A few years ago when I was in Nursing School and homeschooling my children, we survived the demanding schedule with homemade freezer meals. Each month, I'd spend one really long day cooking and prepping 30 meals, then we'd freeze them. It made dinner time so much easier! There was one serious drawback though- when our freezer unexpectedly died one year, we lost a big investment of food (to this day I still feel a gut-wrenching sensation when I remember throwing away almost a QUARTER OF A BULL. Yikes- hundreds of pounds of meat were garbage. Sad, sad memory.).
So I don't like relying on electricity or appliances to keep my food in good order. This year I've been exploring the Bagged Meal approach. (This is totally not my own idea- I had this idea from the book, "It's In The Bag", by Trent and Michelle Snow.........but I really didn't like half of their recipes. So I worked on making better ones. And...I lost the book somewhere, so I can't use even the recipes we loved. Drat! But I learned how to alter our already-favorite recipes to be shelf stable.)
With this idea, all the ingredients are shelf-stable. This is because everything is either canned, home-canned, dehydrated, or freeze-dried. I just measure out all the seasonings/veggies into a sealed plastic baggie, and assemble it with all the other necessary ingredients in a sturdy plastic gift bag. (I bought my gift bags online- they are pretty cheap when ordered in bulk. I think mine are size 5 1/2 X 8 inches.)
Attach the recipe to the bag, put on a quick sticker noting the expiration date for the ingredients, and -Viola!- dinner's ready for a busy day. Most of my recipes just ask me to throw everything in the crockpot and forget about it until dinnertime. We usually add some fresh steamed vegetables or sliced fruit to the meal to round things out.
I needed to rotate through some food storage anyway this year, and all those yummy freeze-dried veggies are just begging to be used. When I assemble a meal, I make around 5-8 bags of each recipe, so there's several opportunities to use each recipe over the next several months.
I love this approach for several reasons. The biggest reason? I hate to cook. Truly. But it's also really nice since my children can put together a healthy meal with minimal effort on days when I'm away working long hours (often the case in October, the hey-day for body artists) or when Nathan and I are making a long trip to worship in the temple.
I measure all the freeze-dried or dehydrated veggies into plastic baggies, along with all the spices. Here is what my seasoning packets look like before I add them to the dinner bag:
Then I assemble the other required ingredients for one meal:
And put them all together in one bag with the recipe pinned in place.
In less than two hours, I had over 30 meals prepped, labeled, and packaged away on our storage room shelves. Check out this glimpse of one shelf- all these meals are ready to jump in on one of my Crazy Days, when my day is packed from morning til night with obligations.
I only need to spend 5 minutes putting it together in the crock pot, then we have a healthy, tasty meal ready to be enjoyed. Here are some of the recipes we've put together. Many of these were originally highly rated recipes online, then I tweaked things to make it shelf-stable. I'll eventually post more recipes as I remember to type them up. The next batch of bags I am prepping for include: White Chicken Chili, Hawaiian Haystacks, Beef Stroganoff, Chicken Korma over rice, Moroccan Chicken with Couscous, Pancake mix, Pumpkin Pancakes, Muffin mix, Cake mix, and Oatmeal-in-a-jar.
Oh! One more thing- I cannot stress enough how important it is to have high-quality freeze-dried or dehydrated veggies! Out-of-date stuff will ruin your meal. Every. Time. Especially onion- that one seems to have the most variation in quality. I tossed my old can of dehydrated onions and bought new, organic dehydrated onion to work with. It made a world of difference. Test out your ingredients before you mix them into everything!
(And one more last thing. Promise. I have no idea why the spacing is wigging out on me in this post, I tried to fix it several times, but it just keeps reverting to the bad spacing. You'll see what I mean in the recipe section. So sorry about that!!)
Chicken Noodle Soup
Ingredients:
1 pint cooked chicken, chopped or shredded
1 quart chicken broth
1 packet of small pasta (I like ABC pasta, star pasta, or vermicelli)
Seasoning packet:
1/3 c dehydrated celery
½ c dehydrated carrot
2 T dehydrated onion
½ t dried marjoram
½ t ground black pepper
2 bay leaves
1 T dried parsley
Separate Packet:
⅓ c freeze-dried peas
Directions:
Stovetop: Add chicken, broth, and large seasoning packet to large stockpot. Simmer for 30 minutes. Add noodles and peas, simmer until noodles are ready, according to pasta package directions.
