1. Make a plan of how many meals you want to make. I organize all my dinners. Lunches are usually the same routine of sandwiches. Breakfast varies from cereal, oatmeal to hot meals. For dinner will there be the same weekly theme.
Monday: meatless
Tuesday: tacos
Wednesday: spaghetti
Thursday: breakfast
Friday: Take out, pizza or leftovers
Saturday: leftovers
Sunday: Sunday Dinner
Skip even labeling the days if that's too stressful and just organize 5 days of meals.
2. Stick with what you know. You don't need to look up recipes. Make hotdogs and a couple sides, pancakes or soup and sandwiches.
3. Before you go shopping look in your fridge and pantry. You don't need to clean it out but utilize what's in there. How long has that can of ______ been in there? Confession: I have some old Hamburger Helpers in mine.
4. Grocery shop with a dollar limit. Set the limit to $xxx for the month. This amount is strictly for food only, not pet products or household.
5. Don't wait for the day before the week begins. You feel stressed out. Whenever an idea pops into your head write it down for the following week. 1 day down and keep building on it.
I find it easy to build around the main item. I will say chicken is once a week, meatless once a week, salmon one day and soup. I might not even assign a specific day for the meals. With this concept then you can focus on a recipe or meal around the chicken. For example bbq chicken or baked chicken. Soup would be cheeseburger or potato.
I hope some of these tips alleviate some of the presumed stress when it comes to meal planning.
I skipped this week but I'm not stressing as we will be ok and once and awhile it's nice to take a break.
#nablopomo
Great tips! My takeaways are #4 & #5. That grocery $$ should be for food only and to record ideas for next week, not this week. I have been budgeting for groceries and running out when it's time to get soap, etc.. Stressful!
ReplyDeleteYeah set a different amount of money aside for that other stuff. I would rather focus on food for me first, lol. We buy a few of our items in bulk too so that chops up money every few months. We also may buy little things at the dollar store. As long as you don't need (maybe only want) a specific brand you can get away with it. Deodorant same size is a buck versus 1.50 or more at the store. Good luck and keep at it.
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