I have been in two modes lately... 1) SAVE MONEY & 2) SAVE TIME! I usually grocery shop once a week on either Sunday night or Monday morning, once a week. Plus, I always have to run up to the store once or twice a week for something I ran out of or forgot about. Our grocery store is about 15 minutes away. So not a huge deal, but still a deal none the less. So, in order to stop all the grocery visits and get organized. I decided to try out menu planning. I hate when I buy random groceries and thought I might use them and then the next thing they are old and waisted!
I had a few friends ask me to write a post about how I'm doing monthly meal planning and then at the end of the month, I'll post about what I would do differently and what I loved!
Yesterday we joined the Costco world! So we started, BUT we started with NO plan! Just looking at stuff we eat a lot of. Last night after the kids went to bed I searched endlessly for the PERFECT planner. Every one I found I would tweak a bit, but
this one is what I went with. Yes, I spent $10 on one when you can find them for free of Pinterest. However, this one was the most "Allyson Friendly" I could find. I love that the pantry inventory was filled out. Even if they aren't foods we use, I can white out the words and put other ones over them. I also liked that the meal planner for the week was broken down into breakfast/lunch/dinner. I would add snacks too, if I was making my own. I also made a list of meals we love to eat. Break them up into categories. I made a "Winter" & "Summer" list. And then in the list break up into chicken, beef, seafood, etc. I really only cook dinners... rarely do big breakfasts unless we have company, so my list only has dinners. If you have this list, when you are in the middle of trying to come up with a full months worth of meals, you wont get stumped. I pulled out pinterest and that helped in making the list.
I read a few different blogs on how they meal plan and got several different ways. One they do an inventory on what they have first and then select meals to fill in they're monthly calendar first, based on what they have. Another, they fill in the calendar first, then do inventory and base it on what they need. Oh, on my inventory, I changed the "Use by" to How many I need this month. I'll explain more in a bit. So, what did I do? I chose this month to fill out my calendar first and then do the inventory. But, next month I will do the other way. My reasoning is, I didn't have much of anything so there wasn't much of a stock pile, other than flours, sugars, oils, etc.
I got started by filling out my monthly calendar first. We eat out, usually every Friday and Saturday night, plus I take the kids to lunch 1 day a week. Other than that, its eat at home. I put on the calendar if we are out of town, or having company. Then I started filling in the dates with dinners I was going to make. I only put the main course, not all my sides or dessert. Then on the side grocery list I wrote everything I'd need to make those (main course only). Then I printed out of Meal Planner for everyweek. I filled in what we'd eat at each meal, but this time put all my sides too. Then same idea on the shopping list side (this time don't put the main course "supplies", remember they are on the other page). Then I took inventory of what I had already. I took all the pages, sat down with my phone and the made a note on it of what I needed from the store. On my weekly shopping list I crossed of what I got. This way, when I get to that week, I know if I need to get anything from the store. I bought a lot in bulk!!! I bought fruits in bulk, because 1) we eat a lot of it and 2) I can freeze most of it and it still taste great later. Even the bananas I can thaw and then use to bake with or make yummy smoothies. I found 6.75 lbs of 88% lean beef. And 2.5 lbs of chicken breast. When I got home I decided that all up into what I would use for a recipe. Put each amount in a freezer ziplock. I also bought shredded cheese in bulk. It freezes and thaws pretty good. Yes, I will still have to go to the store every week, but after $300 of groceries for the next 3 weeks, I'll only have to go for milk, bread, and some produce. I also, still have 3 lbs of ground beef for the next month! One of the things I bought in bulk was Mac 'n' Cheese. 15 boxes!!! So, we will only use at the VERY most 6 boxes this month. That means I have enough for almost 3 months.
I know this will take planning ahead & sticking with the menu!
