Need Recipes/cookbook Recommendations for Prepare Ahead Meals

The Fix it and Forget it cookbooks are nice also. They have several different ones. Hope this helps.

Hi D.,
I can see you have a busy household! If you'd like to visit my webpage at www.homemadegourmet.com/sue19279 you can find many great options for easy-to-prepare, delicious home-cooked food. I would love to work with you on meal-planning and we can fill your freezer with meals too! Feel free to contact me anytime. I'd love to help another busy mom!!
S.
Homemade Gourmet Independent Distributor & Team Leader

Hi D.

Congratulations on your family addition! When I had my fourth child, I was overwhelmed with the oldest turning 7 one month after the last was born. At my mom's house I read a copy of either Woman's Day or Family Circle, and that's where I found out about Flylady.net. Her simple reminders and encouragement helped me find out how to organize myself and my house/kids/laundry/life. Check out www.flylady.net for her tips. There's also a link on her site for easy and nutritious meals complete with shopping lists for the recipes. Not every recipe is going to work for you & yours but with thought you can come up with clever modifications. My husband doesn't eat fish, so sometimes I can make the recipes with chicken instead and they are pretty tasty.

I think the most important part of the flylady message is Do It Now. Instead of putting things off and thinking I'll do them later, I go through mail when I get it instead of setting it down in a huge pile and not knowing where it went. When I take clothes out of the dryer, I fold them right then and put them away. That way things don't pile up and get overwhelming. We're all working on putting things away when we're done using them, and that makes a big difference in our attitudes.

Try to make sure you have a 'date time' with your husband where every week you get time together ALONE. Then you can catch up and keep your relationship alive. It doesn't have to be anything really fancy, but perhaps on Saturday morning or whatever time of week you have together, you go for a walk or get coffee somewhere and take a little time to be together. A half hour can make a world of difference, and once in a while splurge and do something extra! That could be a picnic or a dinner at a nice restaurant. Last year my husband and I joined a couples golf league. I'm not that great at golf but I'm learning a new sport, it gets us out of the house together and in the fresh air for some exercise. Never in my life did I think I'd be interested in golf but I've discovered I like it!

Try also to set aside special time for the older children, even if it's playing cards after dinner or have them help you with a particular chore than is mindless (like folding laundry) so that while you're doing that you can talk to each other.

Sometimes my 'talk time' with my kids is in the car when we're going to school (now my kids are 13, 11, 8 & 6 so they're all in school and I'm busier than ever!)

I hope this helps. You'll find your stride! Just don't forget to take care of yourself in the mix. Get your sleep and have fun with those kids and babies before they grow up and leave the house.

Finally, here's a recipe for Mr. Food's All-Day Macaroni & Cheese

8 ounces elbow macaroni, cooked and drained
4 cups (16 ounces) shredded sharp cheddar cheese, divided
1 12 ounce can evaporated milk
1-1/2 cups milk
2 eggs
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper

Spray crockpot with Pam nonstick spray. Place macaroni in and add all other ingredients EXCEPT 1 cup of cheese. Mix well and sprinkle with the reserved cheese on top. Cover and cook on low 5-6 hours or until mixture is firm and golden around the edges. Do not remove cover or stir until mix has finished cooking.

This one gets raves whenever I make it.

"Fix It & Forget It" Recipe book is awesome for crock pot cooking!

I recieved some great advice here about organzation and meal planning a few weeks ago - check out what was posted for me... "04/29/08 Suggestions for organization when I return to work"

My favorite BY FAR was the suggestion to go see FLYlady at www.flylady.net - a true life saver!!

Check out recipes at www.recipezaar.com - crock pot recipes can be limited by the "5 ingredients or less" button!

Good luck and I love the advice you've recieved so far!

I use my crock pot all the time. There's a cookbook call crock pot cooking with 5 ingredients or less that's wonderful. Fast and simple.

Clue me in if you find a solution. I'm a mom of a 2 1/2 year old and 7 month old and our life is constant chaos. Good luck.

D.,
Recommended to me was to make dinners as usual, with extras, and freeze some in ice cube trays. It makes food easier to put in baggies, label it, and thaw only as much as you need at the time.

