Exchanging Meals

Two things I have found common in Grand Rapids kitchens: "freezer meals" and "meal exchange meals". It seems very popular here to cook in larger batches and freeze the meals for later. Saves on the prep and clean up time as well as fewer groceries to buy at one time and potentially cheaper if you buy in bulk. I had no idea there were so many cookbooks on the subjet! (FYI, uncooked potatoes do not freeze well but almost everything else does!). I also recently joined a meal exchange group (mainly made-up of moms from my MOPS group) that incorporates freezer meals. Here's how it works:

On the first Tuesday of every month, the seven of us meet to review recipies, decide on next month's menus and swap frozen meals. We take notes on how our families received the most recent meals and whether or not we should bring back certain recipies. Each person then brings two or three recipe suggestions and we choose one for that person to make 7 batches of for the next meeting. We all bring our coolers to both hand out our meals from the last month and receive everyone else's.

Sometime that month, each of us independetly cooks 7 batches of our chosen recipie (one for each member), planning for approximately 4 servings in each batch. If meat is involved, we plan about 1 lb. per batch. We also include labels, thawing and serving instructions on each package. We freeze each batch in freezer bags before the meeting.

We then have seven good-sized meals to choose from during the month, and especially with toddler-appetites we usually have leftovers. This greatly reduces the time needed during the busy (and chaotic) before-dinner hour.

Potential drawbacks: not everyone likes the same food, obviously. The nature of the group does expect that people will be open to trying new things. But we do have some general guidelines including no seafood, beans, or certain vegetables. Thankfully, no one involved has allergies. Also, I think we tend to eat healthier than many of the families involved--but that's where the recipe choice discussion at the meeting comes in. I'm learning to politely steer others away from choosing recipies with processed foods, but I'm one of the newest members so I'm also still learning the groove of the group. So we're still trying things out to see if this will be a long-term option for our family. Now does anyone have any good freezer meal suggestions?