Do you have a college student who’s headed off to college? Or maybe they are headed back? We do! Our niece, Emily, is moving out and starting a new chapter in her life. She is very excited but wants to make things move as smoothly as possible.

Food…. that is always a subject on the mind of a college student and she is no different. She was coming to visit so we thought it would be a great idea to prepare some meals for her to take and make in her dorm room. Hopefully, it will make her transition a little easier.

She strives for a sugar-free lifestyle and so she chose the following recipes:

• Chicken Caprese
• Chicken Chili
• Ground Beef
• Red Pepper Chicken
• Beef and Sweet Potato Chili
• Crack Chicken
• Chicken Fajitas
• Pumpkin Healthy Cookies
• No-bake Chocolate Coconut Bars

We wanted to make this change as easy as we possibly could for her. As with any major lifestyle change, there are variations in our behavior that can make or break us.

We all know how hard it is to cook dinner every single night. We also know what happens when we don’t cook dinner. We go out to eat or eat things that are convenient and those options aren’t always the healthiest choices and can get pretty expensive too.

So we decided to have three specific categories for preparing this food.

• Single-Serve Meals
• Slow-Cooker Meals
• Dessert

Single-Serve Meals

We wanted to provide some heat and eat options and so we planned for several meals to be cooked and packaged into individual servings. These meals could be packed as a lunch or a quick snack and easily heated in the microwave.

Slow-Cooker Meals

She planned to cook a whole meal (4-6 servings) in the slow-cooker once a week. Then she would divide the meal into separate smaller meals serving it throughout the week with different side dishes. To add variety, she plans to pair them up with rice, salad, tortillas, or sweet potatoes.

Special note: These meals could be cooked in the instant pot too and would be a quicker way of doing it.

Single-Serve Meal Directions

Chicken Caprese

This is a delicious way to make boring chicken taste yummy. We like to top our chicken breast with all kinds of different toppings to make things interesting. Chicken Caprese is chicken breast topped with fresh basil, sliced tomatoes, and shredded mozzarella cheese. You can serve it with a side salad or on a low-carb tortilla.

Ingredients

• 5 pieces of chicken breast
• Fresh basil
• 2 tomatoes, sliced
• 1/2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

Food Preparation Day Instructions

1. Cook the chicken on a cookie sheet in the oven at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes until the internal temperature is 165 degrees.
2. Remove from the oven.
3. Layer basil and two slices of tomatoes onto each piece of chicken.
4. Top with the shredded mozzarella cheese.
5. Melt in the oven for about 5 minutes.
6. Remove and let it cool.
7. Individually wrap each piece of chicken with the toppings in plastic wrap.
8. Place the individually wrapped chicken in a Ziplock Freezer bag labeled Chicken Caprese

Cooking Day Directions

1. Thaw.
2. Unwrap the chicken.
3. Heat in the microwave at intervals of 30 seconds until heated through.

For juicy and moist chicken, follow our brining method in this recipe for Grilled Chicken.

Chicken Chili

This delicious recipe has some simple spices. I used to buy the spice packets for white chicken chili until I found this recipe. Over the years I have altered it some by adding extra garlic and canned diced tomatoes and green chiles. Personally, I think the secret ingredient is ground oregano!

I serve this topped with cheese and a little bit of sour cream. It also makes a good filling for a taco or served over some rice.

Ingredients

• 3 lbs. chicken breast
• 3 lbs. Great Northern Beans
• 3 cans diced tomatoes and green chilies
• 2 onions
• 8 cups of chicken broth
• 3 tsp granulated garlic
• 6 tsp ground cumin
• 3 tsp ground oregano

Food Preparation Day Instructions

1. Combine all the ingredients in the instant pot and secure the lid properly.
2. Push the Bean/Chili setting or high manual pressure for 90 minutes.
3. Let it release pressure naturally.
4. When it is done, let the chili cool.
5. Divide the chili into sandwich-sized freezer Ziploc bags into 1cup portions
6. Put all the individual bags into a large freezer Ziploc bag labeled White Chicken Chili.

Cooking Day Instructions

1. Thaw.
2. Put chili into a microwave-safe bowl.
3. Heat in intervals of 30 seconds until heated through.

Ground Beef

She wanted to have some cooked ground beef available so she could make it into a quick taco with a low-carb tortilla, add it to a salad or top a sweet potato. She kept it simple by just seasoning it with salt, pepper, and garlic.

