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Monthly meal planning, does it really save money?

Posted: Aug 10, 2010

Because of the crappy economy, I'm trying to budget my money better and I've decided to try to give this a try. I work second shift and I've gotten into the habit of cooking dinner maybe three times a week and doing take out the rest of the week and I want to get out of that habit. And I also want to take time to sit down with my kids and eat supper. Take my dinner break and enjoy it. But I am the least organized person! So before I dive into this, I want to make sure it's worth it and I want suggestions to help me stay organized and focused. Not to mention some really good, easy recipes would be nice to. Like crockpot recipes. I hate my crockpot. I never use it, but because I work second shift, I think if I had some good crockpot recipes that I could fix and slow cook all day, so by the time I start my shift, dinner is pretty much done so all I have to do is take my break and eat with my kids.

My kids are also big snackers and I find that a large portion of my grocery bill is on crap like chips and Little Debbies. I still want to have sweets on hand as a treat for the kids, but I don't like the amount of money I spend on that stuff.

So any planners out there wanna give me some suggestions?

Thanks!

;

cut n paste from meal planning site - maybe will help.

[ In Reply To ..]
Meal Planning Made Easy

By Rachel Paxton

It's no fun trying to decide what to make for dinner every night. Planning your meals ahead of time often saves you time as well as money.

There are many different ways to plan your meals. How you plan yours depends on how much time you want to spend now to save yourself time later.

I plan my meals once a week. Because I have limited refrigerator/freezer space and a small family to feed (3), this plan seems to work best for me. I only go to the grocery store once a week. When I'm getting ready to go to the store, I sit down and starting planning my menu for the next week.

This is a good time to go through this week's grocery ads to see what's on sale this week. I also take this time to clean out my refrigerator to see what needs thrown away and what can be re-used as leftovers in the next couple of days. Cleaning out your refrigerator weekly is crucial in avoiding wasting food that could still be used to make a perfectly good meal.

So after I've cleaned out the refrigerator and scanned the grocery store ads, I start my shopping list. I try to plan around what I already have in the freezer. For example, if I know I have a pound of hamburger in the freezer and I know I have spaghetti noodles on hand, then I just need to put spaghetti sauce on my list in order to have spaghetti for dinner one night.

I've also found that often we don't need as much meat in our meals as you might think. For our family of three, a pound of hamburger can be used for both spaghetti and tacos. If I cook the hamburger all at once, I can just put half of it in the refrigerator for the next meal (a big time savings!). If I already have taco shells on hand all I need is to make sure that the sour cream I have in the refrigerator is still good and put lettuce and tomatoes on my shopping list.

You should always stock up on meat when it's on sale. If you do you'll find that some weeks you'll end up buying almost no meat at all, if any. I also stock up on items like jars of spaghetti sauce when they're on sale. Then I'll always have a quick dinner ready on a moment's notice if I already have hamburger (also bought on sale) and spaghetti noodles on hand.

Some weeks I realize that I already have much of what I'm going to need for the week. Some of the staples I keep on hand: sour cream, cheese, taco shells, spaghetti noodles, egg noodles, cream of mushroom soup, onions, potatoes, garlic, tuna, spaghetti sauce, tomato sauce, black olives, canned clams, and rice. These ingredients make a lot of the meals we eat, like: hamburger and rice, beef stroganoff, tacos, spaghetti, clam chowder, and hamburger gravy and mashed potatoes.

I usually plan for only 5 meals a week. I know that sometime during the week we'll be eating leftovers or fending for ourselves due to time constraints.

This system has worked really well for me and saved us lots of money. I plan once a week, shop once a week, and don't give a thought to meal planning for the rest of the week. And I don't hold myself to cooking a certain meal on a certain night. I usually decide that day what I'm going to cook for dinner to be a little flexible.

There are many other ways you can plan your meals. Some people cook once a month and freeze their meals for later use (requires a lot of freezer space). A couple of books on this subject are Frozen Assets by Deborah Taylor Hough and The Freezer Cooking Manual by Tara Wohlenhaus.

Meal planning doesn't have to be hard. Modify your plan to suit your family's needs. Just make sure you HAVE a plan. It will inevitably save you time as well as money.

When I make spaghetti sauce, I make enough for 3 meals or more - Backwards Typist

[ In Reply To ..]
I then cool, and use either freezer bags (less room taken in the freezer) or freezer containers to save separate portions.

I do the same with hamburger. Fry up a lot, cool and freeze in portions. Good starter for a lot of meals. Plus I make meatloaf ahead of time, cook, freeze, and then microwave it.

When soup fixin's are on sale (carrots 3 bags for $1, celery 2 for $1, etc.), I dice or slice them all, use beef or chicken broth and freeze. I also keep cans of mixed veggies on hand "just in case."

You can make extra portions of just about any meal and freeze the extra portions. I have containers that have separate sections (like TV dinners do), make up extra portions of meals and freeze.

Everything freezes well...except I'm still working on how to freeze celery. That's my challenge right now. LOL

Have you tried blanching it first? - Happy MT Robin

[ In Reply To ..]
I watch a lot of cooking shows. Haven't tried to freeze celery, but something I saw on one of the shows was blanching in boiling water for about a minute then putting in an ice bath then freezing. This helps to prevent the crystalization in the cells that makes the food soggy after the freezing.

Thanks. I'll try that. I used to watch a lot of cooking - Backwards Typist

[ In Reply To ..]
shows, too, but they make me hungry and broke due to some of the ingredients necessary! DH doesn't care to watch.

I have tons of Basil growing this year. Looks beautiful. I did see where you could freeze herbs, but I think I'll dry most of it and just test freezing. First I have to steal DH's ice trays fron his fridge.

It's been a great year for veggies this year. DH planted 70 tomato plants, so I'm gonna be ultra busy...if he doesn't give them all away first. LOL

Wish he would find my canning equipment in the shed, though. That's why I have to freeze a lot of things. When we moved to this house, they packed everything in the shed except the bare every day necessities, or stuff I could grab before it got lost in never-never land, until we got settled in, but not specifically in order of importance. (I was working 2 outside jobs at the time).

Spaghetti sauce, etc. - Aspiring coder

[ In Reply To ..]
I've done all of these things except the soup fixin's but that is a good idea. I like to freeze sphaghetti sauce or just about anything I make in the crock pot because it is quick to grab and go for lunch or dinner. I study in the evenings so need something quick. You've probably frozen produce more than I have but asparagus (if you can get it fresh where you live) keeps pretty well if you blanch it first and it is yummy grilled, I use my indoor grill a lot. After the discussion about seasonal produce, I purchased asparagus and fresh strawberries, even some locally grown corn, 2 ears for $1.00 at farmer's market. Ooh, I'm getting hungry, think I'll check out the crock pot recipe web site!

crockpot365.blogspot.com has some really good crockpot recipes - nm

[ In Reply To ..]
:)

What a great site! Thank you so much! - LoriMT

[ In Reply To ..]
I'm dusting off my crockpot as we speak!

Thanks So Much for this site. I spent the last 2 hours - Backwards Typist

[ In Reply To ..]
there. Didn't get through most of the recipes, but am planning on making some yogurt.

The recipes are definitely fancier than my crockpot recipe books and I'm definitely going to check them out.

http://slowandsimple.com/ is a good one, too. - Love my crockpot!

[ In Reply To ..]
nm

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