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Things have been a bit wacky around here!! Honestly I thought once Christmas was over and put away we’d get to rest… Oh HELL NO!! We’ve been running around like crazy and I think ‘cleaning’ up Christmas made an even bigger mess. How’s that possible??

While doing all that ‘cleaning’ I completely neglected the kitchen and the grocery shopping and cooking for that matter. But it comes to a point when an onion, some wilted lettuce and soy sauce ain’t gonna cut it!! On New Years Day I bit the bullet and geared up to fight the masses and just Get-Er-Done!! Lucky me I must have hit it just right, I guess most people were still sleeping off their party from the night before – Score!! A couple of days later I hit another couple of stores and puff the fridge and pantry are fully stocked again. Which is no small feat and with most of the previous freezer meals gone a new cooking session is in order!!

Did I mention I got some killer deals?? I was looking for hamburger to do some meatballs and a meatloaf but the prices were outrageous!! I couldn’t believe it!! They wanted like $5.48/lb for the cheap stuff. Ridiculous!! Lucky for me I found some ground pork for $2.85/lb, hot sausage for $1.99/lb and ground chicken for $2.99/lb!! I now have like 8 lbs of ground chicken…and not a single recipe!!! CRAP!!

Pinterest to the rescue!!! There are a TON of recipes out there!! Who woulda thunk?!?!! Now I’m even more excited about my great deals!! Saving money AND getting to try new recipes?!?! Does it get any better than that??

Making my list for the next batch of freezer meals and these are just a few I’m going to give a whirl…

Chicken Parmesan Meatloaf from Proud Italian Cook – recipe here.

Green Chili Turkey (or Chicken) Burgers from Elana’s Pantry – recipe here.

Chicken Lettuce Wraps from Cavegirl Cuisine – recipe here.

Baked Chicken Meatballs from Dandy Dishes – recipe here.

Bacon Mushroom Stuffed Turkey (or Chicken) Meatloaf from Beauty and the Foodie – recipe here.

Hamburger Pie another one from Beauty and the Foodie (going to attempt it with ground chicken and pork) – original recipe here.

Of course if you eat grains there are even more options out there but we prefer to limit our grain intake and keep it as clean as possible…to each their own. One nice thing about using all these ground meats is that I’ll be able to mix the meats in my huge bowl and then specialize each individual batch according the recipes – should save me a bunch of time and dishes!!

I have to confess I did a little prep and a few freezer meals yesterday…just too much in the fridge than needed processing. It started off so innocently with just prepping the lettuce and salad veggies but before I knew it I was baking the potatoes and whipping up a batch of marinara sauce… Once I got started it just kinda went from there. So several hours and a couple of loads dishes later… I have officially started refilling our freezer with healthy clean dinners!! WOOHOO!!

  • Pork Chops with Apples (left-over from last freezer meal cooking event)
  • 2 full gallon baggies of Cooked Apples (we were gifted a huge box of apples at Christmas, way to many to eat before they went bad, so I spent an afternoon cutting and peeling them all and then cooking em in butter with cinnamon, apple pie spice and a smidge of allspice – YUMMMM)
  • Applesauce
  • Chicken Broth
  • Shrimp Creole (brought to us by a dear friend over Christmas)
  • Gumbo (another gift…what can I say…in New Orleans nothing says I Love You better than food!!)
  • BBQ Shrimp (leftover from Christmas dinner with my parents)
  • Jambalaya (also leftover from my parents visit)
  • Beef Fajita – made yesterday
  • Marinara sauce – made yesterday
  • Hashbrowns – one leftover, one made yesterday using flash freeze method. I’ll let ya know how it works out
  • Sporkin – This is a recipe we stumbled into years ago while Low Carbing. We really enjoy it but I keep forgetting about it. I found some thick pork chops on a super sale and knew they’d be perfect for this recipe and perfect for a freezer meal. One of the beautiful things about it is that it’s so simple yet amazing!! I cubed the pork chops and then dry rubbed em with chili powder and garlic powder. Set aside. In a small pot (or microwave) warm a whole cube of cream cheese with salsa, maybe 2 cups worth and a handful of diced onion. We like our sauce smooth for this recipe so once the cream cheese concoction has cool a bit we use the blender to smooth it all out. Completely a preference thing, tastes just as good chunky as it does smooth. I usually add chopped jalapeno to the sauce to give it a little extra kick but I was afraid it’d get too spicy in the freezer so I left it out this time. I can always add some on the night I cook it!! If you eat grains this is fabulous over pasta!! If not the sauce is nice with roasted potatoes or even fire-roasted peppers.

So after all that I still needed to cook dinner last night… Seems silly after all that cooking but I wanted to try a new recipe I found on NOM NOM Paleo. OK, I’ve been dieing to try this recipe!! She calls it Cracklin Chicken, full recipe here, and OMG it was A-MAZ-ING!!! Mr Man doesn’t care for bone in chicken…at all… But chicken thighs have such a great flavor and are so much more reasonably priced that I prefer to use them over chicken breasts now. But Mr Man protests every time about the bone… Then I saw this recipe with instructions on how to cut out the bone…the answer to my prayers!! It was much easier than I thought it’d be too. To go with the chicken I used a couple of the baked potatoes from earlier and stuffed em with broccoli and cheese and made a lovely side salad to complete the meal – it was utterly fabulous if I do say so myself!!! Mr Man agreed and devoured both his chicken thighs with NO protests!!

Time to regroup…gather my recipes…and get back in the kitchen to finish off this round of freezer meals!!

With Much Love

❤ Kristy