Toddler friendly - unless I miss my guess, they are going to be eating with you for the rest of their 18 years before college starts. :) Anything you eat that isn't totally off the charts (Dave's Insanity sauce, for example) is going to be game.

To make odd stuff like rice 'cube-able', mix with a sauce or a liquid veggie (cream corn, although that's 2 starches, you get the idea....)

For your older kids: Catch them for 10 minutes before they head off to school, my best idea so far. Are you their wake up call in the morning? Maybe a brief sit-down review of their day would be welcome (maybe not right away, but may be welcomed in the future?) Sometimes being woken 10 min early to chat and not have to get out of a nice snug bed right away is a great way to start the day, too.

I'm guessing it is midnight to 8 AM that your husband works, and that is rough too, because he misses the older kids before they head off to school. Family time is going to be slim pickings if you aren't careful, and kudos for you to keep up on that, too.

Bravo on keeping the younger two out of daycare, too.

Good Luck, wanna know how this turns out, because I may in this boat later on, too.

M.

A really quick way to fix pork chops is to layer them in a slow cooker with applesauce and turn it on. The pork chops come out very tender and moist, with an apple-sweet flavor. This was such a hit with my family that I fixed it for a friend from France whose mother is a gourmet cook. Ooh-la-la!

To help you with the chaos at home, you might want to check out this website: www.flylady.net. Flylady is an online personal coach whose mission is to help you gain control of your house and home. Her service is absolutely free.

I hope these suggestions help. Good luck!

Hi D.,

Try Vitamin E cream. It worked for me. Good luck!M.

D. -- Not sure where you are located, but "Make & Take Gourmet" or "Dream Dinners" are two franchises that offer a service where you chose which recipes you want to make and go in and put the meal together and take it home to put in the freezer.

I've done this 3 times and the cost works out to $3-$4 per serving. All of the recipes have been very good and it is so easy to just grab something out of the freezer and put it in the oven or prepare it on the stovetop.

B.

P.S. I work full-time and have 5 children ages 3-18 and I drive an hour to the closest "Make & Take" coordinating it with any appointments I might have.

check out this website wwwallrecipescom they have some really great recipes and they give lots of good cooking tips.

Hi, D.,
For a long time I was a personal chef who helped families just like you! You can make dinnertime easier in a couple of ways. Yes, use the crockpot at least once a week. Make a pot of chili and then use the leftovers for chili-cheese fries (frozen fries and bags of grated cheddar) for the older kids. If you make it mild (you can serve it with salsa or hot sauce) your 2 year old can have it for dinner, too. Pot roast in the crockpot can be one meal -- put some potatoes and carrots in for a full meal. The leftover pot roast can be put in the food processor and you can add bottled bbq sauce and serve on rolls for a bbq beef sandwich.
Try to do the 'labor intensive' stuff on your day off. Maybe your stepchildren can help with making a huge salad for the week, chopping carrots and celery for nibbling, cutting up fruit for fruit salad for the week. Make meatballs (or even buy them frozen) and sauce which can be a dinner with pasta and then another meal as sandwiches.
So, always think of doing things in advance and making them do double duty.
As far as limiting chaos-- I'm one of 7 children and when my kids were young I was a family daycare provider. Talk about potential chaos! If your house is a huge disaster and you can afford it, have it professionally cleaned- even if it's just a one-time deal-- so you have a 'clean slate' to work with. This is the time to make systems and organization work for you. Keep things you use everyday in the same place (keys, diaper bags, purse, etc) so you don't waste time looking for them. Pack what you need for work the night before, and get the food for the next day organized either on your day off or the night before. A few minutes even just placing every thing you need from the refrigerator in together and pulling out pantry ingredients will make assembling dinner a lot easier. Make sure you get plenty of rest so you don't 'lose it' when you're harried and hassled.
Good luck!! I've been there before- this too will pass.

One turnkey breast with bone in. Put it in the crock pot dump 2 cans of grave over. It comes out moist and juicy.

Before my youngest was born, I made a few lasagna's, meatloafs and huge pots of mashed potatos. They all freeze really well. I seperated and wrapped or ziplock bagged them based on how much our family would eat. With bags of frozen veggies, it made for really easy dinner prep and clean up. Good luck.

google crock pot recipes and you will find thousands!