Meal Planning Ideas

vlagrl29 · September 2014

One of our goals for September is to eat out less so that means I need to meal prep more. I'm making a grocery list today and going to the store on Tuesday. I'm sure that bill will be larger than normal. I'm wondering if any of you have meals planned for the week and what they are. So far I have - fake fried chicken, spaghetti with meatballs, breakfast for dinner, tuna helper? I need to get more creative. My go to meals are chicken stir fry, tortellini, taco salads or soft tacos, DH grilling or a quick TV type family dinner.

love1229 · September 2014

We just started doing this too for September! I've found that we're saving money and a ton of time by planning the menu before I go to the store. We went to Costco and Aldi today (So much cheaper than other grocery stores!) and spent about $100 and got ingredients for dinners and lunch foods for the rest of the month!

It is hard to think of meals so far out without doing the same thing over and over, but also healthy, so I am excited to hear what others will suggest too. I found a bunch of recipes on skinny taste too.

Off the top of my head, we have:

stuffed peppers

meatloaf

chicken parmesan (with light mayo, greek yogurt and parmesan cheese - tastes better than it sounds!)

broccoli cheese and potato soup

vegetarian chili

lemon chicken

rotisserie turkey

crescent roll pizzas

JuneBug86 · September 2014

I'm big into meal planning. One tip is to make a few recipes with a few of the same ingredients in them to save money and waste less. I just search the internet for new recipes and try 1-2 new ones every week. For recipes that we like and want to eat again I add it to out "list of recipes". That way when I'm planning out our meal for the week we just go to the list and browse the list and pick the ones we want. It saves time of sitting there trying to think of things off the top of my head.

beetee123 · September 2014

I meal plan for the month, but we don't always stick to our plans. This week we are having pork chops, baked chicken, tacos, turkey burgers, etc. my SO is a bit picky, and I have allergies, so we don't have a ton of variety. I also take one day on the weekend to prepare lunches. Today I made stir fry to pack in my lunch for the entire week (I don't get bored). I also prepared all of my SO's sandwiches and snacks. It definitely makes life easier, and we save tons by not eating lunch out! I was shocked at our first bill for our monthly shopping trip (posted about it here in fact), but from what people said the $400 range seems normal if you are preparing every meal at home.

RosieC18 · September 2014

I like an easy pasta dish my mom always made - cut sausage (we use italian, but you could use chicken or whatever, or skip for vegetarian), cook through in a frying pan, add a can of cannellini beans (white kidney beans), and spinach or swiss chard. Cook until limp/warmed through. Serve over whatever pasta you like (we usually spirals or other short pasta). Yum!

I also love an easy breading trick for chicken or pork chops. Brown the meat in an ovenproof pan on the stove, spread on about a tablespoon of mustard and cover that with panko. Move into oven until finished. It's like breading and frying, but without all the mess of breadcrumbs falling off.

Or easy home-made fajitas - cut up chicken breast, cook in frying pan with a jar of whatever salsa you like. Add frozen onions & peppers - serve on tortillas. Costs practically nothing, takes 20 minutes, healthy and tasty.

When I'm watching tv I often scroll through epicurious, blogs or other food websites looking for things to bookmark. On Sundays I plan the meals for the week, including lunches (usually leftovers). I would say as often as not I don't actually end up making the recipes I find/mark but they remind me of something else I like or to invent something of my own.

I also try to eat vegetarian at least two days a week, fish at least once a week and more chicken than pork. I only eat beef when I'm out. This is mostly for environmental reasons, but it forces me to be more creative. Before trying this I couldn't cook many filling vegetarian meals and it's been fun exploring what different proteins I like, etc. It's also (usually) cheaper and healthier.

