Meal Prep + Freezer Meal Tips

We're talking all about it. It's stocking up that freezer, keeping it full. It is freezer meal time, y'all. It's time. If you haven't tried freezer meals before, this is the season. Tis the season for meals in your freezer, ready for all those busy days or cold chilly nights pulling it out of your freezer. Keep much to do, yes, But first, before we get into that, we're going to talk about today's sponsor. Free. It needs no introduction because it is the sound of free, the feel of free, all of

the free. We love free. Our annual debt Free Christmas Planner and it's free. Get it. It's a twenty page planner that will help you plan your holiday budget and gifts. Track your online orders right out your favorite holiday recipes. Track your savings for next Christmas with a cute tree where you can color in all the ornaments. And so, if you aren't already on our email list, then check your inbox or if you are already on our email list, check your inbox today and you'll see it there. If not,

what are you doing? It's free Friends podcast dot com slash Christmas. To grab yours and you'll get on our email list, which gets you all of the freebes, not just that one. We've got so many other free bees that we send out at least once a month. So Frugal Friends podcast dot com slash Christmas see you there. Yes, yeah, it'll probably be in your inbox like from Friday or from the yesterday. So if you're on our list, you should have it. So, speaking of free let's make this

season a little more stress free. It's not gonna be completely stress free, let's make it less stressful. And this is why we use freezer meals. If you are not already on board with meal planning and prepping, then I urge you to listen to every gosh tenth episode or so of the show where we talk about some form of meal planning or groceries or something. But a few

specific to meal planning. Our episode two thirty four where we come pair meal planning apps, so we compare the ones that you do the planning and upload them to the app, and then also the ones that are done for you. And there's even one emails that has a freezer stash. Every month they have a six meal freezer stash dash menu. I don't know like that they give one to you every month, so please check out that episode or episode one Frugal Meal Planning with Ashton Hope.

We talk a lot about doing your own meal planning, how to find recipes because that's sometimes the most like confusing part um. How do we find frugal recipes and organize everything with all the choice we have? So those are two really good episodes to queue up. Next and today we will focus specifically on freezer meals because who I mean a freezer meals are always hot. Don't try and give me like a freezer meal that you just def austin and serve me cold like it's not a

salad like in the summer. So they are designed for winter, and there's like never more to do than around the holidays in December. It doesn't stop. And so in order to avoid more takeout, having freezer meals on hand and knowing what to do with them and knowing that they're going to be good is essential. And so let's get into this first article. Kick us offt Jill. So this comes from Fabulously Frugal, and I love the example. I mean it's a really quick introduction, which I also appreciate

about this article. She doesn't waste time getting into the content, but gives this scenario of a child or a spouse saying what's for dinner and then panic and suing and then maybe responding with a I don't know what are you making? And then the person who asked the question rolls their eyes, and then you head to the pantry only to find something that's going to take forever to try and cook. Then you order door to ash, you pick up fast food, and it just doesn't go the

way that you really wanted to go. So sad enter freezer real cooking and how that can save the day because you've thought ahead and all you gotta do is pull something out of the freezer and heat it up and you know it's gonna be something good because you've made it. I also really love the picture in here. I know I'm not getting into the content, but this is worth describing to you. I don't know if the author took this lecture, but there's a spoon that is

balancing over like the fulcrum. The balance point of the spoon is a calculator turned on its side, and on either end of the spoon like a seesaw. On the one end is coins and on the other end is a potato punctured into the side of the spoon. And it's balancing on a sideways calculator and it is fantastic. Is everything food, budget, money, math. It's sending all of the messages you know what, it's convincing us to freezer

meal cook. This is a fantastic photo. And I'm gonna I'm personally I'm going to take a picture of it with my phone. Nice, okay, so that I can show you on social media. All right? Uh so these are just some like good reasons that you need freezer milk cookie in your life. If I didn't convince you maybe fabulously frugal. Well, first is you will save money again. You won't be ordering as much fast food m as much take out. It probably won't save you from every

