Meals for a New Mom

Someone ordered us pizza. That was my favorite.

I think a soup with bread and a salad is always nice.

Wow, where were you people when I had my 2 kids? Those all sound so yummy! I think taking a meal to someone who just had a baby is one of the kindest things you can do. Thanks for all the great ideas!

I use Gretchen's Gourmet, she is a wonderful lady who cooks homeade meals out of her home and they are so reasonable $20 for a HUGE portion feeding 4 that left us 2 days of leftovers. She delivers for only $5. Her email is ____@____.com and her beef stroganoff is the best I have ever tasted. :)

How do you cook the king ranch chicken that sounds good

The first meal bought to me after the baby was soul food.

I like Taco Salad. It's simple and delicious.

1 lb. ground beef
1 pkg. taco seasoning
1 can Ranch Style Beans
Lettuce
Tomato
Grated Cheese (your choice Cheddar/American/??)
Fritos corn chips (regular size)
1 bottle Catalina Dressing (Use as much or as little as you want)

Crumble and brown the ground beef. Drain it and add in the taco seasoning. Rinse and drain the Ranch Style Beans and add them. Prepare as much of the lettuce and tomato as you desire. Add in the grated cheese and Fritos. Toss it all together with the Catalina Dressing. Enjoy!

*It can make alot. I usually fix the ground beef and beans portion and store separately if I'm not ready to serve it right away. I have also fixed it with everything separate and letting people add their own of whatever they like.

I think a roast chicken dinner (either home made or from Costco or Boston Market) can be good. It's something you can use for left over sandwhiches, etc. I like to bring that along with a salad, some fruit, a starch and a veggie along with some bread or dessert. Macaroni & Cheese -- home made especialy -- has always been appreciated when I took it. Again, it's something that can easily be refridgerated or frozen for another meal. And if there are kids in the house, they almost always will eat it.

Comfort food like meatloaf or mac and cheese homemade.

I've never actually taken it to someone but it's my husband's favorite and can be served hot OR cold. I cook up a breast or two of chicken in olive oil, throw in spices (oregano, basil, Italian seasoning, anything else cool that I have on hand) and throw it in cooked tortellini with some steamed broccoli. I put all of this in a big bowl and dump pesto over the top and mix it in (sometimes I'll add kalamata olives as well). Pretty simple with a lot of room for variation with seasonings/pesto.

My MOPS group did a meeting on freezer meals and the meak we made was 2-4 chkn breasts (frsh or frzn)
Mix 1 pkg onion soup mix
1 can whole cranberry sauce
1 cup french or russian dressing

2-4 chkn brsts per bag, pour the mix over and put in the frzr until you are ready.
I think 350 for maybe 30+ min

It is really good!

After I had my first baby, and I have had 3 more so you know this had to be good :), a gal made me french dip sandwhiches and salad. I loved it. She put some fine cut meat in a crock pot with beef bullion and then bought fresh rolls and then just a green salad. I think she also brought ice cream sandwhiches. Anyway I ate the sandwiches for a few days. It was tasty and different than a casserole and lasagna.

I used to make a oven beef stew that took 4 hrs. to cook. It's always been a hit. But this summer I found a recipe in Fitness RX magazine for fancy stuffed cornish game hens. It is probably one of the best things I've EVER tasted. Truly gourmet! It's super healthy. I brought it to my step-sister in the hospital after she had twins in hopes it would help w/ the milk supply - it did.
I dropped it off w/ my ex's mother last night.. she's starting another round of chemo on Monday.
1 c cooked brown rice
3 scallions chopped
2 ribs celery finely chopped
1 med. red apple finely chopped
1/4 c raisins
1/4 c chopped dried papaya (this is the fun part)
1/4 c chopped pecans
1/2 tsp. sage
3 tsp. tamari soy sauce (it has to be tamari - in the asian aisle - whole different flavor)
1/2 c plus 2 tblsp apple juice concentate
4 rock cornish hens rinsed and patted dry
1/8 tsp. pepper
1/2 c water
Combine first 8 ingred. 2 tsp. tamari, and 2 tsp. apple juice in a large bowl (I'm a tiny bit more liberal w/ the tamari though). Preheat oven to 350. Stuff hens w/ filling and tie legs together w/ cotton cooking string. Arrange hens in a baking dish, breast side up. Sprinkle w/ pepper. Mix together 1/2 c apple juice concentrate, water, and remaining tamari. Bake and baste 1 1/2 hrs., basting frequently w/ juices.
(I usually only do 2 game hens b/c it's way too much if you do four and my grocer sells free-range, organic game hens in a 2-pack. I also increase the amt. of rice mixture by a quarter so the hens have a bed of rice to hang out on top of. I also go organic on all the ingredients since most of my friends and family eat organic, and since w/ chemo- the last thing you need is extra chems. for it to play w/.) Hope you enjoy as many compliments/recipe requests on this as I have!

I brought a basket of snacks... little munchies that you wouldn't normally treat yourself too.
It sounds silly, but it went over well.
GOod luck. YOu've gotten great suggestions.

I have a great easy receipt. Its called Mac and Cheese Lasagna.

