Revisiting Menu Planning

Married2MrWright

Hi ladies,

I really want to be better about planning meals...especially now that DH is in clinicals and I'll be taking on more the dinner prep.

I came across this and wanted to share:

https://orgjunkie.com/menu-plan-monday/menu-planning-resources

My friend shared with me this site: https://e-mealz.com/

I love that it coordinates with grocery stores and what they have on sale. Sadly, I don't shop at the stores they list. And we don't use tons of canned, frozen or pre-packaged foods, so I've been looking for something similar that is more "whole foods" based...

Which has led me to https://www.plummelo.com and https://www.plantoeat.com I am doing trials with both and will see if I like either enough to pay for their services (actually, I think the first one is free, for now).

What do you ladies do? We sort of just buy the stuff we always have and then cook it up...we eat fairly healthfully, but I feel we could reign our budget in a bit better AND have more variety in what we eat from week to week (we do chicken, broccoli and rice A LOT, for example!) We also have TWO crock pots that never get used, so I want to come up with ways to use them to prep dinner while I am at work...throw the stuff in the morning before I head out and hopefully, come home to a yummy dinner!

MrsNJSwimmer

I have no feedback, but we eat fairly UNhealthfully, so I'll be following this!

MrsZiz

We also eat fairly healthy. We started a list of things we eat and add to it and then when we meal plan we look at the BIG list and take ideas from that. It's much more difficult now that I'm pregnant and NOTHING sounds good though. We have a blank one month calendar that I printed several copies of and we make meal plans for a couple of weeks at a time. Just because it's on "monday" doesn't mean we have to eat it on Monday though, it's just a rough plan. Have you looked at crockpot 365 blog? I can't remember the exact link but that helped me get some crockpot ideas. We've made pork chops in the crockpot and ribs and roasts of course but the blog has some other great ideas. 

jaysgirljulie

MrsNJSwimmer:

I have no feedback, but we eat fairly UNhealthfully, so I'll be following this!

ditto!

KShiz

We don't have planned menus, but have the same staples. We buy chicken when it's on sale and keep it in the freezer, pasta in the pantry.  I'll cook a weeks worth of chicken at once and use the leftovers throughout the week.

mrspresley

i'm in the group that cooks once or twice a week and then has leftovers the rest of the week! i usually go through the same rotation of things we like to eat

the what's cooking board has lots of people who do menu planning so you might get some ideas there...

MauiBride2008

Aggghhh! 

I'm doing my weekly meal plan now and have two days where I'm just stumped and can't stumble upon anything to make that sounds good, quick or easy.

So far this week we have:  Beef Lasagna & Salad, Salmon, Rice & Green Beans, Tostadas.  I'm not very creative when it comes to meal planning, I need all the help I can get

SanHawaii08

I'm also in the camp of "cook once or twice a week and eat leftovers".  I'm so impressed by those of you who meal plan...I wish I could manage to cook more often!