fast food and every takeout. That's just like what you deal with during in busy seasons. That's just that's the name of the game. Don't feel guilt, but we can do things to limit the number of times we get take out. And then also buying in bulk. So having a stockpile isn't my favorite, like stalking up for the apocalypse, but when you are prepping a batch of freezer meals, you can plan it to be similar ingredients. You can buy those ingredients in bulk. A lot of them are

already frozen. When I'm doing freezer meals and I'm doing vegetables in the freezer meal, I buy frozen vegetables, right, what right, So so those are less expensive, they're already chopped. Um, I buy them in bulk, so I save money there. So there's just a lot of great money saving reasons beyond take out. That batch. Prepping meat freezer meals is great. And then it says you'll shop last two so no more last minute runs to the grocery store to graph

and a greedy it. So stuff like that, and she said the first time she got together with friends to do freezer meals, she paid only eighty five dollars for twelve meals. That's next level. I can't believe she she batched twelve meals. This article wasn't even written in like I mean, it was written in eighteen, but still, like, can you imagine even right now spending a hundred dollars

for twelve meals? It's insane. There's a fun tip just embedded in that doing this with friends, getting together and having this be like an activity, because I think so often that that can keep us from doing this. We love the idea of freezer meals, but I got to set aside a day to batch it, which has plenty of pros and cons to it. But batch cook in a day with someone who you enjoy hanging out with. Take it a step further and maybe you know, have

your friend make six meals. You make six meals, split them in half, and now you've got twelve different meals, and so then you can have like a little bit more variety. So lots of things to consider. What that one The next point reason that we should be doing this is that you will save time. We've already referenced this. It's perfect for busy families, people on the go during busy seasons because you're able to just not have to think, pull whatever you want out of the freezer and heat

it up. So you're going to spend less time grocery shopping, which we've already referenced, because you've already bought it all in bulk. It's already cooked, so now you don't have to go to the grocery store that week. Potentially, if you're eating all out of your freezer, you've already done the cooking and preparing. So yes, it does take a good significant chunk of time, but that's in one consolidated time like a Sunday afternoon or a Saturday, rather than

every single night of the week. You save time on all of the prep of the food because it's already done. It's already made, and oftentimes, like you've referenced jen for the peeling and chopping of the veggies, you might not have to do that if you've purchased the frozen veggies that can just go right into the meal that's going to go into your freezer, less time cleaning your kitchen again, because you did it all in one fell Swoop. So

if you like the idea of saving time, try freezer meals. Yes, and actually, later on I will list out a few of my favorite freezer meals for you to google and do. Yeah. Number three is it saves you brain power. We have talked about decision fatigue so many times on this show. By the end of the day, you have made so many decisions that your brain does not have a lot of extra energy to expend. And that's why we resort to take out at night and the late night Amazon browsing.

We get our brains get less motivated to do what's right the longer we spend in the day, and that's normal. Freezer meals will save some of that brain power. Uh. And I love that she also talks about decision fatigue. It is. It's not just a frugal friends thing. It's like a very well known thing. So don't work against it. Don't try to be better than than what your natural brain does, like at least not better. We go for one percent better, and freezer meals is a way we

can be one better. So having a batch of freezer meals, knowing your schedule and being able to defrost one in the morning, or it does not take long to defrost one in the microwave. I know, maybe that's like sacrilegious to some of you. Some of you sitting across the screen from me don't even own microwaves. But like three minutes in the microwave, and a freezer meal is gushy enough to fit into an instant pot. So that that is what I will say. It will save you brainer.

