Having Gluten Free Freezer Meals in the house is a life saver for this busy mom! With three little ones crawling and running around trying to make dinner is a challenge. Having dinner in a bag that you throw in the slow cooker makes life so much easier.
Some of our friends just welcomed a baby boy so I decided the best gift I could give them would be freezer meals! I hit Aldi’s to grab everything I needed. During nap time I got everything ready. I spent $35 at Aldi’s and 1 hour of chopping and assembling to make 5 meals! Super easy!
The shopping list:
1 bag frozen chicken
1 package of pork chops
1 italian sausage
1 bag of onions
1 bag baby carrots
2 zucchini
2 green peppers
3 multi-colored peppers
3 cloves of garlic
1 sweet potato
1 can corn
1 can black beans
1 can diced tomato
1 can pineapple
1 can tomato sauce
1 can tomatos and peppers
1 jar salsa
box of freezer gallon size bags
Kitchen Staples:
GF BBQ sauce
Brown Sugar
Salt/ pepper
GF soy sauce
GF teriyaki sauce
Italian seasoning
Paprika
Ketchup
Honey
Orange juice
Cream Cheese for Chicken Chili when served
Step one – chop up veggies
Step two – label bags with cooking instructions
Step three – assemble meals in bags
Step four – freeze the meals
Sausage and Peppers
Sliced sausage
3 handfuls of peppers
2 handfuls of onion
1 handful of zucchini
1 tbsp italian seasoning
1 can diced tomatos with juice
1 can tomato sauce
1 clove garlic
COOK – 4 hours on low. Serve with pasta. This meal could also be cooked in a skillet for 30 minutes.
BBQ Pork Chops
3/4 cup BBQ sauce
1 handful carrots
1 handful peppers
1 handful onion
1 sweet potato
1 tbsp brown sugar
4 pork chops
Cook – 4 hours on low. Serve with rice.
Teriyaki Chicken
1 can pineapple with juice
1 handful carrots
1 handful onions
1 handful peppers
1 clove garlic
1 tbsp GF soy sauce
3 tbsp GF teriyaki sauce
4 chicken breasts
Cook – 4 hours on low. Serve with rice.
Chicken Chili
1 can black beans drained
1 can corn drained
1 can tomatos and green peppers
8 oz salsa
2 chicken breasts
Cook – 4 hours on low. Pull out chicken and shred with forks. Add 4 oz cream cheese. Cook on high for 30 minutes. Serve with GF tortilla chips.
Hawaiian Pork
1/2 cup ketchup
1 tsp paprika
1/2 cup orange juice
2 tbsp honey
1 garlic clove
1 tbsp GF soy sauce
1 handful zucchini
1 handful carrots
1 handful onion
1 handful peppers
4 pork chops
Cook – 4 hours on low. Serve with rice.
Making freezer meals really is that easy! It saves time, saves money and saves the worry of “What am I going to make for dinner?!”.
Since these are gifts I am delivering them with a bag of tortillas chips, boxed pasta and a box of rice. The only thing my friend has to do is pop them in her slow cooker at lunch time and dinner is ready for her now family of five!
Check out this post for my first Gluten Free Freezer Meals post!
I really like your freezer meals. Wish I had more freezer space.
For the Italian sausage did you actually use German kielbasa? That doesn’t look like uncooked Italian sausage in your photo.
I seriously want you to come over to my house and teach me how to do this.
Super easy all you do is prep the patatoes and vegetables all everything into a big ziploc bag. Season with salt,pepper and what spices you wish. Zip close and remove the air so you can lay them flat in the freezer.
Rogene – We bought a freezer at Lowe’s before the twins came to help store up baby milk and food. It has been a huge help!
Marlow – We need to have a freezer meal party! If I can do it during nap time you can do it between homework and playing with Hazel.
I love this idea and cant wait to try it and will look back for more ideas, coming from someone who hardly cooks and just under a yr of being diagnosed to be Gluten Free!
About to do this today. š
FYI… The chicken chili calls for salsa and cream cheese that are not on the grocery list.
Oh, also on the chicken chili is the tomatoes with peppers not on shopping list.
Thanks for these great recipes. Can’t wait to cook them!!!
Amber,
Thank you so much for letting me know those items were missing from the shopping list! I have updated the list! Hope you enjoy the meals!
Was just going to make a few of the meals and didn’t see a quantity listed for the orange juice. 1/2 what? cup? Thanks! Can’t wait to try these!
Really like your freezer in a bag idea even being retired and with plenty of spare time use the slow cooker a lot. Now just have to wait until I have some room in my freezer. .
This idea would have been great during a kitchen reno. The fridge, freezer, microwave, rice cooker, and slow cooker were in separate rooms for weeks. I chopped veggies on top of a filing cabinet in the foyer.
What brand or recipe of teriyaki sauce do you use? I use Coconut Aminos soy sauce but don’t have a store bought teriyaki sauce. We’re Gluten, soy, egg, pn, tn, oats, & sesame free.
Thanks
I can’t make it home for lunch can these recipes be cooked for 8 hours on low?
Yes! Try them on low for 8 hours. You can also get a slow cooker with a timer on it that turns to “keep warm” after the set cooking time. That is the kind I have. So it will cook for 6 hours then be on “keep warm” for 2 more.
When putting this into the crock pot, do I need to thaw it out before hand or just put it right in?
Thawing is good but you just need to get it soft enough to come out of the bag.
I have just completed assembly and added these 5 recipes to the freezer. I am excited to have them in my back pocket for the next few weeks. It took me about 30-45 minutes to assemble. Next time, I might switch out the onion chopping for a bag or two of frozen chopped onions. I am a HUGE wimp and can hardly get through chopping one onion – this about killed me š
I also picked up a box of those handy crockpot liners – easy prep and easy clean up = win/win! Thank you for sharing! I can’t wait to try them!
Great job! Hope you love the freezer meals as much as we do! And I hear you about the onions!