Freezer Stocking Party

Some of my New Year's Resolutions included (1) Spend more time with my friends, (2) serve a home-cooked meal more than 4 times a week, and (3) save money.  I combined all of these together and came up with a "Freezer Stocking Party!"

Here's how it works:
1.  Get a group of busy moms together that want to seve good meals, but don't always have the time to do so
2.  Come up with a menu (search the internet!)
3.  (Day 1)Shop for all the ingredients to make your menu
4.  (Day 1)Divide the tasks among the group (one person cooks all the meats, one person chopps all the veggies, one person boils all the noodles, rice, etc...)
5.  (Day 2)Meet to assemble the meals
6.  Enjoy on a hectic night (when you would have normaly gotten take-out!)

That's the basics...let's see if it works as well as I hope!

I tried to get a bunch of my friends together to do this, but because I came up with this idea on Wednesday and wanted to do it on Saturday and Sunday, only one of my busy friends was available for my experiment; Lizzie.  No problem! 

Lizzie and I came up with a menu:
Garlic Ranch Chicken
Parmesan Chicken
Southwest Chicken Wraps
King Ranch Chicken (one of my family's ABSOLUTE favorites!)
Pineapple Chicken (for the crock pot)
Taco Soup
Cheesy Spinach Burgers
Pizza Calzones

We both decided how many of each recipe we'd like to make and made our shopping lists.

We met at a wholesale club to purchase the meats and cheese.  I purchased all of the whole chickens, chicken breasts, ground beef and cheeses for $87.96!  Ok, I'll admit--I did add a box of huge pretzels to that shopping trip.  They're my FAVE!  :)

Next, we went to the grocery store to purchase all the other items (Gallon-size freeze zip-top bags are a MUST!)  I spent only $48.07.  Unfortunately, my shopping trips did not include anything that I had a coupon for.  Next time I think I'll plan my menu around meat sales and coupons to save even more cash.

Loaded down with our purchases, we met at my house to divide the work.  I'll cook the chicken (we had LOTS!) and she'll cook the ground beef and veggies.

Today, we meet to assemble the meals.  Wish us luck!