That is a fine way I think to defrost a meal that's already been cooked. It's just not a great idea to try and defrost meat in the microwave that's that's raw, because it could start to cook it. Yeah, but it's only like two or three minutes. It's just enough to break it up so that you can break it into pieces and fit it into the instant pot. So that's what I do. You do you. I'm just not going to tell like hordes of listeners to defrost raw meat. What you do in the comfort and privacy

of your own home, that is up to you. Jen Will speaking of Will that number four freezer meal, and Jenn is still alive. I just want to point that out. I'm still here. Good job. Has Jen gotten sick before? From this from that. I've definitely gotten sick before, but it's usually from a restaurant, it's never from what I've cooked. Well, you know, Frazer meals can help your health. They say save your health. I don't know. I think that they're just going in line with save save, save, save time,

save money, save your brain power, save your health. And this is in part because when you are making the meals, you get to decide and think ahead of time, what do I want to eat? What are the ingredients and nutrients that I want and I feel good about, And you get to decide. And so even in those days where decision fatigue is kicking in and all of your best intentions are waning, going for a freezer meal, going the quote unquote easy route is still really great for

you because it's food you've prepared. You've been intentional with what that meal is, what the ingredients are in it, and so it's far better for our health for physical bodies than just going and grabbing something quick from a restaurant, fast food, you name it, take out. It just it's not going to be as good for us, although it's tasty,

But you can make freezer meals tasty too. So there's another reason to go that route is you've been intentional about what the food is and you know you're going to enjoy it and it's good for you, yes, uh. And then number five, you can save the day for someone else that So this is what I am personally interested in, as being twenty two weeks pregnant at the time of recording, U uh, having this So this is something I did. I stalked up on my own freezer

meals before I gave birth the last time. But being able to when you hear someone's given birth, being able to just pull a meal out of the freezer, bring it over and say, cook this whenever you want. I'm not going to force you to eat dinner right now, or like, yeah, I mean bringing over. Bringing somebody a meal is great, but sometimes we're in a busy season

like December, and maybe we don't have time. So having some of these on hand can very much help somebody else in need, or somebody has like an emergency surgery, they fall down, they break their leg and now they can't stand up to cook, and you're over here saving the day with a freezer meal. There are so many reasons that freezer meals make generosity just easier. Yeah, it's already cooked. And again say, as you time, you can be generous without needing to find extra time in that

specific week, last minute to make food for someone. It's not just babies, like you said, it's it's people who might have surgery or be going through a really particularly difficult time. Maybe there's a death in the family. There's plenty of reasons that people could really benefit from the generosity of a home cooked meal that you might already have on hand because of your efforts in this regard. So we love generosity. It's a great final point in

that article. Yes, moving on to the next one, let's move on with some practical tips for making freezer meals, because there are some rookie mistakes and we don't want you to make those, so kick us off. Joe. You mean like defrosting great chicken in the microwave. If it is so I put it in Like I have a whole freezer meal, like a chicken tortilla soup, and I put raw chicken in there and it's covered with everything else, and so I just need it to be enough to

where I can fit it into the instant pot. It goes directly from the microwave to the instant pot, So I don't I don't know what's wrong with it cooking a little bit in the microwave, if that's what its final destination is going to be, is cooked. Microwaves are for cooking chill, Yeah, I mean, I guess it could also just affect texture and flavor when the outsides and the ends get like a little chill doesn't cook. Let's put this chill doesn't own a microwave, she doesn't like microwaves.

It does not meet Microcrorewaves are unsafe. No, no, it doesn't. Actually when we can get into like a rabbit trail on microwaves later, but they are apparently not as bad for you as what was previously touted in the past. Anyhow. Second article comes from Real Simple Ten genius tricks for freezing food that will make meal prep a snap. We're

not gonna go through all ten. We're picking our favorites, but I will talk about the first one, which is freeze foods Fast, and I like it because of alliteration, but also I agree with this for multiple reasons. First of all, some of the things that they say about this is that the faster we can freeze foods, the more we're gonna lock in the nutrients and the flavor of whatever it is that we're freezing. I have been

