Save Your Sanity when Meal Planning (FREE PRINTABLE!)
It’s easy to feel like a crazy person when you look at a blank calendar and try to pick meals for a WHOLE WEEK for a WHOLE FAMILY! So here are 3 tips for easy meal planning! (Along with a FREE printable at the end!)
1. Have a different theme or genre of food for each dinner meal that’s the same week to week. Here’s what it is for our family currently:
Monday: “Big Meal Monday” Pulled pork, brisket, roast chicken, casserole, anything that will give me leftovers for lunch throughout the week. I typically use my crock pot or instant pot on this day!
Tuesday: Taco Tuesday, Duh! I categorize anything Mexican food into this.
Wednesday: Eat Out (or “order in” these days…)
Thursday: Italian/Pasta
Friday: Pizza Night – Homemade, frozen or from a restaurant. I’ll usually make a salad or roast some veggies to go with it.
2. Keep snacks and breakfasts the SAME every week.
If you have kids, keep the snacks the same week to week and WRITE THEM DOWN! This will save you a battle of “But I don’t WANT a cheese stick!” When you can say “Oh I’m sorry! That’s what’s on the menu today!”
3. Keep lunches simple if dinner is complex.
This is another great tip for meal planning because it eliminates difficult recipes for certain meals. I mean do you really want to be cleaning out your skillet potentially 3 times in one day for scrambled eggs, quesadillas AND chicken?! I don’t.
As a bonus tip: have a set alternative for picky eaters.
Archer has the option for a cheese stick, peanut butter toast or scrambled egg if he isn’t eating his full meal. Not a whole separate meal. It’s nothing flashy or more appealing than the actual meal.
And lastly, no matter what, write it ALLL down! It helps your family and it helps you! That way you don’t have breakfast burritos, quesadillas and tacos all in the same day. 😉 I made a nifty little printable you can’t fill in week to week! I recommend printing on cardstock and laminating. Then you can use a Sharpie weekly and erase with a magic eraser.