For the last three or four months, my friend Jaime and I have been trading meals each week. We make four family portions of the same dish. I keep two and give her two. It's saves a significant amount of money each week at the grocery store and I always have fresh and delicious home cooked meals ready to go. We usually steer clear of casseroles and try to find recipes with lean meat, whole grains, or vegetables.
Jaime and I bought a few books specifically geared toward freezer meals, such as Don't Panic - Dinner's in the Freezer and Super Suppers. Since cooking lots of recipes from the freezer books, we have a pretty good idea of which meals can be frozen well. Now, we're adapting almost any recipe for the freezer. I highly recommend the first book, as it includes great information about storing food properly and saving freezer space.
Some of our favorite swaps have included: chicken tetrazzini, meatloaf, southwest pork and black bean stir-fry, homemade sausage and beef spaghetti sauce, meatballs, cranberry chicken, chili, broccoli bisque, chicken breasts in phyllo, brisket, chicken quesadillas, stuffed shells, and asian chicken lettuce wraps.
The weekly saver ads in the mail are a great place to find sales on overstocked meats. Usually we wait until we get the weekly saver on Tuesday before deciding what to make the following week.
Here's an example of the meal I am making for next week. I chose Paula Deen's Cola Basted Ham.
At the grocery store this morning, I bought:
cloves $ 6.49
Coke Classic $ 2.00
brown sugar $ 1.59
maraschino cherries $ 1.39
pineapple rings $ 1.29
12 pound uncooked cured ham $ 14.53
Total: $27.29
Okay, so the $27.29 feeds 7 people (sum of our two families) four times. This breaks down to $0.97 per person, per meal! Not too shabby, huh?
Of course this doesn't include a side dish (we just swap the main dish each week). We have yet to have a meal's ingredients cost more than $50. Even at $50, that's just $1.79 per serving for fresh, healthy food.
If you are looking for a way to save time and money, try new recipes, and eat nutritionally, try setting up a meal co-op with a friend :)
I like alliteration, okay? ;)
Here's a speedy Ottobre shirt I made for Kate the other day.
