Freezer-Friendly Meal Train Ideas: Meals that can be eaten over time
Image Courtesy of love and lemons.
Life throws us curve balls that we may or may not be prepared for, and it’s just a fact of life. As you read, you will see how helpful and convenient freezer-friendly meals can be, primarily when you assemble a meal train for a friend or loved one in need. Follow along to learn more about a meal train and some freezer-friendly meal train recipes that will keep your loved one and their family fed.
The Importance of Meal Trains
How a Meal Train is Beneficial
If someone you know is going through a tough time or in need, we recommend that you create a meal train. Image courtesy of Allrecipes.
Meal trains are a system that can be put together to help someone in your life who is in need. So let’s go ahead and get into it. To begin with, what is a meal train?
A meal train is a system in which a group plans different meals to bring to a friend or family member in need. Some of the various reasons a group may create a meal train involve an individual being bed bound, recovering from surgery, losing a loved one, or fighting cancer. The point is that they are put together by friends, family, and community members to help support individuals going through tough times.
The trick to organizing meal trains is gathering a group of people (friends, family, or community members) to help assemble a meal train. One of the best ways to do this is to create a sign-up where individuals can note what they plan on making and when to deliver the meal to the recipient. The main reasons to do this are so that individuals don’t overwhelm the recipient with too much food at once and the recipient doesn’t end up with multiples of the same meal. Remember, though, that there are several recipes you can modify or change to the recipient’s liking.
It’s essential that as you are assembling the meal train, you keep in mind the recipient’s allergies and intolerances that they may have. The last thing you would want is to have the recipient of the meal train suffer from an allergic reaction or become sick.
One of the beauties of a meal train is that the individuals who assemble one can provide meals that can be frozen or thrown in the oven. In the case of this piece, we are going to be focusing on the various meals that can be frozen and heated as desired. Be sure to provide a sticky note or a piece of paper with your meal train meal that includes instructions on how to cook the dish and when to eat the food.
Freezer Meal Train Ideas
Easy to take out, defrost and eat
Pastas, soup, and casseroles galore, all delicious and fresh, make for great frozen dishes. Image courtesy of Southern Living.
As mentioned, there are several variations in what one can do with meals that can be made and frozen for later. Let’s begin with casseroles; as many of us know, this is one of the most common meals that individuals will make; despite the cliches of it all, there are numerous types that one can make for a meal train.
Some of the most common ingredients that all casseroles share include meat, vegetables, cheese, some starchy binder, and sauce such as tomato or cheese sauce, to name a few. The types of casseroles and what you add to them vary from person to person and are all up to personal preference. Just keep in mind any allergies or if the recipient of the meal train is vegetarian or lactose intolerant. These are essential factors to remember when making a casserole that can be frozen. Be sure to leave cooking instructions and when you should consider eating it.
Next, soup is always a safe bet to make. Not only do most soups take very few ingredients, but they are easy to freeze and heat at a later date. Now we know it is easy to just run to the store and pick up a can, but making any soup homemade, allows you to customize it to the recipient’s liking. Two easy and common soups to gift others via meal trains include tomato or chicken noodle soup. They make for a warm and delightful, defrosted and heated meal.
Don’t you like carrots or celery in your soup? No need to fear; by making soup from scratch, you can add and remove what you want and don’t like, keeping the recipient’s likes and dislikes in mind. Images courtesy of Southern Living.
Beans are a wonderful food, the more you eat, the more you toot! All jokes aside, chili is another great meal to provide via meal train that can be frozen. Now the type of chili may vary depending on what the recipient likes and what the individual providing the chili wants to add. Some may add a combination of different beans, while others may consist of meat or chunks of different vegetables. All chilis vary and are unique. No matter the result, it is excellent to give via meal train to others as they can freeze and eat later.
Let’s talk about Mac N Cheese. Crispy, creamy, with or without meat mixed in, it all depends on the individual you are making it for. Two ways to make mac n cheese are either via box, where you can go to the store to buy a particular brand that includes a cheesy powder or sauce that you may mix in, while the other consists of making it from scratch.
When you do this, you can choose the type of cheese you want or the noodles you feel like adding to it. Mac n cheese recipes vary from individual to individual and, like most other things, can be made to a particular liking. No matter what recipe you use, you can freeze the mac n cheese later. If the recipient enjoys crispy mac n cheese, it will be essential to leave instructions on how long to bake it in the oven and what to add to the top of the mac n cheese to help make it a crispy layer on top.
Stew. Stew stew stew is a fun four-letter word to say. How often do we hear individuals announce that they are making stew for dinner? We don’t know about you, but we sure don’t hear about or use this particular meal term often. So what exactly is it, and why should you consider this for a potential meal train item? Aside from the fact that it is a delicious meal that can be frozen and later defrosted to make for dinner.
To begin with, the word stew is defined as “a dish of meat and vegetables simmered in a closed dish or pan." The ingredients that all stews tend to have typically consist of any combination of vegetables you choose that has been slow-cooked meat of your choice. Meats commonly used include venison, rabbit, lamb, poultry, sausages, and seafood. It all comes down to what an individual’s preference may be.
Another thing to consider while making the stew is if you intend for the recipient to eat the stew alone or if they should be sure to cook and add pasta to it when they defrost it to eat. We recommend having them wait to add the pasta until they are ready to eat it so that it can be fresh when they decide to add it.
A final dish to consider is pot pie. Unlike many other dishes, you want to be sure that your pot pie has been cooked to an extent. We suggest this because you don’t like to gift the recipient of the meal train a completely raw pot pie to freeze, but you also don’t want it to be fully cooked. It essentially needs to be made into a happy medium. When creating the pot pie, you can make it in two common ways. You can make the pot pie and have it be meatless with just vegetables and a cream soup cooked beneath a thin layer of crust. The other common type of chicken pot pie is chicken or beef. It all comes back to personnel preference regarding cooking it and the kind that the recipient of the meal train receives.
Warm crust with a delicious meat and vegetable center, how much better can it get? Image courtesy of realsimple.
These are just some of the many different recipes for meal trains that individuals can cook and receive. By reading through the few ideas provided, we hope that we could plant some other freezer-friendly meal train ideas in your head for the next time you are asked to participate in a meal train. For more ideas, tips, and advice on creating meal trains, we recommend visiting Give Inkind for more information.
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