Friend's Mom - Help

[MDefarge]

I just found out that a good friend's mom is dying and according to the Dr has, at the most, two months to live.  Obviously no one in their house feels very much like cooking right now, so this weekend I was planning on making 5 or 6 meals that can be frozen for them to eat whenever they need to. 

I'm planning on making the traditional pasta dish (most likely ziti) and possibly meat loaf, but was looking for some suggestions for dishes that can travel a short distance and freeze/re-heat well.  Recipes that serve 6-8 would be ideal because that way they could have 2 meals from one dish.  I feel terrible saying it but I'm on a bit of a budget so more economical meals would be especially welcome. Thank you all in advance. 

[Shoo]

Spaghetti sauce. 

But before you make all that food, have you ascertained that they have a freezer to store it in?  Some folks don't....

[MDefarge]

I know they have a regular freezer, but I was also thinking of bringing the food over 2 at a time, and storing whatever they couldn't fit in my parent's stand alone freezer.

[MDefarge]

faussonl I'd love the pot pie recipe.

[Harriet Jones]

Country Chicken Pot Pie (makes 2)
1 c chopped onions
1 c chopped celery
1 c chopped carrots
1/3 c butter, melted
1/2 c flour
2 c chicken broth
1 c half & half or evaporated milk
4 c chopped, cooked chicken
1 c frozen peas, thawed
1 1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
4 pie crusts (folded Pillsbury pie crusts)
Preheat oven to 375*.
Saute 1st 3 ingred in butter in a large skillet over medium heat until tender. Add flour; stir til smooth. Cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Add chicken broth and half&half or evaporated milk. Cook, stirring constantly until thinkened and bubbly. Stir in chicken, peas, salt and pepper.

while the filling is cooling, assemble bottom crusts - do not bake and do not flute/crimp edges yet. Divide filling in half and put in bottom crusts. Assemble top crusts. Pinch the edges of the 2 crusts together and then flute or crimp. Make slits in top crust for steam to escape.

Bake uncovered for 30 min. Then bake covered with foil 30 more minutes. Let rest 10 min before serving.

Note: If you want to eat one and freeze the other, put the filling for one in a ziploc bag and freeze, getting as much air out as possible. Just defrost in the microware and assemble, baking as above. Freeze the crusts too!
 

[DottyG]

Can I add (to the Chicken Pot Pie recipe - which sounds yummy, by the way) that you can get tart shells (basically, the same dough as the Pillsbury big ones) that are the perfect size for individual pot pies.  Look for them in your freezer case.  That might even work better, as the family may not have as much of an appetite all at once where a big pie would be needed.

The shells are the perfect size, and you can use one for the bottom and invert one for the top of the pie.

[evil_xylo]

A good beef stew might be nice.  I can't say that I have a recipe really, I just throw 1-2lbs of beef (either stew meat or a roast that has been cubed), a bunch of carrots and celery (about a cup or two of veggies total), and about 2-4 potatos cut up into a crock pot or oven bag with 4-5 cups of water and beef stew season and cook.  When the beef is done I then thicken it with potato flakes.  Everyone seems to love it made this way.

I think the whole pot cost around or less than $8 depending on the price of beef and has served 4 adults (two of which had 3 bowls each) and 3 children.

[Arianoor]

Calzones work well being frozen and re-heated, plus you can make a bunch of different varieties and use cheap cuts of meat.

Jumblaya or dirty rice also survive freezing well, if you use turkey/chicken sausage or ground turkey/chicken they can be pretty healthy, too.

I'll keep thinking and get back to you.