1 box of Mac and Cheese family dinner (7.25 oz)
1 jar of your favorite spaghetti sauce
1 pd of ground beef
1 package shredded cheese

Preheat oven to 350. Cook your Mac and Cheese as prepared on the box. Then cook and drain your ground beef. Take a 9x9 casserole dish and spray with Pam. Layer bottom with half of the Mac and Cheese then half of the ground beef. Next pour over half of the spaghetti sauce and then pour half of the shredded cheese. Repeat the rest of the layer with the remaining ingredients. Cook for about 25 minutes. Enjoy its good!!!

I like to make a breakfast: Apple-walnut French Toast Loaf that I bake in my bundt pan. It looks beautiful, reheats well, and with lots of eggs, milk and bread (I use part whole-wheat) is packed with protein that a new mom needs. Here is a link to the recipe: http://challengedairy.com/recipes/recipe.php?rip=1420

If the new mom is nursing, my other suggestion would be to make her a snack basket. I remember being SO hungry when I got up for those middle of the night feedings. I ate so many snack bars (like Granola Bars, Nutrigrain and Luna bars) and juice boxes at 3 am! So a little basket with some easy snacks that a bleary-eyed new mom can just grab would probably be appreciated.

I love to cook so I enjoy making dinners for people. When I provide a dinner for someone, I try to choose something that freezes well and can be re-heated. I also take bread, salad and light dessert. We ar enot big dessert eaters in my family to I try to keep that light for other families in case they don't care for sweets or are watching calories. My desserts are simple home made brownies, cookies or something like that.

Homemade Chicken Pot Pie,
Pot Roast
Chili
Beef Stew
Broocli Chicken casserole (this is a family favorite)

Good luck!
Susan

I have tried quite a few different things, and have gotten great response from Chicken Fajitas. I just grill chicken breasts with fajita seasoning, and then saute some onions in a small amount of oil, with a little salt to make them sweat, and soften (Rachael Ray's advice) and when the onions are soft, add the chicken for a rewarm. Then I put this in a ziploc and then take all the fixings in seperate containers, and they can fix their own as they like it. It's also easy to seperate out the onions for breastfeeders, or if they're really sensitive, leave one chicken breast that doesn't even touch the onions.

I also got rave reviews about a Chinese Stir Fry I brought someone.

Our favorite to receive was a pot roast, with tons of leftovers that were easy to freeze for a later meal. Total comfort food!

I also try to do something a little different so I take breakfast complete with coffee from Starbucks. I call them before to get their "order" and pick it up on my way over. It's always been a hit. I usually end up taking Einstein Bagels and cream cheese as food, but anything would work. My thought process is basically that those are two places that it's hard for a new mom to get to that she may miss :) Plus bagels keep for a while, so get a half dozen or more and they are great for daddy and older sibling snacks too.

I make those two dishes you mentioned or chicken pot pie. Buy the pillsbury pie roll outs enough to line and cover a casserole dish. cook and chicken and debone keep about 2 cans of the broth cook some mixed vegetables try to buy one that has potatoes and then I cut up about 3 potatoes to add to it mix 2 cans of cream of chicken the broth the vegetables, salt and pepper to taste add chicken and put in pie shell and cover with the top pie shell and bake at 350 for 45 minutes or until crust is golden brown.

I recently tried Super Suppers for the first time and took one of them to my friend. She loved it! They could cook it on the night/time they wanted and had leftovers for later.

I LOVE salads, feta cheese, mandarin oranges, etc... After having a baby, I'm ready to start getting my body back.

When I had my youngest a wonderful lady from church brought over several casseroles that she had made and frozen. I believe there was a Mexican Casserole and a lasagna and a couple of others. They were so wonderful and all I had to do was take them out of the freezer an hour before dinner and put them in the oven. I was really greatful and it meant that I had more time to spend with my twins and new daughter.

Hi!

I think all the suggestions below are great!! Other options are quick chicken enchiladas that can be reheated or even a mexican cornbread. Both are easy to make and make enough for leftovers. Central Market also has some fantastic dinners and a great cafe where you can pick and choose what you would like. Hope this helps!!:)

Tuna casserole? LOL just kidding. We got lots of tuna casseroles and chili mac and brownies. I froze them and then reheated them later when I wasn't soo tired of the same kind of dishes.

My favorite was a picnic meal. She gave us a big ziplock bag of several kinds of breads (rye, sour dough, ect) and two packages of deli meats and two or three different kinds of cheeses and some Sun Chips and little plastic containers of condiments including sun dried tomatoes and pesto....it was all fabulous! she kept apologizing for it not being a homeade meal but it was great- we took the meal and the kids to a park and shared it with the inlaws.

I loved gift cards to restaurants that had takeout- my husband picked up dinner on the way home from work!

S., mom to four

I'm not a cook, my husband is the chef in our house. However, this meal knocked his socks off.

Season boneless skinless chicken breasts with garlic salt, lemon pepper, and Tony Cacheries (cajun seasoning) to taste

Spray Pam in a baking dish

Dump 1 can seasoned black beans, your favortie salsa ( I use Hell-on-Red mild), and sprinkle handfuls of monterey jack cheese on top

Bake at 350 for 30-45 minutes - Excellent taste and easy to fix! We usually don't need any sides - Enjoy!