I've never really been into planning dinners in advance and especially now that we get our fruit and veggies delivered weekly, it's been easier to just decide each night or the night before based on what we have in the fridge or cupboard and maybe can collect on the way home from work. But today I've been looking into menu planning because next week I'm working the full five days (the first time since I went back to work three days a week after my maternity leave) and I want to make sure I am nice and organised with dinners so there's less to stress about.
I found a few websites that had lots and lots of recipes and ideas for planning menus weekly or monthly (can't even fathom that!). I love the ones that come with a mobile app where you can choose your meals for the week and add the ingredients to the list. Then when you go shopping you can cross them off as you get them. At the moment my husband and I use a website for our calendar and shopping lists. That way, either of us can add items to shopping list and whoever is shopping can cross them off as they go. Of course, you have to have mobile service in your supermarket otherwise it doesn't work very well, as we've found out on several occasions!
The most interesting website was one called Planning With Kids. There are lots of recipes that seem to be easy to do and are great for both mid-week and kids. I even got the app to go with it although it seemed a bit restrictive in what you could do with it. It's a good start though, if you just want to think about organising your dinners and planning the week's meals. I made a list of the meals I'd chosen, both from the website and my own, and then added the ingredients I needed to my shopping list. It's the first time I've done a whole week's worth of shopping in one go and it felt good. My fridge is now laden with lots of goodies and as long as I can control myself and not change things too much, the week should be stress-free when it comes to cooking!
Feel free to tell me if you've ever planned your meals weekly or monthly before and how it worked out. Or if you still do, and how it's going!