guilty of this in the past. We're all just kind of throw everything into a bag or a dish, or I'm just in a hurry, and and I freeze it, and it's all just kind of clumped together. Not only is it going to take longer to freeze and maybe not maintain a lot of as much flavor as it could have, but then it's a lot more difficult to defrost too. So there's kind of like twofold reasons to freeze food fast. And one of the ways that we

do that is as much in a single layer as possible. So, for instance, if we're freezing berries soon after having picked them, you know, I'm thinking in the summertime, we're gonna want to put them on a wash them and everything, put them on a single layer on a tray, freeze them, then go back once they're frozen, put them into a bag. And that allows you to be able to take them out in as the amounts that make the most sense to you. You don't have to defrust the entire bag.

Similar thing with roasted veggies. Really whatever you can kind of lay in a single layer. I would also say this is great for sauces to like if you put sauces into like a plastic bag and you can lay it flat rather than in a clump. That's also going to allow you more room and your freezer. So there's a lot of little tips embedded into this one thing. But freeze things in a single layer first, then consolidate

them however you need to consolidate them. Yeah, I'll also do this with like a tomato paste or Chipotle peppers. I'll put them in a ice cube tray and divving them out like a tablespoon each so that they're not frozen in like a solid clump. And I can easily know the measurements of each so it freezes them faster, and it's just helpful knowing the amounts. I personally don't freeze foods that I care about texture on. So number two is avoid foods with crispy and crunchy textures. So

I actually won't freeze roasted vegetables. I will freeze my freezer meals will be ones where I don't care about the texture or where I want the texture to be uniformed. So I do a lot of chilies, soups, stews, stuff like that. That's just that's a me thing. I don't do any like casseroles or things that have to go in the oven. I only do things that can go

in the instant pot or the slow cooker. Primarily I will do we'll I have a foodie so pressure cooker or slow cooker, because you do not want to put like raw frozen meat in the slow cooker. That is where you don't want to put it. The microwave is fine, the slow cooker is not, because it will stay at an unsafe temperature for too long. You can avoid that

by just pressure cooking. So the and the article also emphasizes to avoid foods with the crispy, crunchy textures because they're not going you're not gonna be able to recreate that after freezing. So soups, stews, sauces really do. But I will say, like I'll roast frozen broccoli, like I'll buy frozen broccoli and roast it and that turns out fine. I just wouldn't refreeze it. I respect that, totally, respect that. I will also a lutely freeze food with crispy crunchy textures.

I think that you can still get the crispy crunchy after reheating it, especially if you're going to put it in the oven or if you've got a air fryer. It works just fine. So I will often do uh. They literally say, don't do a chicken palm. It's like exactly what I do do when I freeze, you are I will do depart on the chicken and then and then you put it in the oven, and then it's totally fine. I don't know what they're saying, I'm I don't. I don't know. Try it out for yourself, I have

I'm talking to our listener. Or too far gone you should I am. I am you're too far gone? I love you. I can't and and so another thing that keeps me from doing frozen cast roles is that they just take way too long long like to defrost, way too long to cook in the oven, like I need something quick. So that's me. Uh. Cast frozen cast rolls super popular. There are a ton of people that swear by them that your make ahead lasagnas um all that stuff, and you can you can buy frozen chicken palm. So

it's like it happens, It's not like nobody doesn't. Yeah, you just got to know how to do it, I guess, and I don't know how to do it, and and maybe that's my limiting. It's especially good for people with with an air fryer, which I know is super common for people to have of that now. Or alternatively, if there is something to a bake that I've frozen where the top needs to be crispy, I just won't put

that top on. So, for instance, poppy seed chicken is a regular go to for me, and usually you put like a cracker, crumpled up crackers on top, and yeah, that that that's just gonna get soggy because before it has time to freeze, the crackers are going to start to absorb the liquids that are on top of that kind of casserole or bake to be up to date in our lingo, so I won't put the cracker top on top. That'll be something And I'm like, oh, yeah,

