I will be the very first to admit that when someone recently mentioned “freezer meal” to me…I was a naysayer.  I’ve been there, done that.  With very little success.  I’ve gone to the freezer meal retail locations, I’ve researched my own recipes and created them at home.  I’ve been unimpressed.  And I LOVE planning ahead, preparing ahead, etc.  Most either didn’t have much flavor or had too much flavor and the kids wouldn’t touch it or we liked only a minority of the recipes and couldn’t duplicate without returning to the retail location.

So I wasn’t too extremely disappointed when my schedule didn’t allow me to attend a neighbor’s Wildtree freezer meal party.  But afterwards everyone was enjoying their meals.  Hmmm…  And then a “Mommy and Me” workshop was advertised and I just knew Stella would love it.

So we put on our aprons, threw our chicken, beef, pork and shrimp in a cooler, and headed up the street for an evening of fun.  And Stella did indeed love it.  We quickly created 6 meals (a “normal” workshop is 10 meals) to take home and throw in the freezer and one gold fish snack to start eating immediately.

Not sure what a freezer meal workshop is all about?

  My Wildtree rep passed along this great description:

So Stella and I enjoyed our time with other moms and daughters and brought home a freezer full of meals AND Wildtree products for my spice cabinet.

And so this week Andy was finally home for a meal (lots of traveling recently) and I pulled out the Busy Day Lasagna.  It still had a little prep to do before putting it into the oven, but it wasn’t any MORE than normal for me.  And the fact that a recipe was decided and I had all the ingredients on hand?  Success! Because that’s half the battle, right?

It was really good and made A LOT.  An entire 9×13 pan of “lasagna”.  Next time I’ll split the freezer part into two meals.  Henry ate all of it.  Stella was hesitant because it wasn’t our “normal very red” pasta.  But then once I reminded her that SHE actually helped put the meal together, she tried it and ate more than half.  Charlotte was a no-go after the first bite, but usually is 50-50 on pasta nights anyway.

Overall, I consider it a success and you know what the best part is?  I have the Wildtree ingredients in my cabinet, the recipe in my hands, and the ability to duplicate it whenever I want.  My brother comes home for fall break next week from college and I think this will be a dish I’ll be sending back to school with him for his house.

Do you plan your meals ahead of time?

Do you use freezer meals?

Anyone else out there tried Wildtree?  Favorite product?