The Best Make Ahead Meals for Busy Moms

Does it ever feel like you clean up one meal (or snack) just to prepare the next for your kids? Are you tired of spending so much time in the kitchen?

It feels like hours, right?! I know I get frustrated with how time consuming feeding myself and my family can be.

So, one amazing solution to eliminating time and hastle is to freeze intentional leftovers and make meals ahead of time. By preparing extra when you do cook, you’ll be making it as easy as possible to pull something out for dinner. Even when you least feel like it. Plus, the set up and clean up are kept to a minimum!

So, here are our favorite meals to either make ahead, or to cook extra and freeze for another time. They freeze beautifully, and are great for throwing in the oven or skillet for a hands-free warm up.

Casserole Dishes

First, these dishes take a little extra time to make, but they give you a complete dinner for another night if you double the recipe. I love making two of a shephard’s pie, pot pie, and just about anything that includes multiple ingredients in a pan. When it’s time to pull the extra one out of the freezer, I usually just put it in the oven and leave it for a few hours.

*Check out this post for other great gifts for busy moms, with other time saving ideas!

Soups

Almost all soups make a wonderful, light dinner and extras can be frozen in containers or baggies. Simply let them thaw out and add them to a pot to warm up on it’s own until hot. Pull out some crackers and you have dinner in only a few minutes.

Fillings

Now, this one is easy! Think about the typical dishes you make that include a filling. Enchiladas, sloppy joes, stuffed peppers, and Italian sauces/fillings all fall under this category. Now, make extra and freeze them for a future dinner. For example, when I make sloppy joe filling, I double it and freeze half in a ziplock freezer bag. When I need a super quick meal, I’ll pull it out and warm up the filling, and throw some sweet potatoes in the oven to cook. Then, bam, presto, I’ve got a second easy meal with little effort.

Meat

For most of us, meat is the most time-consuming part of cooking a meal. So, next time, as you make your meat for dinner, double the amount you make and put some aside for another time. This works well with shredded chicken, pork, ground sausage, and ground beef/turkey. Then, when you’re lacking time and energy, you have the meat ready to go for burrito filling, stir fry, or anything else you want to whip up for a quick weeknight dinner.

In Conclusion

Making dinner seems like a simple affair, but as your family grows, you find it can be a lot of work. Making meals/extra food ahead can help TREMENDOUSLY in keeping your amount of work and energy down so that you have time for other things that truly matter to you.

"Efficiency is doing better what is already being done." – Peter F. Drucker

*This can be done with breakfast and lunches as well! Double a smoothie for the next morning, or make-ahead overnight oats and boiled eggs for half the week.

Jenn writes at her blog healthyhappyimpactful.com. She’s a mom of three looking to learn and grow. Check it out if you love helpful tips on health, family, and personal growth.