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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Menu planning..
does anyone here do it? If so, let's chat. 
Re: Menu planning..
I NEED to do it. I am curious to hear what others say.
We do weekly. Before we head out to the grocery store, we sit down and decide what we would like for each night except for Friday night because Friday night is takeout night. Anyway, then we look to see what ingredients we have and what we need. We plan the whole meal from the meat to the sides (salad, steemed veggie, etc.) and buy only what we need for the meals and for our lunches.
We don't necessarily say, "on Monday we're having mac and cheese and on Tuesday we're having pork chops" we just plan a meal for each night and then each night we decide which meal we're in the mood for that night, being conscious of "doubles" so we can spread them out. For instance, let's say we're going to have a chicken pot pie and chicken divan in the same week-- we'll spread out the chicken dishes so we might have one on Monday and the other on Thursday so we don't get too chickened-out.
We do it on a weekly basis... I pick typically six dinners that I want to make over the week and I buy all the needed ingredients on the weekend. SometimesI usually plan the menu on Friday at work
, then we go shopping. I typically make one crockpot meal a week, etc. I like it...I think it makes it much easier than trying to think of everyday what to make, etc.
I do!
I usually sit down Sunday and DH discuss what we want for the week. I usually plan for 5 or 6 meals because of takeout, leftovers etc. I look at the igredients and then anything I need I put on my shopping list.
I feel that it helps save us money because I am not randomly buying things at the grocery store that we don't need!
This is our menu for this particular week
BLTs with french fries (not fancy but we were both craving BLTs!)
Chicken and rice casserole (has veggies in it) with dinner rolls
Shake 'n Bake pork chops, side salad, Au Gratin potatoes
Mac & cheese, ham, broccoli
I try to plan at least 4 meals a week and buy meat when it's on sale. We usually have a good stash in the freezer at any given time. This weeks meals:
steak tips, rice, veggie
chicken stew/soup w/garlic bread
turkey pie w/mashed potatoes (my mom made this one though)
baked ziti and chicken sausage
grilled chicken salads
we usually do egg wraps or sandwiches or quesadillas once a week for something easy/cheap too
What I meant was more of a flow between dinners. Like in the past few days, I made roast beef. Then I used the leftovers in shredded beef enchiladas. Today I have applesauce chicken in the crockpot and the rest of the chicken in the package that I didn't use is going into chicken pot pie later in the week..
does that make sense? I find that with a small family, my leftovers (if left as they were originally cooked) don't really get eaten and I KNOW I throw a lot away.
I agree. My husband and I are going to try menu planning -- sort of a New Year's resolution.
On a side note, I have the same top that you're wearing in your siggy pic (but in maroon), EastCoastEmily.
Sorry Heather. I totally didn't get that that's what you meant! Honestly, I can't really help you there much. I've pretty much figured out proportions so we don't have many leftovers. But if we do, I'll usually bring the leftovers to work for lunch the next day so they get eaten! But if we bake a small ham to go with mac and cheese, I'll usually just slice it up day by day to make Matt's lunch sandwiches with until it's gone. So that in itself I guess is advanced planning. We'll purposely not buy deli meat for his lunches that week b/c we'll know that we'll have the baked ham to use. And if we want to buy a package of bacon for breakfast one weekend morning, we'll plan a weeknight dish that uses the rest of the bacon like BLTs or Carbonara (sp?). Leftover pot roast I might cut up into chunks and create a small beef stew out of it. Sorry, not much help, huh?
I do this, specifically make lots of recipes for 4 servings for the two of us to take for lunches.
?
Every week, I sit down with the circulars (or smartsource.com - thanks Kristin) and see what's on sale and then I make my grocery list based on sales, coupons etc and literally plan the whole week out.
?Part of this is because it helps me be?successful?in WW?and the other part of it is to remind me if I have to take food out of the freezer and to be a little organized about what I'm doing when I get home from work (when I was working)