Here is Part 3 of my freezer cooking. This week’s menu includes:
Colorado Beef Burritos
Thai Chicken Wings with Peanut Sauce
Loaded Baked Potato Soup
Meatball Beef Stroganoff
Pork Tenderloin with Apple Cranberry Sauce
Taco Chili
You can find Part 1 and Part 2 here:
I print out all my recipes ahead of time and make a shopping list (you can find this below). I chopped all the vegetables and brown the ground beef for the Taco Chili. I then label each bag with directions, cook times, additional ingredients, etc.
All meals will cook fine from frozen, but be sure not to add cold/frozen meals into a hot crockpot as it can crack. Many people have concerns about putting frozen food in the crockpot, but I have never had an issue. It is my understanding that once the food reaches a certain temperature, it is fully cooked and safe. If you have concerns, just thaw in the fridge the night before.
Cook times will vary depending on your crockpot. It may take you a few tries before you get used to how long things take. In general 6-8 hours on low will do the trick. If all ingredients are pre-cooked, 3-4 hours will work. There are a lot of different crockpots out there. Mine is from the middle ages, has no temperature gauge, only low and high. I have burnt things many times:) It’s a learning process, but you will perfect it with practice. Now get crockin!
Colorado Beef Burritos
Ingredients:
2 lb. stew beef
2 12 oz. cans enchilada sauce
1 cup chopped onion
1 cup beef stock
6 flour tortillas
2 cups shredded cheese
Directions: Label bag and add the stew beef, 1 can enchilada sauce, onions and beef stock. Freeze until ready to cook. Thaw slightly and place in slow cooker. Cook on low for 6-8 hours until beef is tender. Remove beef and shred. Divide beef between the flour tortillas, place in greased baking dish, top with other can of enchilada sauce and cheese and bake for 20-30 minutes until cheese is melted and bubbly. Serve with salsa, guacamole, shredded lettuce and tomatoes
Thai Chicken Wings with Peanut Sauce
Ingredients:
2 lbs. chicken drumsticks or wings
1/2 cup bottled salsa
1/4 cup Peanut Butter
3 T lime juice
3 T soy sauce
3 T water
2 T freshed chopped ginger
1/4 cup sugar
2 cloves garlic chopped
Directions: Place all ingredients in bag and freeze until ready to cook. Thaw slightly and place in slow cooker. Cook on low for 6-8 hours.
Loaded Baked Potato Soup
Ingredients:
1 bag of diced potatoes (found in the deli section)
1/2 cup chopped onion
32 oz chicken broth
2 cups heavy cream
3/4 lb. chopped cooked ham steak
Toppings:
1 bag shredded cheese
1/2 cup cooked chopped bacon (you can use real bacon bits)
4 chopped green onions
2 T chives
1 can french’s fried onions
Directions:
Place potatoes, chopped ham and onions in bag and freeze until ready to cook. Thaw slightly and place pototoes, ham and onions in slow cooker. Add chicken broth, and heavy cream and cook on low for 6-8 hours. Ladle soup into bowls and garnish with shredded cheese, bacon bits, green onions, chives and fried onions.
Meatball Stroganoff
Ingredients:
1 large bag frozen meatballs
1 cup chopped onions
2 cans cream of mushroom soup (if you can find the organic version, use that instead)
2 cups sliced mushrooms
1 package cream cheese
1 8 oz container of sour cream
hot pasta or rice
Directions: Place meatball, onions, cream soup and mushrooms in freezer bag and freeze until ready to cook. Thaw slightly and place in crockpot and cook on low for 6-8 hours. Stir in the cream cheese and sour cream during last hour of cooking. Serve over hot pasta or rice.
Pork Tenderloin with Apple Cranberry Sauce
Ingredients:
2 lb pork tenderloin (not in a marinade)
1 t salt
1 t pepper
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 T cider vinegar
1 t ginger
1 t cinnamon
1/4 t red pepper flakes
1/2 cup dried cranberries
3 peeled and chopped granny smith apples
Directions: Season pork with salt and pepper and add all ingredients to freezer bag and freeze until ready. Thaw slightly and cook on low for 6-8 hours until pork is tender.