I typically have crackers on hands. So in the final moments once I've cooked it, once I've pulled it out of the freezer and cook it, then I added on, so there are there's always a way to hack your favorite foods and still be able to use the freezer. Yes, none of us need to leave this episode. We're all welcome here. What's your next tip, Jim? That was my next tip? Number two? Okay, number six, blanch your greens first. This one I need to listen to. I'm mostly calling

it out so that I can remind myself. This is mostly if you care about the looks of your edgies. Blanching it is going to lock in the green color rather than make them look kind of wilty and gross. It's all fine, it's still safe to eat. But I'm gonna be honest. The last time I froze spinach without having blanched it first, by the time I took it back out of the freezer, yeah, it was really unappealing to me and I did not use it. So and

to blanch greens, quick little three step process. You bring salted water to a rolling boil in a large pot. You put your vegetables or whatever, green vegetables. You could do this with green beans, leafy greens, green green, and green whatever, and put it in that boiling water until it's tender. And then quickly pull it back out and throw it over some ice to shock it, and then you're going to freeze it in that single layer we talked about, and then you've got greens ready to go.

I will agree with this. I don't do this because again I just choose places where the look does not need to be appealing. But I have done this before and it is a good idea, and it is a good idea if you want to put in the extra step. UM seven is always allow enough time for defrosting. And I just added this one at the last minute. I wasn't going to talk about this one because maybe enough time for you is three minutes in the microwave. No,

but I do so. I plan for freezer meals, so like I'll look at my schedule every week and I'll I'll look at what we've got going on at nights, or what I've got going on during the day. Like if I am doing a lot of stuff, maybe a lot of recording, and I've got some deadlines and i

know I'm going to be tired, then freezer meal. If we've got something going on at night where we need to eat really quickly before leaving, freezer meal so I look at my schedule and know when I'm going to do a freezer meal so that I have enough time to defrost and all always put it. Um, I'll take it out. I'll give it a full twenty four hours. That's what works for me. I find that if I give it a full twenty four hours to defrost, it's perfect.

I don't have to put it in the microwave. But in times when I am just and nothing has gone to play and it really is a last minute need, I have also defrosted in the microwave. Okay, and I am still here, so we all know you've made it very clear. The article does say defrosting and a microwave can too easily cook rather than defrost the meat. It can, So you just have to like three minutes if it's a big bag, two minutes if it's not. It's just

really enough to get it into the instant pop for me. Yeah, my last tip on here, this is what I've not done before, but again calling it out because I think it's a good idea and I want to give it a tribe. Don't toss leftover herbs instead. If you've got extra herbs of any kind that you've been cooking with,

but you don't need the rest of them. Chop them up, put them into an ice cube tray and cover it with a little bit of oil and freeze that and then you can pop it out the next time you're sauteging or roasting something, and I'll add some really nice flavor. So that's a great idea. You know what else is a great idea? Well, I mean I do know. It's not mycro waves. Some would say it's microwating to defrost. Others would say the week. That's right, it's time for

the best minute of your entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name is William. Maybe you paid off your mortgage, Maybe your car died and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore. That bill Buffalo, Bill, Bill Clint. This is the bill of the week. Hi, Jen and Jill. My name's Megan, and for my bill of the week this week, I wanted to share an exciting decision that my eleven year old son Liam made regarding money that he receives from me every month as

part of his allowance. We've always divided it into save spending give, and his savings have been in a bank account for children, but he just decided that he wanted to start transferring all of his saving money directly into investing. And part of this is definitely because he has grasped the concept of compound interest and it's all very exciting

to him. I wanted you to know that he loves your show at asked as my eight year old daughter Sloan, and together the three of us love listening on car Rants and we just want to thank you for all of the content you create. Bye, oh Megan and Liam and Sloan, you guys, Hi, shout out to you, and shout out to especially Liam for investing and grasping compound interest, which is something that many adults still have not grasped. So congratulations, you are going to be okay, You're gonna

