184 - Helpful Habits for Meal Planning
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Resources from this episode:
The Work & Play Weekly Checklist (Free Download!)
Show Notes:
Here's a job description that life handed me that I just didn't really see coming. I have to be a cook like every day and I have to be a fairly good one because the tiny humans that I feed around my table are fairly opinionated about food. Actually, they're very opinionated about food.
Also, with that job description, it will affect my mood, whatever I make, whatever I cook, it's gonna affect my mood and theirs. Also, if I feed them and myself unhealthy things, it affects our mood and our weight and our overall health, how much we get sick, and it just so happens that the food that they love are the things that are terrible for you. So when I'm having a hard day, all I want to do is feed them goldfish and gummy snacks and ice cream and nothing that has any nutritious value because I'm gonna be honest, it's just a lot easier to give them what they want for that moment of course, because the cycle just continues. Food, our health, our moods on repeat, not to mention it affects the clarity of my own mind. If I eat, when I eat, how much I eat, what I am eating, it affects how I discipline them because I get very cranky and I am quick to anger when I'm hungry. And also I just wanna enjoy life and I want my ice cream and gummy snacks too sometimes.
Listen, it's just a lot to balance all of this. And here's the deal: I'm just supposed to be good at it. I'm supposed to be good at it and I'm not. I'm not normally good at this whole cooking thing, but it is a skill that's required of me as I have to feed my family and it's up to me, and this year I put some new habits into place—nothing huge, nothing massive—that have changed everything for me.
They're small changes that I've put into place just to help me stay sane, to help me stay on budget and to help me bless my family. So, I'm not a great chef, although I really love to pretend to be one with my kids and they like to call themselves sous chefs, especially because we're watching Ratatouille on repeat lately. But here we go. Here are some habits that I have recently put into place, just the last three months really and I've committed to them and I'm gonna share them with you today. Take them or leave them, but maybe just take one or two because honestly they've all served my family really well and served me in my sanity well, and I feel like at least one is gonna serve your family well, too.
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Before I jump into this episode, I just wanna say thank you to my patrons. You guys are amazing. Thank you so much for supporting this podcast. If you're interested in becoming a patron, you can head to patreon.com/work and play. And for as little as a dollar a month,
you can help keep this podcast going. And I'm trying to decide what I wanna do for my patrons with this episode, but I was thinking of maybe releasing like a month of like what my meal planning looks like. I don't know, would that be helpful? Maybe patrons can vote on that and I can put something special in Patreon just for you guys.
All right, I'm gonna share six habits, six things that I have put into place, habits, I think is the right word, maybe boundaries or guidelines that I have embraced for this year. Whatever word you wanna use. Here we go.
Number one, choose your budget friendly stores to shop in and stick with those stores. In order for this year, I've chosen Aldi, Sam's Club and Target. Here's my reasoning. Last year I mostly did Target pickup. It was great, it was fine. Target prices are actually pretty reasonable, but on repeat, they kind of add up and Aldi is definitely a better alternative. And I just thought it's just $2 to pick up your grocery store at Aldi. I'm definitely saving that money. I'm gonna just try to do my bulk week to week shopping at Aldi.
So mostly produce, fresh veggies, fruit, snacks for the kids, all that's coming from Aldi.
Number two, I'm new at this big bulk situation. Sam's Club. All right, here we go. I'm doing it. All I know so far is that I'm spending more than I want to. No, I'm just kidding. I mean kind of, not really. But here's the thing. When you buy in bulk, it is more expensive but you're saving in the long run. So I feel like I still need to learn kind of the long run piece of it. But I have found some really great things at Sam's Club and I know dollar for dollar, it's cheaper to buy three packs of organic ground beef for like $5 each, $5 a pack. I mean it's like $15 you get you tracking then you know like $8 at other stores. Okay, moving on. Choose your budget friendly stores. That was number one.