Taco Chili
Ingredients:
1 lb. cooked ground beef
1 medium onion chopped
1 can corn drained
1 can black beans drained
1 can navy beans drained
1 8 oz can tomato sauce
2 14 oz. cans diced tomatoes
1 small can diced green chiles
1 package taco seasoning (I use old el paso)
Toppings:
shredded cheese
Fritos
chopped green onions
Directions: Place all ingredients in freezer bag and freeze until ready. Thaw slightly, place in crockpot and cook on low for 4-6 hours. Serve with shredded cheese, chopped green onions and fritos
Some of the finished products
If you don’t have a dutch oven, I highly recommend this set from Pampered Chef. You can brown the meat on the stove and transfer directly to the warming piece. Then directly to the fridge. This thing is seriously amazing and saves a ton of time on dishes.
I also recommend these knives for preparation. The best knives I’ve ever used
Shopping List
Crockpot Freezer Meals {Part 3}
Ingredients
- 2 lb. stew beef
- 2 12 oz. cans enchilada sauce
- 4 onions
- beef stock
- flour tortillas
- 2 lbs. chicken drumsticks or wings
- 1 jar salsa
- Peanut Butter
- lime juice
- soy sauce
- freshed chopped ginger
- sugar
- garlic
- 1 bag of diced potatoes (found in the deli section)
- 1 ham steak (about ¾ lb)
- 32 oz chicken broth
- heavy cream
- 2 bags shredded cheese
- cooked chopped bacon (you can use real bacon bits)
- green onions
- chives
- 1 can french's fried onions
- 1 large bag frozen meatballs
- 2 cans cream of mushroom soup (if you can find the organic version, use that instead)
- 1 package mushrooms
- 1 package cream cheese
- 1 8 oz container of sour cream
- pasta or rice
- 2 lb pork tenderloin (not in a marinade)
- brown sugar
- cider vinegar
- ginger
- cinnamon
- red pepper flakes
- dried cranberries
- 3 granny smith apples
- 1 lb. cooked ground beef
- 1 can corn drained
- 1 can black beans drained
- 1 can navy beans drained
- 1 8 oz can tomato sauce
- 2 14 oz. cans diced tomatoes
- 1 small can diced green chiles
- 1 package taco seasoning (I use old el paso)
- Fritos
Instructions
Love it! And now order……Thanks
thanks for stopping by!
What a great idea!
thanks! I work full time, so cooking at night has always been a challenge. this way, I can spend all afternoon Sunday, planning, shopping and cooking for the week! I pull out a meal in the morning, throw it in the crockpot and it’s done when we get home!
I have to say, your blog (specifically these crockpot pre-mixed freezer bag recipes) is so amazing! I am the mother of a toddler and it is SO HARD to cook when watching her. Now, I can do these on my husband’s days off and not worry about dinner as much! Thank you!!!
Yay! this is so easy to do all at once!
I can’t wait to try these! With hubby and I both working full time plus an 8 year old and a 3 1/2 yr old, well..we have our hands full!!. Thank you for the ease of dinners. Just a question, do you know how many servings each recipe serves? Thanks again!
I would say these recipes would serve 3-4
Fantastic! Thank you 🙂
Just a quick question, as I go through some of these great recipes I look at the pictures as well. It looks as though the Potato Soup has ham chunks in the bag however there is nothing listed in the recipe. Am I missing something or seeing things? LOL Thank you so much for these wonderful recipes. I am adjusting a few of them due to family allergies but they all look WONDERFUL!!
Yes! I forgot to add the ham! I use a ham steak and chop it up into chunks. Thanks for catching that:) I added it to the shopping list as well
There are ham chunks in it. The recipe calls for a ham steak..You cook it and cut it into chunks as shown in the pic. I bought ham chunks for my recipe just so i didnt have to cook then chop..hope this helps.
finally a site with really food any one can make ahead this site is defiantly a favorite from now on thank you
thank you!
The pic for the potato soup also looks like it has celery in it, but that ingredient is not listed in the recipe…?
Glad I found your site through Pinterest, BTW…what an exceptional resource! My husband & I both work full-time, & four of our five children are still at home & school-age which results in an extremely hectic family schedule…can’t wait to try some of these recipes! Thanks!
Thanks Stella! I would recommend doubling these recipes with such a large family:)
These recipes look great! I can’t wait to try them. It’s refreshing to find recipes that don’t just dump meat, cans of ‘cream of’ soups and cheese into the pot. As a working mother of 2 young children, I don’t always have time (or energy) to cook in the evenings; but I don’t want to feed my family all processed food either. Thank you for these recipes!
