caring for home:
Is dinner time a struggle for you, friend? It never fails. We get up, we go about our day, we do all the things. And inevitably, dinner time rolls around again. Every.Single.Day. Like an uninvited guest who forgot to tell us they were coming. You think we’d get the picture by now – dinner time is going to show up, and we’d better be ready for it. Unfortunately, meal time is often an afterthought for a lot of people. It used to be for me as well, until I learned this easy approach to meal planning. It’s not hard, and once you try it a couple of times, you’ll have meal planning in the bag!
01. Start with the basics
First things first. Let’s get this out of the way. Meal planning isn’t hard. It isn’t time consuming, and it doesn’t have to be challenging. Skeptical? Let me prove it to you.
I want you to take out a sheet of paper. Yes, a literal sheet of paper. Grab a pen or pencil while you’re at it.
Now, on that paper, I want you to jot down your family’s three favorite meals. You know them like the back of your hand. It’s those go-to recipes you use in a pinch and they’re a hit every.single.time. Ready? Go.
I’ll wait.
Excellent work! Now I want you to look at each of those meals, and jot down the ingredients you need to prepare each one. Ready? Go.
Congratulations. You just meal planned three meals. In a nutshell, that is as simple as meal planning is. You think of a meal – generally an entree and a couple of sides – and you plan to purchase the ingredients you need to prepare those meals.
02. Go with what you have
A penny saved is a penny earned…and all that jazz. But when it comes to meal planning, it’s actually true. Have you been to the supermarket lately? Food is expensive! So why purchase something for meals, when you may already have something on hand that you could use?
The number one lesson I can tach you is to be mindful of what you already have in your freezer and refrigerator. Most of us have an extra pound of ground beef, some type of chicken, or pork in our freezers. There’s probably a couple of veggies in there, too. And let’s not even talk about what’s hiding in the pantry shelves. I bet there’s a box of Mac-n-cheese, some pasta sauce and a box of spaghetti in there as well. But the real money is hiding in your refrigerator. True. It is.
The items you have in your pantry are shelf stable. The items you have in your freezer aren’t going bad any time soon, either. But the stuff in the refrigerator? That’s gold.
Take a moment and imagine what you have in your refrigerator. I’ll give you an idea of what I have in my refrigerator as I write this article. Right now I have:
- left over chili
- eggs
- bacon
- shredded cheese
- one grilled chicken breast
- white potatoes
- parmesan cheese
- banana peppers
- olives
- pepperoni and salami
- broccoli
- white rice
- sweet potatoes
- tomatoes
- two onions
- romain lettuce
- hard boiled eggs
- 1/4 gallon of whole milk and 1/2 pint of heavy cream
What can I do with that?
That’s an excellent question. So, I’m going to give you several options I can make for dinner from what I have in my refrigerator right now. Without buying a thing:
- Loaded baked potatoes: Uses – white potatoes, left over chili, and shredded cheese
- Breakfast: Uses – eggs, bacon, and fried potatoes
- Broccoli chicken casserole: Uses – Chicken breast (shredded), broccoli, cheese, diced onion, and white rice
- Dinner Salad: Uses – Romain lettuce, tomatoes, olives, banana peppers, salami and pepperonis, shredded parmesan cheese
That’s four meals I could make without buying anything, or cooking anything new. These are just the items I have on hand and at the ready.
What if I add in something from the freezer or pantry?
Currently, in my freezer I have a few bags of frozen veggies, some chicken, some ground beef, some ground turkey, and a half bag of frozen meatballs.
So what could we make if we took stock of the fridge, the freezer, and the pantry?
- Spaghetti: Uses – spaghetti pasta (pantry), sauce (pantry), ground beef (freezer) or frozen meatballs, and Parmesan cheese (fridge.)
- Chicken Casserole: Uses – bag of mixed vegetables (freezer), one can cream of chicken soup (pantry), one chicken breast (fridge or freezer), bread crumbs for topping (pantry), and shredded cheese (fridge.)
- Turkey Burgers: Uses: ground turkey (freezer), lettuce for wraps if we’re short on buns (fridge), tomatoes (fridge), with a side of sweet potato wedges (fridge), and deviled eggs (fridge)
I think you get the picture. Without having been to the grocery in a little more than a week, I could, at random, create seven meals just from what I had on hand in my refrigerator, freezer, and pantry.
03. Make a list, check it twice
The real magic happens once you build a good list. That may sound really overwhelming if you consider sitting down and trying to come up with a week or a month’s worth of meals. However, if you take the slow and steady approach, this will be an easy and simple task.
You may be thinking that I’m going to encourage you to make an inventory of your refrigerator, freezer, or pantry. But I’m not going to. I mean, if you get a wild and crazy desire to do that, by all means, go for it. But, I’m not going to start you there.