Number two, I'm recording and tracking everything I'm spending on groceries. I'm gonna confess last year I was not good at this. I did not track my spending well or stay on a food budget very well at all. We didn't go out out to eat a ton, we went out some but it was not a ton. I cooked mostly at home but I still just didn't track it. So I was unaware of what I'm spending. So the first few months of this year, all I've been doing is tracking what I'm spending at Aldi, Sam's Club and Target and really trying to get a hold on what my family actually needs week to week. The numbers that I really want to know are my weekly spending and my monthly spending. Like what does my family need every month to eat and then what does that translate to every week? Because I think what I'm gonna do, my strategy is to do one big Sam's Club order for the month and then fill in with Aldi every week and then maybe Target here and there for just items that I know my kids like from there. And also I love the Target brand paper plates. So you know, I'm just, I want, I want my target paper plates. Okay, moving on.
Number three, look through the freezer and fridge. Before planning my grocery order every single week, I am the worst about just buying whatever I need fresh. I mean that's a good thing. But also if I have it in the freezer, I don't use it very much, but like why do I need to freeze stuff if I'm not gonna use it? I need to use it because it's just gonna sit there forever. So that's my third habit that I'm really embracing this year is to really look through, see what meals I have ready to go see what meat, what veggies, see what I have in the freezer before I buy everything new every single week and use what's in the freezer.
All right, number four, meal planning. Now I've kind of tweaked my meal planning a little bit. I try to plan about five to six meals a week, knowing that there's gonna be probably like five, knowing there's gonna be leftovers, knowing there's gonna be a pizza night cuz we like to do pizza nights on Saturdays and knowing that there might or might not be a date night or something else that comes up.
So I usually try to plan four really healthy dinner meals for our family. And then leftovers another night, which will be five. One of those will definitely be leftovers. And then a six meal will be pizza. And then the seventh meal is just an easy kid meal, hot dogs, chicken nuggets, mac and cheese, something like that. And maybe Will and I will either get takeout or eat other leftovers or I'll fix us something else.
Or we'll eat hot dogs with the kids cuz we love hotdog. Number five, set a weekly spend goal and do my absolute best to be resourceful and to meet that goal. I am starting this in March. Okay, I have not actually done this if I'm honest. I feel like I have not gotten a hold on really what my weekly spend budget is as a family of six. And I know that might sound terrible, but I'm just gonna be honest with you and tell you that now. But I'm working on this and I think the first step is to track my spending for two months, which is the plan, which is what I'm doing as part of the Contentment Challenge and part of just my budgeting for this year. We're tracking it and entering it into our budget just to see what my spending habits are and then I'm gonna kind of tighten that down in March and really get a handle on my spending, my weekly spending and my monthly spending.
Okay, last habit.
This is new and I'm so excited to share it with you. Okay, quick backstory—a few weeks ago Will and I went out west to Utah to go skiing with his cousin David and his wife. And I was so impressed while I was there with because we had two days of skiing planned and she had pre-made the meals like ahead of time and they were just ready to be warmed up, like baked the breakfast casserole, had the soup ready to go. And I realized just in this one visit that I feel the need to make everything fresh that day. And I don't need to do that. That really like a lot of time could be saved if I don't do that. And so I came home from this trip and I started making two meals every Monday and maybe an extra meal or like I might get up to three meals. Like I might do two meals Sunday, two meals Monday, and then all I have to do is reheat the rest of the week. Now I know that doesn't always work with some of the meals that you make. Like we make fresh guacamole. Guacamole I don't like, I don't want that sitting in the fridge all week, that's gonna be gross, I wanna make that fresh.
Certain meals this isn't gonna apply to, but a pot of chili, absolutely you can just chop and make the whole thing early in the week and then reheat it two days later. So this is a new practice, a new habit that I'm getting into that I'm really excited about because I've already started to see the fruit of this and how much it helps me to get more outta my time in those days. Later in the week I went on a walk with the kids, I was not stressed out around dinner time. The kitchen is less of a mess. It's just great. So I just encourage you to try that. Just bake and cook a couple things like ahead of time, let 'em cool off, stick 'em in the fridge and then just reheat 'em later.
I'm telling ya it. This is a good habit. This is a good habit. I'm very excited to partake in the rest of this year. That's it.
Those are my simple new, hopefully helpful habits for meal planning this year. And I think they're gonna help us to eat healthier, to stay on budget, and for me to generally be in a better, happier mood around my kids, which is always a win.
I'm gonna close with words from Gusteau and Tui, "Anyone can cook."
Thanks so much and I'll see you next time.