do well. This is remarkable. Liam and Sloan, thank you for listening with your mom. It's so fun to hear the wide array of audience members who listen and enjoy the show. We are here for you, glad to create content that you like to engage with together and really

making great decisions after listening to the show. So well done, well done, Thanks for that Bill, How remarkable motivational exciting if you are listening and you happen to be just a really cool kid and you've got a bill that you want to submit about some amazing money decisions you're making. More If you're just you know, a regular adult listening to us and you also have a bill, that's fine too. We're here for you for Real Friends podcast dot com

slash bill. Leave us your bill. We're ready for it, as always open arms for for those bills. And now it's time for round all right here it is. This is the moment you've been waiting for our favorite simple freezer meal, and I'm gonna give you. I'm gonna give you more than one. We need that. We do need that, because you know what, we freeze more than one meal, right. I'm actually gonna let Jill go first because I love her answer. I think it's I think it's the one

that you should hear. Verse After you hear Jill's you can then decide if you just want to turn off the episode and say I don't I don't need what Jen has his Jill is good enough for me and which is sometimes what I do. So I'm gonna let you have the opportunity to make that decision for yourself, and here you I like to freeze bread. I mean, you'd enjoy that as a reminder Jill's choice for the only food she would eat for the rest of her life if she only had one option, So she's not lying.

It's so funny. If you were to go into my freezer right now, you would find freezer meals, but you would also find an incredible amount of bread in there, which I realized might be a little bit of a waste of space because bread is not expensive. But I also hate food waste. So if I've just got a little bit of bread left, it goes in the freezer. I will give you more freezer meals than this one.

But bread freezes so well, and it can be reheated so nice and crispy, So even for those times that I find myself at a great bakery, but I don't end up eating the whole loaf, I don't have to let it go moldy, throw it in the freezer, and then it's just like a nice treat that I've got some great crispy bread to go with. Whatever food Gen makes out of her freezer frozen bread will actually crisp up well like that'll get a good crisp on it.

I'm I'm all for that, and um, if you want to add other foods to it, you do you As our listener, you can do you. Jill will do her as always. I also have found that if I have my like a meat or a protein pre prepared, whether it is in some sort of bake or casserole or it's just cooked on its own, for instance, ground meat for tacos or chicken that is breaded and ready for to be put on a salad or into a pasta, that really helps me with my prep of food for

that night. Like I don't have to always have a full meal ready to pull out of the freezer. That is nice, but it cuts out a lot of the decision fatigue and time fatigue for me when I am able to have at least like one aspect of the meal pre prepared that I just have to pull out. So that's one of my kind of freezer meal approaches. What about for you, Jen? Yeah, so I will freeze ingredients, but I am more likely to use a full frozen meal.

So like if I'm if I froze if there was a deal on ground turk key, like a few months ago when I bought a lot of ground turkey and put some of it in the freezer, like, I made sure to defrass that in the fridge, like I didn't throw that in the microwave. But it does. I do have to be intentional about checking for it and remembering to use it my meal plan. So that doesn't that kind of like freezer like ingredients. I don't count like

as freezer meals. Like for me, it has to be a take out, throw in the instant pot forget it for a half hour and eat sort of thing like it has I am my brain maybe doesn't. Monitoring does not work well at nights, and I'm gonna get really lazy. So it has to be the as easy as possible. So yeah, at least on those nights where I have to do a freezer meal, it's like all or all or nothing on those nights. So yeah, I have quite a few favorite tried and true freezer meals and they're

they're mostly so. I love a lot of like Indian so butter chicken Chaanna masala like with with just the If it's a vegetarian meal, I can do it in the slow cooker. Again, I rarely use my slow cooker. It's always the pressure cooker. But a lot of Indian food is good for that. I can do like a

barbecue pulled pork. So again like the pork, forget the cut, but that's often on sale in big pieces, and so I'll just cut that in half and freeze the part I'm not using with some barbecue sauce or whatever else I want. And then it's great because when you defrost, it kind of marinates together. I always forget to marinate meat, and so this is a great way that I can get the meat marinated. Or if I'm making chicken dishes, anything like chicken that you can put with rice, Like

