Belinda from Dinners in the Freezer shares a few great ideas on how to stretch a whole chicken…or 3!
I thought I would share with you all what our family ate last week from 3 roasting chickens that I prepared. I love seeing how far I can stretch my grocery dollar! (Erin here: She’s a girl after my own heart!) I have 7 children, 4 of them still at home, and we homeschool so cooking and eating are a big part of my day.
First off I got a wonderful deal at Krogers on the roasting chickens. They were the all natural hormone free ones and were on sale for .59 a pound. Excellent deal. I bought 3 large ones and put them to roast Sunday morning on the way out the door in my large electric roaster. I also tossed in some carrots and potatoes. YUMMM.
Our first meal was one of the roasted chickens for dinner that day. I love coming home to the smell of lunch permeating throughout the house. We often have sauerkraut chicken but today was the whole chickens roasted with veggies.
Monday I made chicken salad for lunch with the white meat from one of the other two chickens. Chopped chicken, onions, celery, mayonnaise and Italian seasoning. I took the rest of the meat off of the two chickens for to use in upcoming meals, detailed below. Then I cooked all three chicken carcasses and made homemade broth for soup. Always save your chicken & turkey carcass!! You will have an endless supply of free broth!
After removing the bones from the broth and the tiny pieces of meat left on the bone (using a strainer), I added the leftover veggies from Sunday’s meal, some chopped celery, a bag of frozen veggies and seasoning. This made a large pot full of Chicken Veggie Soup, so there will be plenty of leftovers for lunch on Monday. That’s a total of 4 meals so far.
Wednesday I used about ½ of the leftover chicken meat to make a broccoli, chicken and stuffing casserole, a favorite at our house. Then, on Thursday I prepared a Chicken Stir-fry with the rest of the chicken meat.
Our family loves chicken so it wasn’t a problem for us to eat it all week. If your family likes more variety during the week, you could always roast the 3 chickens and prepare a few disheds and then freeze them for the following week/month. Out of the three chickens I got for a bargain price of just $.59/lb, I was able to make 6 meals – 7 if you count our weekly leftover night. Planning ahead will help save both time and money!
Belinda J Mooney is a freelance writer and homeschool mom of 7. You can visit her sites at Dinners in the Freezer, Cooking with Kids & Learning Treasures.
Photo Credit: Joffer
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
That is awesome!!! I shy away from whole chickens, but at that price who can resist?
What a great way to stretch a chicken! I buy whole chickens, but usually end up cooking it and freezing the meat. It would be so much fun to try this technique and have meals for the whole week!
awesome way to stretch your dollar and the chicken looks good
Just an FYI, the “no hormones” you see on chicken is an advertising gimmick; the FDA does not allow hormone use in poultry.
I love cooking whole chickens. They always look so impressive not to mention taste wonderful. I actually JUST posted a whole chicken recipe at my blog, and a giveaway too!
Great post! Keep ‘em coming!!
Do you need to have a roasting pan to roast a chicken? Can you roast it another way?
I do mine in the crockpot! Low for 10 hours.