. Definitely would recommend this, or have you over for dinner to eat it :)
20. Make ahead garlic bread (goodcheapeats.com) This has become a staple in our house since we are all garlic bread junkies. Probably not a good thing! But its the most amazing garlic bread! (with a bunch of extra garlic of course!). We made 4 of these!
21. Mix and Match Muffins (goodcheapeats.com) this is a mix to freeze, though I also bought two containers of blueberries so hopefully I will get one container before the kids eat them all and make some muffins to freeze for breakfasts or snacks.
22. Multigrain pancakes (goodcheapeats.com) another mix, ready to go! Have buttermilk waiting for fresh pancakes this weekend!
23. Dump chicken #1: Paula Dean's Vidalia Onion Honey Mustard salad dressing - half a bottle dumped onto a package of raw natural chicken tenders. Marinate in the fridge overnight then freeze. Took this out and grilled it tonight. AMAZING. Use the rest of the dressing to dip if you wish, but we didn't need to. SO tender and full of flavor.
24. Dump chicken #2: Same as above except I think it was caesar?
25. Dump idea but with pork chops and dressing is Italian. Oh - and all of these have garlic added :)
26. Italian Flank Steak Pinwheels (onceamonthmom.com) - cannot wait for these this weekend! This can be fresh or frozen. Ours might be half and half.
27. French toast sticks (onceamonthmom.com) repeat. 5x the recipe - Those texas toast loaves are so large! I use two loaves and it is so much bread when you cut it up! I got a bazillion sticks.


Phew. Its so funny because You get all of this stuff done (by Tuesday night since I did it in bits and pieces here and there) and then when you dip into it for the first time it hurts just a little! But it is just such an amazing feeling to know that I will not have to worry about meals for a LONG time. My big eaters right now are Josiah and Delia, so snacks will be different especially with Josiah home from school. I am hoping that the muffins, fruit cups and that kind of thing will do the trick. I have found some great sneaky chef type recipes to use for popsicles that I will try when my snack supply gets depleted but it should last well into summer!
 I was bummed that I didn't have more time to do couponing this time. With the party planning I was so preoccupied. Next time! But I saved $18, so I will just be happy with that. When I look at all that is in my freezer, and the fact that other than milk/juice, and fruit we really won't need groceries until who knows when, I am really impressed. A lot of these I could make more of with what is left in my pantry (staples that are still stocked). And I can't wait to go down the salad dressing aisle to try more flavors for chicken/pork! It is so fun to be expanding my search  - trying new recipes, testing out the concept of making my own mixes for things, not buying them, etc. I prefer to make things from scratch, just because I like to, not because I'm a cooking snob!! - but with the loudest little one who wakes up very hungry, we need to be able to eat breakfast FAST - so scratch breakfast items don't work. And when Josiah asks to bake something, sometimes there is only time for a mix, so this would be perfect and way cheaper!

DO try the roasted veggie pasta!! And the Paula Dean dressing as a marinade! And the oatmeal bars with chocolate chips! And the pumpkin muffins! there are just too many good ones…