I'll make the rice while the um. I won't freeze the rice. I'll make the rice the night of. But I'll just buy a big thing of frozen chicken breasts and I'll just like divvy out these chicken breasts to the freezer meal bags. And there are things you can buy that keep your bags open. I don't. I just propped them up between things. Reusable bags are very easy to wash. I would only only use them for freezer meals. So there are a lot of things. So my favorites.

I have a whole outique Mu sala that um, well, Chatta sala um. Let's see chili like a bean chili, or even a ground beef chili, chicken tortilla soup, a smokey tomato soup. So I will roast tomatoes. If my in laws have a lot of tomatoes, so they get and they give us tomatoes. On the rare occasion, I will roast them and make this delicious roasted tomato soup.

And so sometimes I'll roast them. You do want to let them you want to freeze fast, but you don't want to put something directly into the freezer right after you roast it. Let it cool off a bit, put it in the fridge, and then put it into the freezer once it's been cooled down in the fridge. But I'll cool those roasted tomatoes, put them in a bag with all the other ingredients for the soup, and freeze that together. Sounds great. Whenever you pull that out of

your freezer. I'll pull my bread out of the freezer and come over. Perfect. I'll also bring a bottle of wine for you. Thank you, assuming this happens after you give birth. Yeah, yeah, thank you. Carnetas is another one where I'll get like the big piece of meat that I just won't use all of it, and I'll put part of it as a freezer meal with all the things for corninas. I love that Italian white bean soup minestrone or minestrone however you like to say it without

the pasta in it. So doing the soup, cooking it and then putting the pasta in for like the last ten minutes and cooking that. I don't freeze pasta. Do you freeze pastall? I freeze everything? Yeah, I thought I'll freeze rice, pasta, milk, bread, butter, cream, cheese, everything. They say you shouldn't freeze, you better believe I'm out here freezing it because you know what, You've got no rules with the microwave. I've got no rules with the freezer.

I have rules with the microwave. Chill Okay, well, so many good hips, Jen, thank you for listening to Jill and ize differing opinions on freezers and waves hots hot take and I hope you've got something on I hope that you are in one of on team Jen or team Jill on this. But now that we're ultimately on the same team, and it's that freezer meals are meant to help you alleviate stress, save money, and eat healthier.

That's what they're here for, and you do you beyond that. Also, if I'm really being unsafe and and somebody knows that I'm being unsafe, you can tell me I'm not stuck in my ways, send me an email in kindness. So thank you for listening. Many of you know we have a private community for our listeners trying to pay off debt. We do monthly money challenges and offer accountability groups, and we want to congratulate one of our members for a

big win. This is from cal Thrin. She says this month, I'm doing a no spend a challenge with the thirty Day No Spend Challenge workbook, and after having read the No Spend Challenge Guide written by me. That's as I'm saying that, not Catherine. Instead of cutting multiple categories, I'm choosing one a month and adding a new category every month. Side note, this is that definition of a one percent better and I love it. This month is no online shopping.

