September 17, 2010
What’s For Dinner?
Yesterday, we brainstormed some ideas for themes of the week for our meal planning. Today, I’m going to talk to your about how I go about meal planning. Here are the things that I consider when meal planning:
- plan leftovers – that way you’ll have them, you’ll save time in the kitchen, and it’s a money saver
- take schedule into consideration – Wednesday night is church night, so we keep meals simple and quick
- what’s in the freezer – some weeks I pull a meal from the freezer one night and the next night is leftovers of that meal – talk about a vacation! Prep ahead, prep ahead, prep ahead! Having a couple steps already taken care of is a huge timesaver.
- what’s on sale/coupons – if there’s a sale on chicken, I will probably try to work that into the meal plan for the week
- the #1 goal is that there’s food on the table and we eat together – it doesn’t have to be perfect – grilled cheese and a can of soup works
Write down the days of the week for two weeks and fill in your ideas for menu themes and meal planning – here’s what my list looks like (notice we do leftovers 2-3 times during the week):
Next week we’ll be plugging it all into a calendar (freebie printable).
Excited about meal planning? There’s a sale through Sunday (the 19th) in the shop on the Meal Planning Kit – it’s marked down to $6 from $12! That’s 50% off! Four meal planning documents to help you get started and follow through with planning your meals.
