Make Ahead Meals

Yesterday it hit me that this could possibly be the last week I have pre- (4th)baby. (I tend to have my babies 10 days early.) Although I had all the baby stuff "ready" it wasn't organized at all... just sitting in a corner in my room. So, I organized, cleaned, washed lots and lots of laundry, started packing the kiddo's overnight bag and started wondering what happened to all those freezer meals I wanted to make. Oh, I never made any! Well, that has to change.

Last night I made spaghetti and doubled the amount of sauce so I could freeze half of it. Half a meal in the freezer! Here's what else I plan on making (if you are interested):

Muffins
Made a batch this morning- I omitted the chocolate chips (for certain people) and used cinnamon chips, a dash of nutmeg and pumpkin spice- they taste great! Yes, this recipe uses sour cream and I have used yogurt in it's place before with no problem. They are delicious.

Cafe Rio Chicken I made this for the first time last week and Tim thought it was amazing. I doubled the recipe so I can freeze half and make dinner with it tonight. I'm thinking it would be good for chicken enchiladas; we used it for tacos last week.

Mini Bisquick Quiches I'll be making these tomorrow. I like that I can freeze them and just pull out however many we want to eat instead of making an entire quiche that may not get eaten- picky children.

Broccoli Cheese Soup I've had broccoli cheese soup three times in my life- sad, I know. Anyhow, I'm going to try this out and hope it rocks.

Roast
Making a roast is not difficult. I just throw a 3-4 pound roast in the crock pot with salt and pepper and about a cup of beef broth. Set the crock pot on low for 6-8 hours and that's it! You can toss some baby carrots in there about half way through cooking and make some mashed potatoes and boom! Meal made with minimal effort, but tastes awesome.

Stuffed Pasta Shells
I made these a few weeks ago and the boys told me that they could eat them every night. Here's what you need: 27-30 jumbo pasta shells, cooked (or boiled, whatever). A large container of small curd cottage cheese, an egg, half a cup of frozen chopped spinach, basil to taste, a handful of mozzarella. Mix all that together and then spoon inside shells. Top with your favorite pasta sauce and generously cover with mozzarella. Bake at 350 until bubbly. *This fed our family of hearty eaters with leftovers*

White Chicken Enchiladas These are good! Not spicy, but obviously you can add whatever you want to make them spicier. I will probably freeze it with the sauce (I know, it says not to, but I'm a rebel) because I don't want to have to think about anything besides pulling out a meal and popping it in the oven when I'm surviving on 3 hours of sleep.

Chili and cornbread muffins
My recipe is pretty simple and sorry, I rarely measure any ingredients. 1 pound ground meat, chopped onion, garlic, chili powder, cumin, salt, tomato sauce + beef broth or water. I usually just add the spices until it smells right.

I will most likely make and freeze some waffles or pancakes, too. If I think of anything else I'll update this post, but I think for now this list will work well.