Let me start by saying what my main goal of meal planning is: making things easier for myself. As a new mom, I struggle with getting dinner on the table each night unless I plan ahead. I think meal planning can be overwhelming for some people, but remember that it doesn’t have to be! Meal planning does NOT have to mean trying 5 new recipes in a week; you’re the one calling the shots here. That means that sometimes my meal plan looks like spaghetti, frozen pizza, and takeout. Planning my meals for the week saves me time, money, and energy – and who wouldn’t want more of those things?
Meal planning means I never run into the dreaded “it’s-4-o’clock-and-I-have-no-idea-what’s-for-dinner” situation. I don’t have to scramble at the last minute to throw something together, I don’t have to pick up fast food because I have nothing to make, and I don’t have to feel guilty about making frozen pizza for dinner because it’s planned ahead of time. This is the magic of meal planning!
That being said, I found that I needed a printable meal planner that works for me. My biggest needs in a meal planning method are: (1) flexibility, (2) a way to “look ahead” to the following week, and (3) a space for notes and meal prep plans. I couldn’t find a meal planner that worked for me, so I created one! Today, I’m sharing a bit about how I meal plan and giving you my free printable meal planner!
How We Meal Plan
Choosing Meals
First, we choose our meals. I like meals that don’t require exact measurements (or a recipe if I’m being honest), that can be prepped ahead of time or come together quickly, and that don’t require a lot of specialty ingredients (because those can blow your grocery budget quickly). When picking meals, I try to consider what is on sale (e.g. a certain type of meat or vegetable), but we mostly just pick things that we want to eat that week.
Pro Tip: make a “master list” of meals to work from, and stick it on your fridge. This could include your favorite meals, any food in the freezer, and your go-to quick & easy meals. That way, when you’re meal planning, you don’t have to spend time trying to remember what things you can cook.
I also am a big proponent of freezer cooking! We still have a few meals left that I prepped and froze before our son was born, so we’ll pull one of those out of the freezer every so often. We also try to double and freeze a meal every week or two, so our freezer can stay stocked for busier days and weeks. For more info on freezer cooking and more meal plan ideas, check out the resources section at the end of this blog post.
Grocery Shopping
After we pick out what meals we want for the week, we make our grocery list and go shopping!
Here are the main tenets of my shopping process:
- Make a list of what you need, and stick to it!
- Only stock up on pantry staples when they’re on sale.
- Buy only what you need for one week.
- Only grocery shop once per week.
- Sometimes, your time is more important than saving money.
- Pick meals without too many “specialty” ingredients.
I started writing more about how we save money grocery shopping and our grocery shopping process, but it got way too long, so I decided to dedicate a whole blog post to it (read that here!).
Printable Meal Planner
Click the image below to download and print the meal planner!
How To Use The Meal Planner
After my meals and groceries have been planned, I fill out my meal planner! The planner I designed has 5 sections, so I’ll walk you through how I use each one.
Meals
First, I list out the meals I’ve planned for the week. I don’t usually plan sides ahead of time (typically if we have a side, it’ll be potatoes, rice, or some sort of vegetable), but once I decide what I want to do, I’ll jot it down under the meal.
Date
Here’s where I write down what day I’ll make each meal. The key to this meal planning technique is that I don’t assign meals to days right away! If there is a special circumstance that calls for a specific meal on a specific day, I’ll write that down, but otherwise, I decide what meal I want to make as I go.
Notes
In this section, I write down anything helpful, like things I can prep ahead of time, if I want to double a recipe to freeze half, things going on that day, etc. The prep ahead notes are the most helpful; that way I can work on tasks like chopping veggies, thawing chicken, or filling a large pot with water for pasta earlier in the day when I have some free time (and two free hands). Making a whole meal from start to finish with a newborn is almost impossible, so this has been really helpful!
Groceries
I like having this section for keeping track of groceries I need to buy next week. Typically when we run low or run out of something, like butter or olive oil, I’ll write it down right away so we don’t forget about it next week! This makes grocery shopping even easier, since I don’t have to do a thorough pantry inventory every week.
Next Week
In this section, I write down any meal ideas for the upcoming week and/or scheduling things that are going on the next week. Writing down meal ideas as we have them means I spend less time meal planning, and writing down events helps me make sure I have meals that will work for the next week’s schedule. For example, if we have plans during the day that mean we won’t be home until dinnertime, we either need a meal that can come together really quickly or something that can cook in the crockpot.
Resources
I hope this was helpful for you! I really encourage you to give meal planning a try! If you need some help getting started, I’ve gathered a few resources here to help you out:
- My recipes blog post archive (lots of quick & easy meals!)
- My freezer cooking board on Pinterest
- The Lazy Genius Guide to Freezer Meals
- The Lazy Genius Meal Plan
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