Preparing a few make-ahead freezer meal recipes can help you stick to your healthy eating plan and take the guesswork out of what to eat. Bonus – if there’s a time you’re behind on grocery shopping, you’ll always have a meal ready in your freezer! Even having one meal per week prepped and frozen can help in managing a busy schedule.
Whether you’ve already undergone bariatric surgery or are preparing for it, now is the perfect time to work on getting your freezer stocked with healthy freezer meal recipes. Planning ahead can help make recovery and transitioning through post-operative diet phases easier. You’ll rest easier knowing your freezer is stocked with nourishing and nutritionally balanced meals.
Plenty of recipes, including casseroles, chili, and even egg bakes tend to freeze and reheat well. There are also crockpot freezer meal recipes specially designed to go straight from the freezer to the slow cooker. Here are 9 bariatric friendly make ahead freezer meal recipes. These recipes are easy to make, low in carbohydrates, good sources of protein, and were all created by Registered Dietitians.
Low Carb Breakfast Burritos – by Bariatric Meal Prep
Breakfast is one of the easiest meals to skip when you’re short on time. That all changes when you have easy to heat and eat breakfast burritos stashed in the freezer. This recipe stuffs low-carb tortillas with scrambled eggs, veggies, and cheese. This is an adaptable recipe, since you can change up the veggies and add extra protein like turkey bacon. To freeze, simply wrap individual assembled burritos tightly in aluminum foil and reheat in the microwave for an on the go breakfast.
Sweet Potato Turkey Sausage Egg Bake – by The Real Food Dietitians
Eggs freeze surprisingly well and, with just 7 ingredients, this egg bake requires minimal time to assemble. You can enjoy this high protein, veggie packed recipe for breakfast or as a breakfast for dinner. Assemble and bake ahead of time, let cool, and then freeze either the entire casserole or divide into individual portions to wrap and freeze.
Low Carb Chicken Enchilada Casserole – by Bariatric Meal Prep
This casserole has everything you need to enjoy a low-carbohydrate Mexican inspired main dish. Because the ingredient list is so simple – just roasted chicken breasts, cheese, store-bought enchilada sauce, and fresh cilantro – it’s easy to customize based on your dietary preferences. You can add beans or extra non-starchy vegetables like broccoli or zucchini to the casserole. There are no tortillas in this casserole, but if you can tolerate them or your family enjoys them, serve corn or low-carb tortillas on the side and fill them with the casserole for easy enchilada wraps. To freeze: cook chicken and assemble as directed but skip baking. Cover and freeze the casserole dish so all you have to do is thaw and heat until the cheese melts and enchilada sauce is bubbly.
Greek Meatloaf Muffins – by Abbey’s Kitchen
Here’s a recipe that combines the convenience of meal prep with portion control. Ground beef is seasoned with traditional Greek flavors, like fresh mint, parsley, and feta cheese and then shaped into mini meatloaves and baked in muffin tins. The meatloaves themselves are not a complete meal, but you can easily reheat them and use them to top a big salad or add non-starchy vegetables, like mashed cauliflower and a green on the side.
Crockpot BBQ Mushroom Chicken – by Lively Table
This is a high protein, cheesy barbecue chicken inspired dish. You can cook this recipe in one pot as written or in the slow cooker and then freeze. Alternatively, you can combine the raw ingredients in a storage bag and freeze to cook later in the slow cooker for 3-4 hours on high. Serve with a green salad, cauliflower rice, or other non-starchy vegetable. You could also shred the chicken and use it to make sandwiches on low-carb bread or buns, if you tolerate them.
Slow Cooker Chicken Chile Verde Stew – by The Real Food Dietitians
This easy slow cooker recipe uses canned green chiles and store bought salsa verde to make a quick and mildly spicy chicken stew. Potatoes are the main source of carbohydrates in the stew, but they’re also an excellent source of vitamins and minerals (leave the skins on!). If you prefer to cut back on the carbohydrates even further, you can reduce the amount of potatoes or omit them completely.
Turkey Chili – by Bariatric Meal Prep
Chili is one of the best recipes to meal prep. It’s extremely versatile, so you can swap out the ground turkey in this recipe for ground beef or omit animal protein all together. While meat based chilis tend to have more protein, it’s easy to create a vegetarian chili using a variety of beans and/or lentils. You can also add chopped sweet potatoes for a different taste and extra fiber and antioxidants. This recipe is written for the Instant Pot, but includes directions for slower cooker and stove top cooking as well. Make a batch and freeze for a quick, protein packed thaw and heat meal.
Turkey Mushroom Bolognese – The Real Food Dietitians
This bolognese is extra meaty in texture thanks to ground turkey, mushrooms, and bacon. There are instructions for cooking it in the Instant Pot, slow cooker, and stove top. You can also make this bolognese with ground beef. Serve the bolognese atop naturally low-carb “pasta” – aka spaghetti squash. Check out this how-to for easy instructions on roasting and freezing spaghetti squash.
Healthy Pizza Soup – by Abbey’s Kitchen
This soup recreates all the flavors of pizza night without the crust. It’s high in protein thanks to turkey sausage and packs in several servings of non-starchy vegetables, including tomatoes, peppers, onion, and mushrooms. To make this soup freezer friendly, cook soup without adding the cheese topping, let cool, and then transfer to a freezer safe storage container. When you’re ready to eat it, simply thaw in a pot on the stove top, transfer to bowls, and top with mozzarella cheese.
These are just a few ideas for make-ahead freezer recipes. Many of the recipes in my collection can be prepped ahead and frozen, check them out here.
