This summer I reached out to Erin Chase from 5 Dollar Dinners to ask her for her EASIEST tips for new moms trying to get dinner on the table.
She went one better. Rather than a few handy tips, she shared with us her strategy for avoiding cooking during the witching hour altogether.
At the time I reached out to her, she and I both had two little guys, age two and four. Well, now that November has rolled around, she has added a third baby boy to her family (congratulations!) along with all the challenges of feeding her family healthfully, cheaply, and with an infant (and toddler and preschooler) hanging off her at all times!
Luckily, she stocked her freezer before baby Tyler arrived and we can learn from her planning. She worked with (and highly recommends) Tricia from Once a Month Mom to plan, make, and stockpile all the foods she’d need for feeding her boys.
I don’t know how large her freezer is, but can I just say Wow?! In addition to baked goods, snacks, side dishes, breakfasts, homemade jams (!), she also cooked up 13 main dishes (some of them doubled up!) like Chicken Parmigiana, Taco Soup, and Zesty Slow Cooker BBQ.
We wish her an easy recovery and hope that her hard work means she can rest a little more this week.
Read her entire freezer stock up list.
Learn the way of the Once a Month Mom.
Another trick for filling the freezer, rookie mom style, is to freeze little cookie dough balls and then eat them one at a time as needed.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
This is actually an excellent idea. When I was pregnant, my mother-in-law stayed with us for 2 weeks before the birth and she spent a lot of time cooking these kinds of food for when the baby arrived.
I didn’t see the genius of it yet while I was carrying the big belly, but when the little one arrived, this was one of the best “birth present” we got. It was so nice to have food waiting to only be reheated during those days when we were too tired to cook.
See? In-laws can be of some good use. Bless her
Erin and Tricia are awesome! I had a baby shower for the two of them at my house and I was very afraid to cook things that these two gourmets were going to eat. I *think* they approved…anyway…the once a month/freezer cooking is a great way to go! Makes it so easy to give a meal to someone else who is sick or just had a baby, too, when your freezer is full!
I’m about to “pop” another one out too, and with a full freezer I might add. I really does help! Thanks for telling your readers about my site. Good luck!
This is the best advice ever! WE did this with mostly Trader Joe’s food and it was a life saver. We also stalked up on homemade food by doubling a recipe and freezing half. Best thing you can do before you have a baby. Even more helpful than setting up a crib.