Instead, I’m going to give you a month-long assignment. Don’t fear, it’s an easy one. Each time you prepare dinner, I want you to jot it down on a calendar or piece of paper. You don’t have to jot down when you dine out or get take away. You only need to jot down what you make for dinner on the evenings when you prepare meals at home. That’s it. Simply keep track.
At first, this is a very slow approach, and it will not immediately take away the stressors of meal planning. However, once you practice this routine for a couple of weeks, you’ll begin to see patterns in your meals, you’ll notice how often you recreate basically the same entrees, etc. One night you make bbq chicken, one night you make bbq pork ribs… same premise, different protein.
Trust me. Take the slow road. It will pay off in the long run.
04. Plan for the unexpected
Now that you know the basics of meal planning, I want you to start thinking a little farther out. That means planning for the unexpected. What does the unexpected look like? Well, it can be an evening when sports practice runs late, or when you have a late meeting at the office, or someone gets sick and you spend the day at the med center. It can be a day when you’re simply exhausted, or it could be a friend who desperately needs a meal delivered. Any of those are the unexpected.
I like to have at least one or two go-to meals in my back pocket for evenings when I don’t know what on earth to do for dinner. For our family, that is typically a pasta dish which simply requires pasta and sauce and maybe a protein. But, that also means having the pantry items for a pot of quick and easy chili, or a freezer stocked with frozen veggies for a nice and comforting soup.
The meals you plan as your ‘unexpected’ meals is entirely up to you. But my advice is to always have what you need on hand in case you need to make a meal for a friend, or you simply have no other options. It’s a life saver and a sanity saver, too!
05. A fun and crafty idea
Do you remember those little three sectioned flip books where there was an image of a person and you flipped through to get him or her dressed? The top section was tops, sweaters, jackets, etc. The middle section was pants, skirts, etc. The bottom section was shoes, boots, etc. Do you remember those? They were so much fun!
Well, I’m going to encourage you to create one of those for yourself to use for meal planning. First, take a spiral notebook; any size will do, but smaller is better. Open the notebook cover – and then cut through the paper pages horizontally, until you have three sections. The top section will be proteins or entrees, the middle section will be sides, and the bottom section will be starches.
Once your sections are divided, simply start writing down the food items you prepare regularly – placing one on each slip of paper. Fried Chicken, Roast Beef, Spaghetti, Pork Tenderloin, Chili, Chicken Casserole, BBQ Meatballs… all of these would go in the top section of meats or entrees. Green beans, broccoli casserole, corn pudding, sautéed spinach, roasted corn on the cob… all of these would go in the sides section. Mashed potatoes, brown rice, couscous, buttered noodles, stuffing, corn bread, roasted sweet potatoes…all of these would go in the bottom section, or starches section.
When you’re stuck for a meal idea, simply flip through and find a protein or entree you want to make for dinner. Then flip through again to find a side dish, and then again to find a starch. Bingo. You have a meal-planning buddy you can use and keep at the ready any time you need inspiration.
The best part is, remember that list I encouraged you to make each time you made dinner? All of those items can go into this flip book. Over time your book will fill up with more and more meal ideas, and you’ll find that meal planning isn’t as cumbersome as it once was.
06. Shopping and storage
There was once a show on the Food Network – I simply can’t remember the name of it – but the tag line was, “Life is crazy, but dinner doesn’t have to be.” I believe this to be so true.
So each week, as you flip through your little book and decide which meals you will make, be sure to jot down all the ingredients you’ll need for those meals. Take that list with you as you shop, or make your pick up or delivery order. You don’t want to plan for Chicken Cacciatore and find out at the last minute you have no rice!
At the same time, if at all possible, each time you plan to make a pantry or freezer staples meal, be sure to replace those items on your shopping list. Did you make chili this week? Be sure to replace those items. Did you take baked spaghetti to a friend? Be sure to replace those items. Always have at least one or two emergency meals on hand for those unexpected moments life throws at us.
Bonus: I try to keep two cake mixes with frosting in my pantry in the event I need to take dinner to a friend. It’s always nice to include a yummy dessert if possible.
07. Planning 101 Worksheet
Friend, I’ve been using this method of meal planning for over two decades and it has never failed me. In fact, I’ve given talks to women’s groups about it – and I hear back from ladies all the time that tell me it changed their cooking game altogether. I highly encourage you to give it a try. In fact, I believe in this system so much, I’ve developed two free worksheets for you to download.
The first worksheet is an example of a simple basic weekly meal plan I may put together for my family. It asks four questions to help determine meals for the week. The second worksheet is blank for you to use. You can print it out as often as you want, and use it as many times as necessary. It also includes the four basic questions you need to get started.
To download the free Meal Planning 101 worksheets, simply find the PDF here.
If you struggle with meal time or knowing what you prepare more than one evening in advance, I encourage you to try out this method. Give it a month and see if it doesn’t change your life!
