Master Your Meal Plan
Let’s talk about domestic harmony, and solving the question of ‘what’s for dinner?’
Did you know that we can spend upwards of 40% more on impulse purchases when we shop without a list? A lot of that extra ‘throw it in your cart’ food goes to waste. In fact, an average family wastes about 25% of food purchased. That’s a lot of moolah, folks.
My solution? MEAL PLAN! A family could pretty much eliminate food waste, and significantly reduce their grocery bill just by getting organized and making a plan. Besides saving the headache and money, here’s a few more positives to meal planning:
More family dinners - when you have your week laid out on paper, you can factor in practices, later office nights, etc. so that you can all eat together.
I mentioned domestic harmony - everyone gets a say, and the plan is there… no battles or going back and forth. Now this doesn’t mean we can’t be flexible. We most certainly can change what we listed for Tuesday and have it on Wednesday if it works better!
Healthier - more dinners are made from scratch, eliminating unnecessary additives. Try new things, it’s easy when you plan in advance.
Happier - It’s frustrating trying to scrounge something from the cupboard and fridge, or frantically racing through the aisles after a long day, right? I bet you’ll be a lot more excited to cook if you have everything you need to succeed.
More eating in - Now, we do want to encourage supporting local businesses, and we’ll factor in at least one to four nights a month for that. If you meal plan, there will be less impromptu fast food visits or restaurants where you may not be making the healthiest of decisions.
If this is all new to you, I recommend planning just one week of meals on a day where you have time as a family to deliberate and go shopping. We order our groceries for delivery, so we meal plan and order groceries online in the same day. Things like coupons, or on-sale items are already factored into my app.
What You’ll Need:
-I have set up an etsy shop with the meal planning tool I designed and use every week. Here’s the link if you’re into google sheets and/or would like to download and print on a weekly basis. Once you download, it’s open for you to change, edit, add to, or manipulate in any way you like. In it, you’ll find full instructions, two different templates to choose from, a recipe load in, and a full grocery list to help with organizing the weekly trip to the store.
-If you’re not into the already made tool, go ahead and grab:
A pen
Paper
Coupons
Recipes or things you’d like to try
How to Begin:
Blank space and too many options make things difficult. Here’s a few tips on choosing a method and making this easy:
Determine what meals you are planning: Is lunch provided at your workplace? Maybe you only need dinners? Do you need separate lunch plans for adults and kids? Factor all of this in.
Start with your proteins: If you shop in bulk at places like Costco, you may have lots of chicken breast, ground turkey, or individualized salmon to use. On your weekly map, start by writing down Monday: chicken, Tuesday: Salmon, Wednesday: Veggie Main, etc.
Divvy up meal types: This helps with adding in variety, but cutting down on the options. On your weekly map start by writing down Monday: Pasta, Tuesday, Taco Night, Wednesday: Pizza, Thursday: Soup, etc.
Think about making more than one meal out of one: Can one or all of you enjoy Taco night leftovers the next day for lunch? Can you make Monday’s chili become Wednesday’s potato topping? Can you turn the shredded chicken from Thursday’s pasta into a soup for Saturday?
Include seasonal produce: Whatever is in season, is going to be cheaper, helps source food locally, and is super easy to plan around. Corn in season? Just google ‘corn recipes’ and bada-boom, your in business.
Determine your ‘fall-on' meals: Brainstorm those meals that everyone in your family loves. Can you come up with 10-20? In your weekly map, scatter those meals and then leave 2-3 nights a week where you try something new or maybe this night you go out. These ‘fall on’ meals can be repeated over and over again, especially if you know all members enjoy them - maybe you change up one ingredient for variety.
Your freezer is your friend: Even if you don’t shop in bulk, you can easily buy the 12 pack of buns at a lower cost with the idea of freezing half for something next week. Once you become savvy at weekly meal planning, you might expand to monthly planning where you plot a few known ideas way in advance.
Ok, I have my method, now what? Details!
USING A TEMPLATE: Did you download my easy meal planning template? Follow these steps:
Choose your preferred layout option from either 1 or 2.
Enter your start date.
Enter your breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snack plans for each day using the method of choice from above. (If only planning out dinners, leave everything else blank).
Copy and paste any new recipes you are trying for the week into the tab labeled weekly recipes.
Highlight grocery items that you need for each day to create your master grocery list.
Print or have phone available to access sheets and/or grocery list and shop!
USING PEN + PAPER: Here’s how to do this with pen and paper:
Create a grid with columns as the days of the week - and rows for the meals - breakfast, lunch, dinner, snack.
Enter breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snack plans for each day using method of choice from above.
Note or transfer any new recipes you are trying below the day or on back of meal plan paper.
On a separate piece of paper, list ingredients needed to create your grocery list.
Take list and shop!
My take-away tips:
-Download the easy meal planning template I’ve created!
-This should be fun! Carve out time to plan as a family or jot down notes throughout the week of new things you want to try. Creating the meal plan should make cooking in the kitchen fun, exciting, and easy.
-Involve all family members. Their opinions matter.
-Start buying in bulk, and utilize your freezer.
-Be flexible. I mentioned this above - you have your plan, and midweek (Wednesday) turns into a crazy day…just change this day to takeout if you need to. Or, sub in Friday’s plan since it was hamburgers. No stress. The key is that you have all your ingredients and things you need to create dinner already in your house.
-Prep ahead. Is there a sauce you can make over the weekend for a weeknight dinner? Are there vegetables you can chop for tomorrow while you’re waiting for the chicken in the oven? Can you make something on Monday to freeze for Friday?
-Invest in a chalkboard, whiteboard, or something to post the weekly meals in the kitchen. This way everyone is aware of the plan, and might even be able to help start cooking since they were involved with the planning! Here’s a few options: 1. chalkboard, 2. chalkboard, 3. whiteboard, 4. whiteboard
-Plan to eat together. This is most important! Meal planning is all about making your life easier, but it’s also just as important to plan to spend time together. Times are stressful right now, the food we make shouldn’t be.
Deep breath. You. Can. Do. It.
This may seem like a lot ya’ll. Once you begin planning once a week, you’ll quickly see how much time and money you are saving. Let’s have the ‘what’s for dinner’ conversation just once a week when we plan, instead of every single day.
Have questions? Send me an email!
