If I’m being entirely honest I have a real love hate relationship with cooking, meal planning, and meal prep. I love cooking and trying new recipes – but I hate having to come up with something and be creative at the end of a long and stressful day. Cue the awe inspiring meal plan! Meal plans help solve so many of my biggest challenges and frustrations.

• They help give me a guide on days when I’m not feeling creative
• Provide an outline/shopping list for my weekly grocery run (helping me to avoid buying things I don’t need and ensuring I have everything I do need!)
• They help me stay within our food budget
• Help prevent us from resorting to ordering take out at the end of a long or frustrating day – which can become very expensive very quickly
• They allow me to control the menu and therefore the ingredients – helping to increase healthy foods, and decrease or eliminate unhealthy ingredients/options.

However the solution (the meal plan) to the problem requires additional effort upfront. I have made many meal plans over the years, bought all the ingredients, and put ourselves in a perfect position to succeed – only to abandon the plan half way through the week because the meals required too much time or effort at the end of a long day.

So frustrating! So discouraging! After all the work and effort – to fall short at the end can cause anyone to feel like they can’t succeed. Or like it isn’t worth it. BUT WAIT! Before we all give up and give in there is one more thing that can really help us to succeed even on our busiest, most exhausting, most frustrating days! Cue meal prep!

Okay, yes I’m suggesting a solution that once again is going to take more of our precious time and energy up front – but stay with me for a moment. The days, weeks, and months I have a meal plan in place, and meal prep completed I find we are truly happier! For me, more happiness day to day is worth the time and effort up front! If, however, you are perfectly happy now and therefore have no desire to increase happiness through meal plans and meal prep consider these other reasons why I love meal plans and meal prep. When I do the work up front we…

• Save money
• Spend less time tied up preparing meals day to day
• Spend more time playing
• Eat healthier (maybe even lose a little weight)
• Try new recipes (because we plan ahead we are less likely to fall into the trap of preparing the same thing day in and day out)
• Discover new flavors or cooking techniques
• Have less dish clean up day to day
• Shorter time to get meals to the table
• Less waste (fresh produce and/or meat purchased but forgotten in the fridge or freezer is not only wasted food but wasted money!)

Some of these may seem too good to be true, but in taking 1 day to plan a week or even a full months worth of meals and then one day or one night each week to clean and prep ingredients – you truly can save yourself time, frustration, and money!

Recently I took it upon myself to make a detailed meal plan and calendar for 4 full weeks. In truth it took me two full days, but when I finished I had this great sense of satisfaction! Not only do I have a road map for the next month, I’ve ensured a great variety. This is something that really helps in our house. My two Wee Laird’s crave variety and do much better meal to meal if we’ve made an effort to make this happen.

To make my life easier when making a meal plan I start with a blank calendar (week or month – whatever works best for you). My sister bought a desk calendar, added magnets to the back so she could hang it on the fridge, and used that to great success! I’ve used basic printed weekly calendars and even dry erase boards in the past myself! For this most recent meal plan my lovely husband printed off blank sheets he found online. 2 weeks broken down into three sections each day – perfect for meal planning! Then I sat down and on a separate sheet of paper I wrote down all of our breakfast foods, then lunch options, and finally dinner meals. If you’re feeling stuck at this point, perhaps not feeling creative or you simply don’t have a list of go to meals, try sending out a blast message to friends and family. Ask for their go to meals and recipes. Before you know it, you’ll have a whole list of great options, and maybe even a new family favorite.

Once I have my master list of meals and recipes, I start filling in the calendar. I like having my list first because it helps me stay on track, avoid planning the same things day after day, and I can ensure that variety we crave.

Once my calendar is filled in I go through my fridge, freezer, and pantry and begin making my grocery list for the first week. Occasionally if there is a great sale on a pantry or freezer item I might stock up on multiple weeks worth of that item – but for the most part I try to stick to one week at a time to avoid potential food waste.

After the weekly trip to the store I try to prepare and organize ingredients as soon as I can. Avoiding a long delay between shopping and meal prep helps keep me on track, and prevents anything from going bad in the fridge before I have a chance to use it! I love preparing as much as I can up front. If I’m making fajitas, I separate the chicken, wash and slice the bell peppers and onions, and toss everything into a Tupperware or bag including ingredients for guacamole and the tortillas. Then, on fajita night, all I have to do is reach into the fridge and grab that meals container. Everything I need is there and most of it is ready to get cooking! Boom, homemade dinner to the table in 15min! Same goes for meals with complex spice combinations or sauces. If I can get these measured and put together in advance it saves me time on the day the meal is planned. It’s the French principle of mise en place – having everything prepared and in it’s place saves time, ensures recipe accuracy, and also ensures you have everything you need as you need it while cooking!

I’m happy to say my most recent 4 week calendar has been a great success! We are into week 3 and doing pretty darn good sticking to the plan. On a few days we’ve made substitutions or swapped days based on preference or weather (some days cold weather makes you feel like soup, and some days the heart makes you crave BBQ), but because we’ve been prepared we’ve always had a ready meal.

Below I’ve added pictures of my 4 week calendars – as inspiration, or for you to use if you like ☺️ If you have other tips and tricks you use for meal planning, or to help stay on track – please feel free to leave a comment! We’d love to hear from you!

Wishing you all health and happy cooking from all of us here in the Wee Laird’s Kitchen.