Fantastic! I thank-you and my crock-pot thanks you. I’ve hardly used it at all,
but that will change now.
I made the Beef Burritos but they didn’t get to finish being made. The kids begged to make quesadillas with the beef. They turned out great! We bought tortillas from a mexican restaurant/store; they taste so much better than the regular store bought ones. This recipe is definitely a keeper! Thanks for sharing!
This is great! One question… In a former post with just regular beef stroganoff, you mixed the soup with the cream cheese and sour cream and here, you added the cream cheese and sour cream in the end. Can it still be mixed? Or is one method better than the other?
Love these recipies! I usually leave the house at 7:00am and don’t return until 8:30 pm, but want dinner ready when we get home. My husband leaves by 1:30pm. How can we do crockpot recipies when they only need to be cooked for 4-6 hours? Do you have any suggestions? Thanks!
Could he put them in before he leaves? 1:30-8:30 on low would be enough time
Love these! Crock pot freezer meals are such a good idea! I use our crock pot for at least 4 meals a week; it makes dinner time SO much easier!
I just found your blog and I’m enjoying looking through all of your recipes! I’ll definitely be pinning some!
-Melissa @ Fit ‘n’ Well Mommy
The Pork Tenderloin is absolutely amazing! Thank you for sharing the recipe.
I am so glad I ran across this! I am also from the south (Alabama) and a lot of crock pot recipes don’t sound like anything I would ever want to eat! Thanks for sharing!!!
Do you ever have trouble with the frozen potatoes turning black or spongy? I would love to make that potato soup!
I love how you have these meals planned for the week and the shopping list~ Thank you for helping us single, busy moms save some time~
Love your recipes but we also try to keep things budget friendly. How much do your weekly menus typically cost you?
I’m curious why you don’t add the broth until you put in the crockpot in many of them. Have you tried to add it when you freeze it and it didn’t work? Also, I’ve tried some soups where my potatoes got black and spongy. What did I do wrong if that doesn’t happen to yours? Thanks so much for these fresh new ideas for my freezer cooking group!
Tabitha, The potatoes are suppose to be a “bag of diced potatoes(found in the deli section)”, but I too don’t have a deli that carries those. If you Blanch your potatoes prior to freezing they will not become black and spongy. Blanching is taking some nice looking potatoes that have been washed, peeled, & rinsed after peeling…Placing them in boiling water (you can use a steamer instead) for only 3-5 minutes…Then put them in an Ice water Bath for 5-10 minutes. After all that you can freeze them, just make sure to remove any excess air from your ziplock bag. Of course if you can find them in your Deli, then that takes a lot of work out of it!
I was also curious as to why you don’t include the broth or some other ingredients (such as cream) when you freeze some of the meals? I’m looking to make several of each meal for my freezer and worry that I’d forget to have that particular ingredient on hand when I actually cook the meal. Is there a reason that I wouldn’t want to add it before freezing? These all look like wonderfully delicious meals that even my picky kids will enjoy. Thanks so much.
you could definitely add the liquid before freezing!
I have this set of meals all prepped and ready to go in my freezer. I made the Colorado beef burritos today and they were a big hit around our house. Easy and so yummy! Definitely will keep them in the recipe rotation. Thanks for doing the hard work of planning and making a shopping list 🙂 we are looking forward to trying more recipes from you.
Hi! Thank you for posting such a great method and recipes! I just wanted to double check on putting the meal in the crockpot…you take the meal right out of the freezer and put it in a cold crockpot and then turn on the crockpot for the day? Or do you thaw overnight/partially thaw the meal? You explained it in your post, but I wanted to make sure I understood it correctly. Thank you so much again, and I look forward to hearing back from you 🙂
These recipes are great! How many people do your recipes serve?
About 2 people per meal. Especially if you add a side or a salad.
Thank you so much for these ideas! And the recipes are really good. You have made my life so much easier!!!!
The pork one sounds amazing. Am I right though when reading that the pork doesn’t get frozen in the bag with all the other ingredients?
I prepped a few of these meals last night and I have the chicken wings in the crockpot now! As a full-time mom of a 1-year old who also works full-time (I bring my baby to work with me 🙂 ) and is a full-time online student, I am so grateful for the concept of freezer to crockpot, and for these delicious meals that I can also feed my little one! Can’t wait to eat!
yay!!! glad you enjoyed!
Maybe I missed it – about how many servings are these? They look great, can’t wait to try it!