Comments on: Do you plan your meals?

By: NtJS

NtJS — Thu, 14 May 2009 01:00:09 +0000

We’ve been meal planning for several years now. It’s pretty rough when you fall off that wagon! Our strategy is pretty simple:
> We shop weekly, so we plan meals weekly
> Always try to plan meals using things we have.
> Write out the needed ingredients, add the weekly necessities, and you’ve pretty much got your shopping list.

It’s like budgeting your meals. It’s such a great feeling to come home from whatever, and have the meal already figured out. Healthier meals and it keeps you out of those food ruts.

By: Angel

Angel — Wed, 13 May 2009 05:45:53 +0000

Congrats on getting through finals!
I menu plan too. Usually for one week, sometimes 2. We have a weekly mexican food night because we all agree we want to eat it that often, one or two nights we’ll have a meal that includes meat, the rest is a list of 60 or so meals that I cycle through. Breakfast for dinner is always popular. I shop once a week based around the sales/coupons so we always have the basics stocked up. I write the menu on a calendar I keep with my coupons and store circulars. Plannning takes up a good chunk of one day a week, about 3 hours but it’s worth it for me. I love our family dinners together. If I didn’t do any of this, we’d be eating cereal or take-out every night like I did when I was single!

By: Jennifer

Jennifer — Tue, 12 May 2009 18:28:48 +0000

Congratulations on living through finals! I definitely meal plan. I am addicted to my family organizer book! We have a copy of Amy Knapp’s Family Organizer sitting in our kitchen. It has a large space for each day of the week, a space for each day’s menu, a to-do list area, and a grocery list area. My husband and I have an agreement that everything we each schedule will go into this book, and we consult it before we schedule anything new. If it’s not on the calendar, then you’re not responsible to plan around it.

The same goes for the grocery list. When either of us sees that we’re getting low on something, we write it in the grocery list area of the organizer. If I go to the store and don’t get something that one of us wanted, it’s usually because it wasn’t on the list. The list is also detachable, so you can tear it out and take it with you.

I seriously don’t work for Amy Knapp’s company. I just love, love, love her organizer! You can see it at https://www.familyorganizer.com/product.aspx?id=89.

By: Craig

Craig — Tue, 12 May 2009 16:35:33 +0000

I plan my meals every week. I go grocery shopping on Sundays and figure out my plans for the week and how I can cook around them and what fits best. That way I don’t have to worry about it each individual day and it’s one less thing to stress about.

By: Miranda

Miranda — Tue, 12 May 2009 16:14:30 +0000

Congrats on getting through finals! We plan our meals once a week (shopping together is one of those family activities we do). We figure out what we want to eat that week, and what fresh ingredients we will need to get. Then we plan out where to go (this is important now that the farmer’s market is starting up again). We also look at our pantry to see what common items we might be running low on. Then we match up our needs with sales.