Insta-dinner!

Tonight, we reached into our freezer, pulled out a delicious, homemade lasagna and stuck it into our oven to cook for an hour. The best part? We didn't make it! We didn't buy it. We didn't do a darn thing, actually! 

We are living the dream here at Tiny Wallet Style thanks to our newly established neighborhood meal co-op! Inspired by this New York Times article, we decided to poll our neighbors and gauge interest in forming our own dinner co-op right here in Boston. 

Suffice it to say, this was an idea that got people excited. We scheduled our first swap for early February and it was a complete success. Ethiopian beef stew, chicken enchiladas, pork and raisin sauce and more. So far, the meals that we've tried have been amazingly good- we're counting our lucky stars to have such culinary genius neighbors! 

We're super excited about the next swap in a few weeks and hope that it will become a neighborhood fixture that inspires wonderful, neighborly camaraderie and some serious money saving! 

Our guidelines (so far): 


-groups are limited to 4-5 people/couples
-we'll swap once a month, initially. Hopefully in the future we can increase the frequency
-all meals need to serve 4. That leaves us enough for dinner and leftovers!
-meals should be frozen before the swap, that way they can be put right into the freezer
-we e-mail our group members what we're making about a week before we swap to avoid repeats
-include heating instructions and a recipe, if possible (this is mainly to avoid food allergies if you're serving guests- we cleared all allergies/aversions with group members prior to the swap)

There's Mike (doesn't he look excited?) and our newest member of the dinner co-op, our neighbor's precious little daughter!