“So what’s for dinner?”
I look at the clock and see that it is 4:30. Dinner is once again upon us and I have no plan. I scramble for my “go-to’s,” nachos, quesadillas, and frozen pizza. Yes we are fed, which is a major success. But leaving meal decisions to the last minute piles unnecessary stress on me as well as reduces the level of nutrition in what we eat.
One solution to this problem? Meal planning!
When you’re trying to make meals happen while also taking care of children things can get hectic. Add in a chronic illness of some sort and it gets even worse due to fatigue, pain, or other daily symptoms.
I personally have some cognitive difficulties when it comes to making decisions and planning, so it is much simpler for me to have a plan in place for me to follow.
There are people who have a monthly calendar that stays the same for each month. Weekly calendars, batch cooking, etc.
Meal Planning with a Weekly Calendar
What most often works for me is a weekly calendar.
I don’t use this exact calendar, but I do use something similar.
The meal that is the most troublesome for me is dinner, so a calendar like this works great.
I have found that it’s best for me to plan the fruit or vegetable along with the main dish. This helps me to use our produce in a timely fashion.
Side note about that, it’s almost embarrassing how many times we buy something just to end up having to throw it away. Meal planning can reduce food waste!
Meal Planning With Batch Cooking
I’ve never tried batch cooking in large part because it seems overwhelming. If you are unfamiliar with what it is, it is exactly what it sounds like.
You choose a day to be your “cooking day” and make a large amount of something. It could be hamburger, rice, or anything your heart desires. A benefit of this is that on the days other than your cooking day meal prep doesn’t take as long because some elements of the meal are already prepared.
An example: On your cooking day you make rice. That night for dinner you have Swedish meatballs over rice. The next day you have stir fry. The day after that you eat ham fried rice.
So you can see the benefit of this method. Writing this post is convincing me that I need to try batch cooking. So perhaps in the future I will add to this post about my experience with it.
Barriers to Meal Planning
There are always barriers when it comes to making plans, and I’m going to bring up just a few that have made things difficult for me.
The effort it takes to plan ahead, finding a time to actually plan, remembering what groceries we have, and thinking of meals to make.
The effort takes care of itself when I get to the planning stage, so when I’ve been successful at meal planning I’ve chosen a time on Saturday to plan the meals for the following week. That allows me to check what groceries we have and then make a trip to the store if necessary.
I’ve also found that having a list of potential meals has made things simpler for me. In the past I’ve tried planning out meals for the whole month, and that is nice because it reduces the number of times you have to sit down and plan as well as having a month full of possible meals that are organized.
Conclusion
Meal Planning is one way to reduce the stress that can come from cooking meals for a family. As I’ve mentioned in a previous post, it is always best to reduce stress due to the inflammatory effect on the body, especially when you have a chronic illness.
What works for you? Comment below with your meal planning method or what method you want to try.
As for me, I will try the batch cooking.