Crock pot: Add all ingredients except noodles and peas to crock pot and cook on low for 4 hours. Turn to high, add peas and noodles. Cook 10 more minutes.
Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup
Ingredients:
1 pint cooked chicken, chopped or shredded
1 quart chicken broth
1 can condensed cream of chicken soup
2 c egg noodles
Seasoning packet:
1/4 c dehydrated celery
3/4 c dehydrated carrot
4 T dehydrated onion
½ t dried basil
½ t dried oregano
1/8 t dried thyme
½ t minced garlic
scant ½ t ground black pepper
Separate packet: 1/2 c dehydrated peas
Directions:
Stovetop: Add all ingredients except the noodles and peas to large stockpot. Add 4 cups water. Simmer for 30 minutes. Add noodles and simmer 5 minutes.
Crock pot: Add 4 cups water, chicken broth, condensed soup, and seasoning packet to crock pot and cook on low for 4 hours. Turn to high and add peas and packaged noodles. Cook 20 more minutes.
Coconut Curry Garbanzo Beans
Ingredients:
2 15oz cans garbanzo beans
1 15oz can coconut milk
Veggie Packet: 3 T dehydrated onion 3 T dehydrated bell pepper 3 T dehydrated carrot Seasoning Packet: 1 t ground coriander
1 t sugar
½ t salt
½ t garlic powder
1/4 t ginger powder
6 T curry powder
2 T dehydrated tomato paste
Sealed bag-
3 cups uncooked rice
Directions-
Rehydrate dehydrated veggies in hot water for 10 minutes. Drain. Heat cooking oil in large skillet over medium high heat. Add onion, carrot and bell pepper. Cook for 8 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add seasoning packet. Cook for 2 minutes. Stir in garbanzo beans and coconut milk. Simmer uncoverd for 20-30 minutes. While this is cooking, cook the rice in 6 cups of boiling water. Serve the curry over cooked rice.Chicken Tortilla Soup
Ingredients-
1 can diced tomatoes (preferably with chilis, or Mexican style)
2 cans chicken broth
1 can chicken (optional) 1 can corn 2 cans black beans, drained and rinsed Seasoning Packet- 1 T dehydrated onion 1 t garlic powder 2 T freeze-dried bell peppers 2 t cumin 1/2 t chili powder ½ t salt Stove top method: Add all ingredients to pot and simmer on low for 45 minutes. Crock pot method: Add all ingredients to crock pot and cook on low for 4 hours. Serve with tortilla chips, sour cream , cheese, cilantro, avocado. Taco Soup Ingredients- 1 15 oz can or 1 pint home-canned red or kidney beans, with liquid 1 15 oz can or 1 pint home-canned black beans, drained and rinsed 1 15 oz can corn, with liquid 1 8oz can tomato sauce 1 15oz can diced tomatoes 1 15oz can Mexican stewed tomatoes 1 4oz can diced green chili peppers 1 can or 1 pint home-canned ground beef or chicken 2 14 oz cans chicken or beef broth 1 4 oz can sliced olives Seasoning Packet- 2 T onion 3 T taco seasoning 1 t garlic powder optional 2 T Ranch powder Add all ingredients to crock pot and cook on low for 4 hours. Serve with tortilla chips, sour cream, cheese, green onion, cilantro, or avocado. Beaker’s Amazing Vegetable Barley Soup Ingredients 2 quarts beef or vegetable broth 1 14oz can organic diced tomatoes with juice 1 14oz can or 1 pint home-canned garbanzo beans, drained Seasoning Packet- 1 cup uncooked barley ½ c dehydrated carrots ½ c dehydrated celery 1/2 c dehydrated green beans 3 T dehydrated onion 3 bay leaves 1 t garlic powder 1 t white sugar 1 t salt ½ ground black pepper 1 t dried parsley 1 t curry powder 1 t paprika Pantry item- 1 t Worcestershire sauce
Place all ingredients in crockpot and cook on low for 4 hours. Or cook on stove top by bringing to a boil, covering and reducing to med-low for 90 minutes. The soup will be very thick. May adjust by adding more broth or water. (I prefer to add 4 cups water- the soup is too rich for our tastes if I add more broth.) Remove bay leaves before serving.