Ingredients

• 7 lbs. hamburger
• Garlic
• Salt
• Pepper

Food Preparation Day Instructions

1. Brown the hamburger until cooked.
2. Drain the fat off and rinse.
3. Season with garlic, salt, and pepper adding small amounts until it tastes good to you.

Cooking Day Instructions

1. Thaw.
2. Put into a microwave-safe bowl.
3. Heat in intervals of 30 seconds until heated through.

Slow-Cooker Meal Directions

Each of the following is what we call dump meals. A dump meal is when you dump all the ingredients into the instant pot or slow cooker and let it cook all together.

On our prep day, we prepared all the ingredients and then packaged them into a plastic freezer bag to be prepared on the day of cooking.

Now, before we go any further, let’s talk about storing the food so it is safe from the elements. This food is an investment and we want to protect it so it would last all semester as she had planned. She was investing quite a bit of time and money into this project.

Plastic Freezer Bags

I always buy the name brand freezer Ziplock bags. Now, I love to save money on generic products but this is one place I do not skimp. The difference figures out to be about $0.03 per bag. Based on my experience, I feel like it is worth it for the peace of mind and the time you will save in fiddling with the packages to make sure they seal correctly.

Last quick tip, make sure you get as much air as you can out of the bags before putting them in the freezer. Not only will keep your food longer, but it will make storage easier in your freezer.

Label Every Meal

Nobody likes mystery meals so make sure you label every single bag that goes into the freezer. I use a permanent marker. We labeled each bag with the recipe name and any prep instructions she needed for the day of cooking.

We prepared each of these meals four times. The ingredients and recipes below are for one meal so we quadrupled our ingredients to get the supplies we needed to make four meals.

Red Pepper Chicken

Ingredients

• 1 pound boneless skinless chicken breasts, fat trimmed
• 1–2 medium-sized red bell pepper, sliced
• 1 small yellow onion, sliced or diced
• 4 large garlic cloves, minced
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

https://thefamilyfreezer.com/2014/09/25/crockpot-red-pepper-chicken-recipe/

Food Preparation Day Instructions

1. Label the freezer bags with the name of the meal.
2. Slice the red bell peppers.
3. Slice the onions.
4. Place all ingredients in a freezer bag.
5. Seal and freeze.

Cooking Day Directions

1. Thaw.
2. Dump the freezer meal packet into the slow cooker.
3. Cook on low for 4-6 hours or on high for 6-8 hours until chicken is cooked through.

Beef and Sweet Potato Chili

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 pounds 85% lean ground beef
• 1 yellow onion, diced
• 2 bell peppers (any color), chopped
• 2 medium-sized sweet potatoes (1 pound), peeled and diced
• 2 cans tomato sauce (15oz each)
• 14.5oz can diced tomatoes, undrained
• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper (increase to 1 teaspoon for medium-heat)
• 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes

Whole30 Compliant Crockpot Chili Recipe

Food Preparation Day Instructions

1. Label the freezer bags with the name of the meal.
2. Dice the onions.
3. Slice the peppers.
4. Peel and dice the sweet potatoes.
5. Combine all the ingredients into a freezer bag.
6. Seal and Freeze.

Cooking Day Instructions

1. Thaw.
2. Dump freezer meal packet into the slow cooker.
3. Cook on low for 6-8 hours.
4. Stir before serving.

Crack Chicken

Ingredients

• 2 pounds boneless chicken breasts
• 1/2 cup real bacon bits (they’re bigger than the pieces)
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon parsley
• 1 tablespoon onion powder
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon dill
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 8oz cream cheese (on the day of cooking)

Slow Cooker Crack Chicken Recipe

Food Preparation Day Instructions

1. Label the freezer bags with the name of the meal.
2. Combine all the ingredients except the cream cheese into the freezer bag.
3. Seal and freeze.

Cooking Day Directions

1. Thaw.
2. Dump the freezer meal packet into the slow-cooker.
3. Cook on low for 4-6 hours until chicken is cooked through.
4. Shred the chicken,
5. Add the cream cheese and cook for 5 minutes.
6. Stir and serve.

Chicken Fajitas

Ingredients

• 2 lbs boneless skinless chicken breasts
• 3 bell peppers (I use two red and one green)
• 1 sweet yellow onion sliced
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• Juice from one lime (about 3 tablespoons)
• 1 tbsp chili powder
• 2 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
• 1 tsp salt

https://www.thirtyhandmadedays.com/healthy-slow-cooker-chicken-fajitas/

Food Preparation Day Instructions

1. Label the freezer bags with the name of the meal.
2. Slice the peppers.
3. Slice the onions.
4. Combine all the ingredients into the freezer bag.
5. Seal and freeze.