This week I did:

- Grilled tilapia (the fish on sale this week) with asparagus

- Gnocchi with white beans

- mustard pork w. veggie couscous

- baked chicken with a spice rub, brown rice and the rest of the asparagus

- poached egg & cheesy polenta

- turkeyburgers on the grill

Next week's list is shaping up to include:

- mexican pulled chicken

- bolognese sauce over pasta (freeze the extra sauce)

- sweet potato curry over rice

- cashew & pineapple "rice" - I've heard a lot of about using grated cauliflour instead of rice and want to try it. We'll see how it goes. Failure is the price of growth!

- pork chops with grilled peaches and brussel sprouts roasted with butternut squash. This one is great with bacon in the sprouts, if you have some on hand.

blondie42107 · September 2014

We try to eat clean but we're human. If you have a tendency to order pizza, try to buy a frozen one and keep in your freezer or make your own. We do this 1 or 2 times a month. We eat a lot of chicken so I have a ton of marinades that I make/buy. We always have greens on hand for salads.

This week we are planning to have:

Chicken apple sausage

Pork chops

Chicken

Spaghetti

We pack left overs for lunch and also eat left overs on another night, if we have them.

Our sides are usually salads, lots of veggies (zuc, squash, sweet potato, etc), cottage cheese, occasionally rice, pasta, beans, etc.

RosieC18 · September 2014

oh! Seconding homemade pizza. The dough is... 6 ingredients, nearly all of which you'll have on hand. You can make 3 or 4 and freeze for really easy weeknight meals. You can buy pre-made sauce that's pretty good for next to nothing that keeps forever, and top it with cheese and whatever leftovers you have on hand. One of our favorites is tuna, green peppers and onions.

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/recipes/pizza

kmurphy2131 · September 2014

I have been meal planning s long I'm not even sure I know how to shop without a plan. One thing that has really helped is using a notebook so that when I'm stumped I can go back and see what we have been eating. I use Pinterest to organize my recipes so I can find them easily. Some easy meals: skinny tastes pesto chicken, chicken Caesar salads (chicken grilled on a cast iron grill pan w Italian seasoning), foil packets of haddock with zucchini tomatoes lemon juice onion and laksa mic dressing, turkey burgers, breakfast for dinner, soups and chillis are awesome in the winter because they have lots of leftovers. Crock pot meals are great - I love salsa chicken, I literally put chicken breasts and salsa in thecrockpot for 8 hours on low & serve with peppers and onions and rice/quinoa/chips/in a tortilla. ID be happy to direct towards recipes if you are interested. I think the number one thing for success is to never try more than 1-2 new things a week and keep a list of your staples so you don't always have to think.

kmurphy2131 · September 2014

Sorry that is formatted horribly, I think it's my iPad.

maple2 · September 2014

With 2 kids and 2 working parents, we tend to go for meals that are quick to prepare and/or can be made on the weekend and eaten as left overs. Our staples are salad with toast; tacos/burritos with beans, quinoa, peppers, tomatoes, lettuce, sweet potatoes, etc.; pesto pasta w/ sauteed zucchini, eggplant and tomatoes; homemade pasta sauce (a bunch of blended veggies); picnic (basically sandwiches with veggies and fruit); and a zucchini back with rice, lentils, tomatoes and cheese; broccoli stir-fry with peanut sauce. Once it gets warmer, we will do more soups and stews as well as squash dishes.

formerlyGDaisy09 · September 2014

we do healthy meal planning. I subscribed to Cooking Light, I found 4-5 new recipies in each issue (more in some). I found after 3 years most recipes were repeats, so I canceled my subscription. they have great 20 minute meals in each issue and will put together a weekly-meal plan of things that use similar ingredients.

I've gone through and pulled out our favorites and written the ingredients, cook-time, and magazine issue/page number onto little cards, H and I will use those to plan our week out and make a shopping list. If there's a night of the week I'm getting home late H then has all the info he needs to start on dinner (still perfecting this part).

strickland8052 · September 2014

Lately I've been buying whatever meat is on sale then planning the meals around that. I hate washing and cutting meat, so I try to do that on grocery day then divide everything into serving size freezer bags and freeze. Depending on the meat, I'll also throw some seasoning in there too. Here is this week's plan with some tips for each meal:

Sunday - BELTs (BLT's with egg. I bake the bacon in oven, because I hate standing over pan. I make a special sauce with greek yogurt, mayo, and lemon to make it more exciting.)

