Want to talk about something really boring and tedious while you're at it, but ultimately fulfilling and time saving once you're done? No? Okay. I'll wait while you go read something else. But if you ARE totally into tedious things like I am, let's chat! Meal planning. There are ways to make this really, really complicated and while my way certainly isn't EASY, it's not terribly difficult either.
First, backstory. We don't have a grocery store in our town aside from overpriced neighborhood markets ($2.50 for a 4 oz yogurt), so grocery shopping is ideally a once a week thing since we have to go to the next town over. It's not super far, but it's inconvenient enough to try and avoid daily trips. We're pescatarian. AC can't eat meat- no chicken/turkey/pork/beef. Without getting into a long drawn out explanation, there's a protein common in all of them that makes his liver disintegrate, and with the hope of keeping him around for a good long time, the only meat currently in our fridge is turkey breast for my lunch sandwiches. He can eat eggs, cheese, shrimp, shellfish, and fish, so while there's been a learning curve on my end, there's still a variety of options I can cook. Endless options, actually, so it's only really hard when I'm craving a cheeseburger something awful- I still eat meat. I actually wasn't big into fish when we started dating, and there are some I still can't eat, but I'm learning! Right. Back to meal planning.
Note: I only meal plan for dinner in our family since I eat pretty much the same thing every day and AC eats at school, but the same steps still apply for breakfast and lunch!
So, step 1: make a list of meals you could reasonably cook on a normal weekday night. Include some no-brainer meals like "grilled cheese and soup" (one of our favorites) for when you just don't feel like doing anything more complicated than cutting cheddar and heating soup. I keep an ongoing list of options and add on recipes as I find them. This one takes a while, but it will help you meal plan every week from here on out! I actually just made my list because I was sick of using the same old recipes we had been using. AC likes those recipes, but I was getting bored cooking them. You can find my list here!
Step 2: Choose your seven meals for the week. If you intend on going out one night, you can choose six. You don't have to assign them to specific nights so you can pick and choose what you feel like cooking on the day you have to cook it!
Step 3: Copy all ingredient lists to one document.
Step 4: Separate out the ingredient lists and put like items with like items- 1/2 tsp lemon juice with 1 tsp lemon zest, 2 cups chopped leeks with 2/3 cup leeks, so on and so forth. Leave measurements on there, trust me.
Step 5: Did you leave the amount of each ingredient you needed? Good. This is why I told you to do that: I had three recipes this week that called for vegetable broth:
Recipe 1: 2 cups
Recipe 2: 5 cups
Recipe 3: 2/3 cup
Which adds up to 8 cups, rounded up. That means I need to buy two containers of it (4 cups in each) but knowing me, I would have just put "vegetable broth" on my list and only bought one, earning me another trip the store. Add. Use Google to add fractions, if you must.
Step 5: Plug all your ingredients into your handy grocery shopping chart. Oh? You don't have a chart? Have no fear, I made one and you can have it!
Step 6: Grocery shop.
Now, if you wanted to be really ambitious you could change the chart to make it match your particular grocery store by aisle. Or, if you go to multiple grocery stores (3-4 in my case), divide up what you get at each one. I sometimes do this in that I mark things I get at Sam's club with an asterisk.
Hopefully this gave you at least a jumping off point to start meal planning. This is the way that works best for me, but please let me know if you see a way I could improve it! Change the system, scrap my plan completely, make your own. Heck, if we had a grocery store closer I'd still be going to the grocery store every day!
I dedicate this post to the one and only kjpugs.
8 comments:
Oh how much I love meal planning. And that's not me being sarcastic, I really love it. We typically eat out 2-3 times per week (definitely Friday and Saturday, maybe one other day for happy hour or something) so I really only plan 4-5 meals, but it's SUCH a good habit to get into. I write out my grocery list at least twice. Once to list everything I need and another time to organize it by category/aisle (I pretty much know my grocery store by heart). Yay for meal planning!!
1) Thank you for saying pescatarian and not vegetarian. That one always kills me. And since you seem to be more versed in shellfish/fish cooking - you could always share a few good recipes (nudge nudge)
2) Thank you for saying grocery store. Love it.
3) I LOVE meal planning, I usually hit up my pantry/weekly coupon specials and start from there so we can save money while planning ahead!
You're awesome :)
OMG. This is amazing. SOOO much more organized and smart than how I was planning. We have a COSTCO membership and if we could plan out like, say, 3 recipes we'll make four times a month, we could get all the ingredients cheaper in one monthly trip. This is so helpful :) Thanks for being SUCH a motivation. I don't think you have any idea how much it means to me.
I love the idea of planning the whole week out.. something I have never done but it seriously makes so much sense. And to add up how much you need of everything. I can't tell you how many times I have to run to the store to just grab feta or scallions or some random ingredient that I need for a recipe. Thank you for posting this!!
This is a great idea. D and I get home too late to actually make dinner. I usually end up zapping a frozen weight watchers dinner or blending up some bean dip & spices for fresh veggies. This is a wonderful system for families too though.
I've been trying to meal plan and I keep failing at it. I like your advice to "include some no-brainer meals". I think that's my problem, I plan every meal to be a gourmet food fest, and after day 2 or 3 I just give up because I'm sick of cooking. Thanks for the tip! Don't know what I didn't think of it myself! ;)
I need to be better about meal planning... especially with my stockpiling and coupon use I have gotten lazy because we ALWAYS have a good stock of most everything but I HATE to open a chicken stock and throw it out because its only good for a few days after it's open!
I never knew AC was pescatarian until after the wedding! LOL Not that it really matters much but I think it's so interesting. I always wonder how a meat eater and a non-meat eater will raise their kids ... :) We have a bride this summer who is strict vegetarian (as is her whole family) and the groom is not. :)
This is the most fantastic poset ever. Thank you.
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