Meal Planning and organising Food!

Someone on the EB forum asked what sort of meals I have on the meal plan, so I thought I would share it here in case anyone else is interested in how I did it. So here is a step by step how-to :)

• The first thing I did was to work out what meals we'll eat, not necessarily pleasing everyone all the time, and allowing for fussy children who may just want salad (we eat a lot of salad here)
• I then went through that list and categorised it, so meals from the freezer got an F, meals that everyone loves got a red star, and meals that can be taken to work as leftovers got a black circle.
• I've made wednesday my baking day, so I also chose 4 relatively easy recipes for baking, one was new, the others tried and tested.
• Once that was done, I put the days next to the meals. I had managed 28, but culled some as I was doing this that I realised are too messy/fussy/time consuming.
• Then all I did was rule some lines on 2 sheets of A4 paper, wrote the days, numbered the weeks, and did a legend down the bottom (I've allocated D one night a week to cook, and he needs to know what to grab for lunch too hehehe). Obviously I wrote in each box too, and it's now on my fridge where it can't be lost/forgotten about.

Some of the meals we have are as follows..

Gnocchi with garlic cream sauce

Fried Rice

Spinach and Ricotta Stuffed Chicken

Macaroni Cheese with corn on the Cob

Chicken and asparagus Quiche and salad

Homemade pizzas

Tuna Bake

Lemon Chicken Pasta

Lemon and Lime Tuna Spaghetti

And a lot of other things such as Tacos, and your standard meat and 3 veg meals.

I always try to do at least one cooked lunch during the week, and a cooked breakfast each weekend, usually when D is home from work, so I've factored those in as well.

Another tip I found useful when I was working is to work out which night (or nights) are the worst for cooking, the ones you're likely to rely on takeaway or cereal for, and plan for those first, get something that is easy and quick to prepare, or better yet, prepare it the night before (which will be easy as you will have a plan). When I do the shopping, I try to cut up any meat and veg that I know won't be used before it goes off, and freeze it. for example, if we're doing a stirfry, I will cut the meat in advance, and freeze it with the marinade over it, so it's all done for when I want to cook it. Same with things like broccoli and pumpkin. We eat a lot of those in risottos, and we have mashed pumpkin and potato sometimes, but otherwise it just ends up getting thrown out, so I discovered that cutting it up, dunking in boiling water and then icy water, and freezing, cuts down on a lot of food and time wastage..

The trick is definately to make sure you've got your meal plan where everyone can see it, that way you're accountable. I find K gets really excited when she sees we'll be having corned beef or mashed potato, so she's reading and holding me accountable as we speak.

The next timesaver I've put in place was to work out when you do your grocery shopping, (mondays here) and divide the weeks up into 'shopping weeks'. I've written shopping lists for each week of the meal plan. Obviously there are some double ups, so I will need to check the pantry, and I'll still need fruit and snacks, but it's going to save a lot of time and money buying things we don't need or already have!

Happy planning!