maybe it stems from all of those dietetics assignments that required us to plan meals for elderly dialysis patients with wound healing concerns. maybe its a pregnancy thing. i'm so sick of eating and though i'm starving all of the time, nothing sounds good. maybe it's just a wife thing. who likes meal planning anyways?!
the alternative...the non-planning approach is NOT working. it's frustrating. it's unhealthy. it's mentally exhausting. so, it must be done.
as i've been working on my plans this afternoon, i've remembered why i have failed at planning meals in the past. a) something comes up and the plan flies out the window, b) it doesn't sound good when it comes time to make the meal, and c) i end up planning too many meals and we drown in leftovers.
so this time i'm approaching it in a new way.
1) i plan to be flexible (planning 2-3 weeks ahead, but only printing out one week at a time, after i've reevaluated),
2) i'm strategically using some meals that will make good leftovers and others that we'll only eat once...and then planning lunches accordingly, and
3) i added an events section (this way i can correspond actual life with meals). hopefully by taking some of our evening plans into the meal plan i can make things fit a bit better together.
alrighty then.
here's a quick look at this week:
so that's that.
Both Jayson and I hate meal planning as well! I love eating good food, but hate all that goes into it :) I hate the planning, the grocery list making, the grocery shopping, the putting away of the groceries . . . I don't mind the actual preparation of the meal itself, just all it takes to get to that point. Things were getting so bad after we had Jackson that we have actually started using a website called E-Mealz to do a lot of the prep work for us. They send you a menu every week, complete with side dishes and the best part is they also give you a grocery list! We have been pretty pleased with most of the meals (you can choose options for 2 person meals so you don't have tons of leftovers). They aren't gourmet recipes, but if you know how to cook already it is easy to do a little tweaking to make them a bit more exciting and flavorful. I don't know from a dietetics standpoint where they fall on the nutritional scale. We do things ourselves to make them a bit more healthy, cutting back on butter, using ground turkey instead of beef, etc. We have loved not having to think of meals and creating a shopping list, it is also good because you get to try a lot of new recipes. Anyway, there is my little plug for E-Mealz. The website is http://www.e-mealz.com
ReplyDeleteand it is only like $5/month.
That's pretty awesome. I think you hit the nail on the head with the 3 reasons why meal planning fails.
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