Tips To Kick Weekly Meal Planning Up A Notch

Most individuals who do the grocery shopping and cooking, whether just for themselves or for their families, tend to do some meal planning. This often stays informal and does not extend beyond briefly thinking about what to eat that week while they are grocery shopping or while making a simple grocery list before they head to the store. Those with busy lives, who want to try new meals, who may be on a budget, or who simply enjoy planning, often find themselves unhappy with an informal meal planning approach such as this.

Keep A Simple Recipe Saving System

Meal planning can seem overwhelming to those who have not tried it before, but it doesn't have to be! When you find recipes you want to repeat or are going to try for the first time, don’t make your system overly complicated. You can print them out and insert pages into a binder, use bookmarks on your internet browser, or even just write them in a notebook. In any case, keeping the system of saving simple recipes is key. Otherwise, more of your time will end up going towards collecting recipes and recording them rather than meal planning itself. If the cycle of collecting and recording seems endless, the chances that meal planning appearing overwhelming will increase.

Ask Family For Favorites

If you are the one who cooks most of the time and have a hungry family to feed, try generating ideas by asking them what they like to eat. Of course, you won’t want to repeat the same meals all the time, but you can create variations on favorites to add interest or use favorite meals to spark entirely new ideas. For instance, if someone in your family loves pizza, try varying the toppings each time you cook it! You can apply the same strategy to spaghetti. Besides, did you know stir-fry with noodles is a great alternative to a traditional Italian spaghetti or pasta dish? Compile a list of your family’s favorites and store them for the future. If nothing else, they make for a good backup.