Author Topic: College student freezer meals  (Read 2257 times)

Offline 4kidsmom

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College student freezer meals
« on: July 21, 2017, 04:52:38 PM »
Hi ladies!

My oldest child is heading off to college this fall!  She will be living with my parents.  They have a sort-of basement apartment--I say "sort of" because she will have a bedroom, kitchen, bathroom and living space but it's not entirely closed off from the rest of the house.  But my parents primarily stay upstairs so she'll pretty much have the run of the basement. 

I'm sure my mom will be inviting her up for dinner from time to time (maybe even frequently. :) ).  I was thinking that we'd work together to make some freezer meals that she can take out in the morning to thaw then just bake/warm up when she gets home.

One thing I was thinking of was stroganoff.  I have recipes for both beef and chicken.  Is it a good idea to freeze these?  Will the sour cream "break" and become watery or should it be OK because it'll be mixed in with other ingredients?

Thanks!
Merilee

Edited to add: Something else I just thought of--how would you do soups?  I'm thinking hearty soups like chili or beef or chicken stew should freeze pretty well.  Chicken noodle soup--freeze without the noodles.  Would that work?
« Last Edit: July 21, 2017, 04:54:40 PM by 4kidsmom »

Offline pamgonzo

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Re: College student freezer meals
« Reply #1 on: July 21, 2017, 06:51:03 PM »
This is a great idea!  What a nice opportunity for your daughter to be able to live with her grandparents, but still have her own space.

I don't know about the stroganoff.  It's not something I make, so I'm not familiar with how that would work.

Soups are great to freeze.  I do it all the time.  Chili works well, veggie soups, I have done chicken & rice too.  I would think chicken base to add noodles to would be fine. 

Also, taco meat so she would just have to put in shells or over chips and add toppings.  Pasta sauce that she could add to her choice of noodles later. 

There are a lot of web pages with dump meals that you just throw into a crockpot all day after thawing overnight.  (If she will have access to a crockpot).  You can google or do a pinterest search for "crockpot dump meals" and find about a gazillion ideas!! 

Pam
Living in West Michigan and loving life!
Wife of 32 years
At home Mom to 3 grown sons ages 29, 25, 22 and  daughter in love aged 25

Offline Alice

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Re: College student freezer meals
« Reply #2 on: July 23, 2017, 02:29:40 PM »
All my kids have done the college cooking routine and they all FAILED. They had so much stuff to make good nutritious meals and wanted to do that so badly but class time, study time and work time consumed them that they couldn't get the routine down when it came to making meals. They ended up just doing the quick rip packages or ramen type stuff. I often ended up bringing them leftovers in divided pans or they would come home for the weekend and bring a bunch of things back. They could take whatever they wanted from my freezer. Often that would be frozen homemade eggrolls, frozen homemade breakfast tortillas and any prepared food.

My son got to be better during his final year of college and cooked every day from scratch. Since his younger sister attended the same college he would offer her a meal as often as they could fit it into their schedules. He baled her out with meals a lot this past year.

The kids had good intentions but it mostly failed. Hopefully you daughter will have better luck with this. And it's nice that the grandparents are right upstairs and I'm sure they will invite her up often!

Alice
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Offline pamgonzo

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Re: College student freezer meals
« Reply #3 on: August 01, 2017, 08:46:23 AM »
Found this recently Merilee:

http://whoneedsacape.com/2015/11/40-freezer-meals-part-2/

Looks like they double up on each meal, so maybe you could each get a meal for the freezer!

These are intended for a crockpot, so she would need to have that available to her.

Hope you are finding some ideas that will work for her.
Pam
Living in West Michigan and loving life!
Wife of 32 years
At home Mom to 3 grown sons ages 29, 25, 22 and  daughter in love aged 25