Cooking Day Directions

1. Thaw.
2. Cook on low for 6-8 hours until chicken is cooked through.
3. Shred the chicken.
4. Serve.

Dessert

According to my niece, every college student eats cookies. So we planned for her to have a couple of sweet options that fit into her lifestyle. She baked these ahead of time and packed them in individual portions so she could just grab it to satisfy her craving.

Pumpkin Healthy Cookies

Ingredients

• 1 cup pumpkin puree
• 2 cups quick oats
• 1/4 cup maple syrup
• 1/2 cup peanut butter
• 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
• chocolate chips or sugar-free chocolate chips – OPTIONAL

5 Ingredient Healthy Pumpkin Cookies

Food Preparation Day Instructions

1. Label freezer bag with the name of the cookies.
2. Bake the cookies according to the recipe above.
3. Let them cool.
4. Wrap the desired amount of cookies for each portion in plastic wrap.
5. Place all the cookies in the freezer bag.
6. Freeze.

No-Bake Chocolate Coconut Bars

Ingredients

• 1 cup Almond Butter
• 1 1/4 cup sugar-free chocolate chips
• 1 tbsp monk fruit sweetener
• 1/2 cup unrefined coconut oil
• 1 1/2 cups unsweetened shredded coconut and some for topping
• 1 cup of raw almonds
• 1 cup of walnuts chopped
• 1 cup of unsalted roasted cashews chopped
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Cooking Day Directions

1. Melt coconut oil, almond butter, sugar-free chocolate chips, monk fruit sweetener, and vanilla extract on low heat on stove till fully melted
2. Then add the remainder of the ingredients to the mixture and fully combined
3. Put the mix in a 8 x 8 pan with parchment paper
4. Put in the fridge for 4 hours, once set up cut into squares
5. Label a freezer bag with the cookie bar name.
6. Wrap each cookie bar individually in plastic wrap.
7. Place in the freezer bag and freeze.

Shopping

After we had determined the amount of each recipe we were going to make, we figured out our grocery list and went shopping. Before we left the house, we estimated how much eat item was going to cost us so we had a rough idea of how much money she was going to be spending.

For some tips and tricks to save money on the grocery bill, check this post out:

Where Big Families Shop for Groceries

Sam’s Club had the best prices on the meats she needed. She purchased a ten-pound roll of hamburger. She bought the frozen chicken breast in ten- pound bags from their freezer aisle.

Aldi had the best prices on fresh produce and dry beans. We calculated that we needed a total of twenty-four peppers and so we saved a bundle. We also bought our sweet potatoes and onions here too.

Walmart was the best place for canned goods like tomato sauce and diced tomatoes since we needed to limit our sugar. We also purchased our freezer plastic bags here too.

When it was all said and done she spent about $145.

Cooking Day

We made a plan for how we were going to cook all this food.

• The first thing we did was write a list on our dry erase board with each prep step we needed to do for each recipe.
• Then we labeled our ziplock bags with the recipe name and cooking instructions since her full meals were dump meals.

Here is a pic of the board and our to-do list:

Emily divided her ground chuck, dividing three pounds between the Beef and Sweet Potato Chili bags. She cooked the remainder seven pounds, let it cool and divided it into individual portions.

I calculated how much each meal got and divided the raw chicken into the labeled freezer bags.

Once we had the meat all done, we tag-teamed it and worked through each recipe chopping and adding the veggies to each meal. The most time-consuming part was chopping the vegetables.

The chicken chili we cooked overnight in the instant pot because we used fresh beans. We let it cool before we bagged it up.

What was the final result?

When we were all done she ended up with 123 meal portions and about 4 dozen baked items. It averaged about $1 per individual portion! Better than a college meal plan and a good way to battle the “Freshman Fifteen.” She was choosing to be healthy, save some time and money.

Freezer Inventory

Single-Serve Meals

• 5 Chicken Caprese
• 25 One-cup portions of Chicken Chili
• 24 1/2 cup portions seasoned hamburger meat

Slow-Cooker Meals

• 4 Sweet Potato and Beef Chili
• 4 Red Pepper Chicken
• 4 Crack Chicken
• 4 Chicken Fajitas

Desserts

• 3 Dozen Pumpkin Healthy Cookies
• 16 No-Bake Chocolate Bars

We had so much fun doing this! I hope it helps her as she starts her new adventure. I can’t believe she’s headed for college! Excuse me, while I go cry. Tears of joy, of course!

Check out our YouTube video to see how we did it and hear from the college student.

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