Monday - Chicken Fajitas (I cut the raw chicken and put the dried fajita seasoning on it before freezing. I took it out of freezer last night to thaw, and I'll marinade it in margarita mix and worshtershier (sp?) sauce about 30 minutes before I cook it. I'll use frozen peppers/onions and plain greek yogurt in place of sour cream.)

Tuesday - Ranch pork chops (The pork chops were washed and put in dried ranch seasoning before being freezed. I'll roll them in egg and breadcrumbs then saute'.)

Wednesday - Lemon pepper tilapia (I use frozen fish. Sprinkle it with onion powder, garlic, salt, pepper, and lemon juice. Bake at 400 for 20 minutes)

Thursday - Soy glazed chicken (Chicken was washed, cut, and sprinkled with garlic and ginger before being froze. I'll thaw and marinade in soy sauce and mirin before I cook it)

Friday - BBQ pork chops (put bbq on pork chops before freezing)

Saturday - Burgers (I have the patties already made and in the freezer, so all I have to do is throw in a marinade then cook on grill.)

As far as sides go, we usually keep sweet potatoes, canned green beans, frozen spinach, frozen okra, mac n cheese, and rice o roni on hand. I'll heat one or two of those up with the meat, but I really need to find healthier options than some of that processed stuff. Any ideas? Sometimes I'll toss some rice in the rice cooker with fresh mint (we have a mint bush in our yard), coconut oil, garlic, onion powder, and lemon juice and zest. The rice cooker is a life saver!

When we get more into fall, I'll cook a big batch of lasagnas and casseroles to keep in the freezer for lazy nights. Grilled cheese and tomato soup are also great for lazy nights when you are tempted to eat out.

vlagrl29 · September 2014

Thanks for all the ideas! We were so busy this summer I got out of the food planning thing and would literally think about dinner at 5pm every day. LOL

SlurpeeLove · September 2014

I downloaded an app called "Yummly" on my phone. They have a lot of really great recipes. I just tried their Grilled Chicken Tacos with Corn and Tomatillo Salsa. So much tastiness, it's ridiculous. We're trying to do meal planning at least once a week this month, if only to add variety.

Erikan73 · September 2014

This is a fav go to receipe in my house. If you don't have the pampered chef deep dish pot, just cook the pasta like you normally would. You just need a dish to mix everything in that you can cover as to steam the spinach.

http://www.keyingredient.com/recipes/1703009/easy-tortellini-toss-pampered-chef/

We also like to get flatbed pizza bottom and make our own pizza. When the weather is good hamburgers, hot dogs, grilled chicken & grilled sausage are always an easy & fast meal. Plus no pots to wash. Which for me is always a good thing.

mana8503 · September 2014

What helps me, is when I try a new recipe, I print it out. I have a binder with the plastic protectors for the sheets. This way when I reuse them, they can wipe clean because I tend to be a messy chef.

If I like the recipe, I put it in the binder. Then when I'm meal planning, I just flip through the binder for ideas. I take them out and add the ingredients I need to my list. I have tabs for breakfast, lunch, dinner, desserts, etc. When I use the recipe I put them in the back of the section so I know I've made it recently.

blondie42107 · September 2014

mana8503 said:
What helps me, is when I try a new recipe, I print it out. I have a binder with the plastic protectors for the sheets. This way when I reuse them, they can wipe clean because I tend to be a messy chef.
If I like the recipe, I put it in the binder. Then when I'm meal planning, I just flip through the binder for ideas. I take them out and add the ingredients I need to my list. I have tabs for breakfast, lunch, dinner, desserts, etc. When I use the recipe I put them in the back of the section so I know I've made it recently.

I need to do this again! I have a great binder but now that we have two kids, free time is more limited.

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