The "make-ahead pie plate dinners"!
Been there - done that.
Craving something really homemade, I would prepare a feast and divide it into aluminum pie plates (I don't care much for using the microwave) and seal tightly with foil. Stick on a label; date and freeze.
Coming home from work I would dig for what I was in the mood to eat - toss it in the oven or convection oven to heat while I took a nice hot bath. Dinner was then ready and I was eating quite healthy. All I had to do was transfer my pie plate dinner to a dinner plate (I would never eat out of a pie plate - too tacky!) And I keep salad mix of some sort already made up in the fridge most of them time, so adding a salad was no problem.
I had a crazy work schedule so I would prepare things on my days off and freeze meals for myself. It worked for me.
Examples:
Turkey or chicken, gravy, mashed potatoes, veggies of choice.
Turkey or chicken and gravy - place in plastic bags. Remove from the freezer and boil in hot water for a hot sandwich. Same with roast beef and eye round.
Extra gravy was ladeled into small freezer containers in case I wanted gravy for a sandwich or to dip my fries in.
Mashed potatoes - with or without an extra pat of butter or with gravy were frozen in small freezer containers. Rice too.
Meatloaf, roasts, pork, steak, etc. portioned and frozen with or without sauce, gravy, onions, mushrooms, etc.
Shredded pork with BBQ sauce or shredded roast beef with gravy and mushrooms could be heated and served on a nice hoagie roll, baguette or French or Italian bread.
Cakes and pies were baked, portioned and frozen. Microwave homemade apple pie to heat thru - love hot apple pie. Even muffins were frozen.
Lasagna was baked, cooled completely and portioned with a scoop of extra sauce spooned over (I am a sauce nut!)
Individual containers of just sauce or pasta with sauce of choice - all portioned. Stuffed shells, stuffed manicotti, spaghetti, tortellini, rigatoni, etc. with or without meatballs and/or Italian sausage.
Sometimes I would even place a piece of homemade garlic bread in with it with grated mozzarella on top so they would cook together and help round out a meal.
Ditto with casseroles, homemade pizza, calzones. Also rice dishes.
I even made hamburgers and cooked them - sometimes with gravy or sauce or mushrooms and onions. If I wanted a cheeseburger - just added cheese when it was hot.
I would cook a large batch of chicken wings or chicken tenders, even chicken breasts, leave them plain, portion and freeze. To cook - I would just heat in the oven with sauce of choice over them or toss in BBQ sauce and grill on the electric grill.
A nice large chicken or turkey made plenty of meals and the carcass was always used to make broth and/or soups to be portioned.
I enjoy pudding - but a whole box is too much to eat at one sitting so I would make pudding pops with the left over.
Homemade waffles were made by the batch and frozen; pop in the toaster and enjoy. Pancakes were portioned and frozen; placed in the convection oven with a pat of butter and syrup poured over while they were still frozen - worked for me.
One weekend I spent cooking and baking all day - had meals for almost 2 months - and that really helped me with the wacky schedule I had. Working 2 full time jobs - it was not easy trying to cook. I'd be so dang tired that my freezer and my oven were my best friends!!
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