chick-chat
This is how we swap it
Posted by
guest on
04.30.09 |
8 Comments
Short Link: http://onceamonthmom.com/?p=1983
Print This Post
Have you thought about doing a meal swap with friends or neighbors? A reader has started one and wants to share with you how she organizes and plans for a local meal swap with friends.
Dinner's with instructions laid out for freezer meal swap.
About 4 months ago, I came across the idea of a freezer meal swap. Immediately, I knew I had to start one. I talked with a few friends from church and they were ‘in’! I got to work researching exactly what needed to be done to make it run as smoothly as possible. Our first swap happened (I won’t dare say it went off without a hitch!) and we learned a lot about what we needed to change! When it came time for our second swap, things went much better and the process is practically seamless now.
Some information about our group – it is constantly changing. We are in a Seminary town and a Seminary church. Life events are always coming up that make it impossible for one person to be a part of every single swap – preaching and teaching opportunities, class work, family events, etc…. Each month, the groups are changed (I’ll explain in more detail below).
I pick a date for the swap to happen and email anyone who may be interested. I ask them to email me by a certain date (usually a week later) how many will be eating in their family (our family, for example, has 4 people, but only 3 eat as our 8 month old isn’t ready to chow down on some chili yet!), any allergies or major dislikes (no allergies for us, and we do not like fish or mushrooms) and then three recipes. I also email the time line for the swap (example below):
- Initial contact email sent on April 1.
- Must respond by April 8th to participate.
- I respond following day with meal choices.
- Meal votes take place between April 9th and 16th.
- Swap will take place May 2nd.
Once everyone has emailed me, I divide everyone into groups based on family size. Usually we have 2 groups with 5-6 families in each group – one group has families with 2-3 people eating and the other is 4 or more eaters.
I then email out the recipes for everyone to vote on, the most popular recipes from each person is what that person will make (for example, I might submit Chili, French Bread pizzas and Calzones. Calzones gets the most votes, so that is the meal I will make). Everyone usually has about a week to get their votes in.
When it comes time for the swap, everyone meets at our house, lays the already cooked meals on the table next to the family names. Once everyone is there, everyone grabs their meals and heads home to enjoy!
Terra lives in North Carolina with her husband, Zach, and two boys, Keaton (2) and Benjamin (8 months). She is a SAHM while Zach attends Seminary. She blogs at http://thejonesjourney.blogspot.com/.
Tags: freezer swap, guest post
8 Responses to “This is how we swap it”
Leave a Reply
Additional comments powered by BackType
I love this – thank you for explaining how you do it! I’ve been thinking about doing this with a group of ladies from church, but have been nervous. I guess I thought there would be more to it than I want to take on, but your explanation makes it sound completely do-able!
I think that’s a great idea. In reading your post, I assume that everyone else invited sends out some meal choices to vote on too? I don’t see our neighbors being interested in this, but I may have to put the suggestion out there. Sounds like a great way to get people together, too.
I started a Freezer Swap several months ago too and I LOVE it!! I love always having easy meals on hand, and I also love that we get to try so many new recipes. We’ve already found some lifelong favorites that I never would have tried on my own! It’s such a simple, and fun way to share with friends and make dinner times easier. I based our group organization around the tips from 30Day Gourmet’s CO-Op cooking e-book!
Mary – it is SO doable! I love it! I look forward to every swap!
Cheryl – Sorry, I guess I could have explained it a bit better
But yes, everyone who is interested sends me 3 recipes that the rest of the group votes one 
Each persons most popular recipe is the one they make (did that make sense? I can’t figure out how to word it right, lol) 
Kelly – Isn’t is fun! I’ll have to look at 30day gourmet’s ebook! Thanks for that!
My MOMS Club has ben doing this for a while now. We prepare the meal we will be bringing for the other family, and one to share with the group. We sample the dishes and have a wonderful lunch socializing with each other, then we swap meals. ITs really nice to be able to have nice lunch with good friends while the kiddos play, and then to know that one busy night during the week, dinner is already taken care of by another great mom!
so do you make one for everyone in your group (so you’d be bringing home about 5 meals with you) or do you only bring one?
you make one for everyone in the group
It’s so wonderful to have almost a week’s worth of different meals in the freezer when all is said & done!
I have been thinking about this for a while too and love the easy explanation you give! My question is do you try to have people make recipes that are easily freezable and are they fully cooked meals, or just meals that are frozen all ready to be cooked, but you don’t actually cook them until the day that you eat them? As you can probably tell, I am new to the whole freezer meal thing, but LOVING learning more about it!