Is dinnertime getting you down?
I know how overwhelming dinnertime can be, especially when you have kids. These chicken dump freezer meals make dinnertime so easy! You can honestly prepare 7 meals in under an hour. That’s a full week’s worth of meals all ready to go!
Free time is not something I have a lot of these days. My guess is, it’s not something you have a lot of extra either. Because of that, cooking dinner has to be a quick and easy kind of thing if we want to stay out of the drive-through line.
One of the best tricks I know to simplify dinner is to take advantage of my slow cooker and keep my freezer stashed with frozen meals so I can cook once and eat all week. That not only saves on prep work but cleanup is so much easier too! These are a few of my favorite chicken dump freezer meals. You can cook 7 (or more) meals in less than an hour and have amazing dinners all week long!
Need some more chicken dump freezer meal ideas? Check out our second chicken dump freezer meal menu plan featuring more of our favorites!
Want to download this freezer meal plan complete with grocery list? Click here and we will send them to you.
On the Menu – Chicken Dump Recipes for the Full Week!
These meals are designed to be quick to prepare and easy to freeze. They are also some of my family’s favorites!
- Salsa Chicken (2)
- Pesto Ranch Chicken
- Hawaiian Chicken (2)
- Sweet Mustard Chicken (2)
Grocery List
You can certainly make each of these recipes separately (or make 7 of one dish if you prefer). If you want to make all of them at once these are the ingredients you will need.
- 10 pounds of chicken – You can adjust this a bit based on your family size. Each freezer meal works bested with 4-6 chicken breasts so if you use more or less than that you’ll want to adjust the other ingredients.
- Salsa
- 1 packet ranch mix
- small jar of pesto
- rice wine vinegar
- dijon mustard
- maple syrup
- 4 cups chicken broth
- 2 cans of pineapple chunks (20 oz. each)
- 4 Tb. brown sugar
- 1/2 cup white wine vinegar
- 4 tsp. soy sauce
- 4 garlic cloves
- 2 bell peppers
- 6 T. cornstarch
Before we get started cooking, I have a few tips to simplify the process. Bulk cooking can get overwhelming. I don’t want you to get frustrated because this really can be so simple to do.
Want to download this freezer meal plan complete with grocery list? Click here and we will send them to you.
How to Make Chicken Dump Meals
There are some easy things that you can do to really simplify the process of making chicken dump meals. Once you do this a few times you’ll figure out what works for you. This is what I like to do:
- Use gallon size freezer bags. I like the bigger gallon size freezer bags for freezer meals. That gives you lots of extra room to work with. If you are planning on freezing your meals for more than 2-3 weeks, I’d highly recommend using a Food Saver. A Food Saver sucks all the air out of the bag and seals it completely so the food lasts a lot longer and tends to not get freezer burn.
- Use freezer bag stands. It’s a bit tricky filling freezer bags if you don’t have a second person to help you. I LOVE these freezer bag stands and am definitely using them the next time I make chicken dump freezer meals. They make the process so much easier and they are only $10 for 2 of them!
- Label all your bags before you begin cooking. It’s so much easier to label your bags before your hands are covered in food. Knowing what is going in each bag also makes it easier to keep track of what you are putting where when you are cooking multiple recipes at the same time.
- Prepare all the chicken first. I like to add all the chicken to the freezer bags before I start working with other ingredients. That way I can trim all the chicken and get my cooking surfaces cleaned before I start pulling out all the other ingredients. Be kind to yourself and use kitchen scissors to trim your chicken. When you are working with this much meat it is a huge time saver.
- Work on one recipe at a time. Once you have all your protein prepared, I like to stick to one recipe at a time so I don’t get mixed up. If I’m doubling a recipe, I’ll use two separate containers to measure ingredients into so I don’t have to worry about one freezer meal ending up with more ingredients than another.
- Mix ingredients together after they are added to the bag. I dump all the ingredients into the freezer bags and AFTER I have added ingredients for all the recipes I squish the chicken around in the bag to mix it before sealing.
- After sealing, lay each freezer meal flat on a baking sheet to freeze. They will be much easier to stack in your freezer this way.
Ready for the recipes? Go to the next page to get them.
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These look delicious and super easy! Thanks for the detailed lists and great pictures!
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I hope they can help you out. These have been a huge timesaver for me on busy weeks!
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How much would you say is a small jar if pesto? I have homemade pesto frozen into ice cubes.
I want to say the jar I used was about 8 oz but you can make this to taste. I like a lot of pesto (especially since I mix this with noodles when I serve it) but you could certainly do whatever amount you like. I’d just be careful to do enough that the chicken doesn’t get dry when you cook it.
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What do you recommend for those who buy the prefrozen chicken breast bags? Leave them frozen and add the sauce, rinse off the glaze, or thaw and freeze again?
I’d leave them frozen and just throw them in the freezer bags with all the ingredients. I do that with frozen chicken thighs all the time. It turns out great!
For the Hawaiian chicken, do you drain the can of pineapple chunks or include the liquid? Thanks.
I include the liquid. You could probably do it either way but without the liquid you’ll need to add some back in when you go to cook.
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I am confused by the ingredient list. All but one recipe says it’s for 2. But the ingredient list does not accommodate that. Am I supposed to make 2 of those recipes, or am I supposed to divide those recipes into 2 freezer bags? The ingredients are comparable to other freezer meals to make 2, but the chicken seems like it’s only enough to make one…does that makes sense?
So sorry it was confusing. I make each recipe separately so I can make sure that each freezer bag has equal ingredients. You could just double the recipe and put half in each bag but I’ve found I always end up with one having more liquid than the other and with freezer meals the liquid is so important.
Thank you, I just wanted to make sure I had the right portions, Im excited, thank you so much for sharing these recipes 🙂
Wow! It looks so tasty. I want to make it on my own. But is it ok if I make the dish without brown sugar?
You could certainly try it. If you do, I’d love to hear how it turns out!
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How would you adjust cooking times for each recipe if you cook them in an Instant Pot?
For most of these, I’d do about 16 minutes at pressure in the Instant pot with natural release.
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I used to lay my freezer meal bags flat to freeze them, but I’ve found that I can cook them in a slow-cooker from frozen! So now I just stand the bags up and make sure the shape of the frozen meal will fit inside my slow-cooker. To release the frozen meal from the freezer bag, just rinse it under hot water for a minute. It will then slide right out into your slow cooker. Cook on low 8-12 hours.