The first three days of the month were easy. I had no temptations, didn't find myself going to my favorite websites. Today, I'm very proud of myself. I got a text about a sale a company I like is having. I ended up cloaking the link, even adding items to my cart before purchasing. I reminded myself that I don't want to spend online this month. I removed from cart, closed the website, and sent a stop to the text thread so I wouldn't receive future text. The person I almost bought is

on my Christmas list. I read minded myself that the first will be there in the future when I have the funds to add it to the budget. In the past, I would have moved money around, taken money from other saving tools to make the purchase. And I'm very happy with my decision to say now, amazing, You're just Catherine building this muscle. It's not about constantly saying no to ourselves, but it's about building the ability to identify do I

really need this? Do I want this? Is it contributing or taking away from other goals that I have prioritizing, Like, that's what this no Spend Challenge month is not just so we can slice and dice always and forever. It's the evaluation and you did that so well. Even this example, like I found myself doing it, Like I let myself go that farest to put something in my cart, but then created the pause. It almost doesn't matter where the

pause happened. The pause happened and you were able to redirect and you feel good about it, which is great too. You're not walking away thinking this really stinks. It kept you on track with the other goals that you had and hopefully helped motivate you even more for just the abilities that you have to make good decisions financially for yourself. Congratulations, I'm so excited. Yes, thank you so much for listening.

So if you are listening, want to check out our monthly challenge community that Katherine's a part of, then head to Frugal Friends podcast dot com slash club to see what's in there, what we're all about, and uh we hope to be reading your big wins soon. See you next time. Frugal Friends is produced by Eric Sirianni Jen. I know that you have a rant, but just really quick, this made me really excited that maybe when my kitchen's done asked for rational goal, we can get together and

do freezer meal cooking. I think that's a great idea. Yeah, I had something I wanted to rant about, but I think that can wait until the next episode because it may have been our most divisive episode yet freezer meals, and I just don't think we need anymore um hot takes, more hot takes. Yeah, and I had a hot hot take.

So I want to just I want to just leave our plans for the future to be positive and freezer mealing with you in your new island will be fantastic and reminding people that we are friends, even though you lean into the microwave and E lean into the freezer in ways that maybe the other was so true. Yeah, but I do manage I bring my lunch to your house and I don't microwave it. I complete it up on the pod. Yeah, I'm not reliant. Yeah, isn't that

reality is all about. I'm not I'm not opposed to microwaves. I did do some research on it, you know where there was this propaganda that was out there about how microwaves zap nutrients out of your food, and it's just simply not true. After you look at the science of how microwaves work. Well, here we go, we said we weren't taking hot takes in this after after Yeah, it wasn't gonna be your hot take. But you know, so I'm not I am not opposed to that. I used

to be. I used to think, like they take the nutrients out of the food. It's not a good way to reheat it. But um, the quicker you it's similar to the quicker you freeze food, the more nutrients it holds in. The quicker you can cook food, the more nutrients that can hold in. And depending on the type of food that it is. But oftentimes the longer you cook food, the more the nutrients kind of seep out

of it. I mean really, that's like that's the science behind making your own broth right low and slow with all of the veggies and bones and all that like seeping out into the liquid. But you're keeping the liquid, so there's the nutrients. But if you're not keeping the liquid, you've cooked it all out of the food. But if you're doing a soup and it all leaves, you're still having the liquid, right yeah, yep, yep, But if you're not. Yeah, So all that to say, sometimes the microwave is good.

Sometimes cooking it on the stove is good, but it's not what I used to think. So when inspired this um microwave rabbit hole that you took a trip down, I don't know who knows what leads to what I think. Eric and I were talking about our kitchen plans and the ways that we currently reheat things and some of the bad rap microwaves get and it's just like, is that true? You know, we kind of had that question

in the back of our minds. Is that true? And and like at least three different articles and videos pointed to it's not true that microwaves deplete all food of their nutrients. Yeah. Interesting. I mean, if you want the most nutrient dense food, definitely raw, but I think any cooked. I don't think if you once you cook food that it's devoid of all nutrients. If that was true, we would all be dead because most of us cook food. So yeah, I think it's apps a little bit of it.

Whatever way you cook it, you're still getting good stuff as long as you're eating it, consuming good stuff. But this gives me something to look I mean, I'm looking forward to my kitchen being done, but definitely that's an extra exciting thing. Your meals with you would be awesome. Great, let's make it a date by see them