Peace in the Home: Five Tips for Meal Planning

Last week in the space of less than 24 hours I had two different close friends, at two different times, express interest in how I organize my life.  The first heard me mention "menu plan" and she said--that's how you do things? you plan out what you will have for dinner?  that must help so much because then you don't have to think about it!  Yes, she's right!

The second was a text I got from another dear friend, who said I'm overwhelmed. I need your help, organizing/time management guru.  So I called her, we talked, and I sent an email as well. She was overwhelmed by trying to balance her domestic and professional responsibilities, as well as family life, and felt like she needed guidance on how to make things at home run more smoothly. She wanted to know how I ran things, so I told her.

So that got me thinking about efficiency in domestic life and how routines help make life peaceful. My house is by no means perfectly-run, perfectly-organized, or (alas!) perfectly-clean, but it's pretty efficiently managed and we're functional and I'm not overwhelmed, so I am happy with it.  Unannounced guests can drop by and I don't panic or want to crawl into a hole, so I think things are okay. However, I haven't always been like this, and I realize lots of people struggle with making meals and cleaning house.  But these things do help foster peace in the home!

So this week I am going to talk about meal planning and next week I'll talk about housework.

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Planning meals makes sense to me because we have to eat every day, multiple times a day, and although some people might be creative enough to stand at the fridge at 5pm and decide what to eat for dinner, that kind of last-minute decision-making causes me anxiety.

Here are my tips for meal planning:

1. Shop the fridge, freezer, and pantry first: to save money and reduce food waste, check what you have on hand already.  Is there a zucchini in the fridge that needs to be used?  A package of frozen beef you could defrost and work into the plan?  Half a jar of leftover pasta sauce?  A dozen extra eggs sitting around?  Take these things into account.

2. Think realistically about the week ahead.  For instance, I know that on Wednesday evenings, dinner needs to be ready when I walk in the door from taking Annie to ballet.  And on Thursdays I get home just in time to start making dinner.  So on Wednesdays I'll plan a meal for the slow cooker and on Thursdays I'll plan something quick and easy. 

3. Make things now to make your future life easier.  I love doing this!  For instance, when I make a pie crust (which I do fairly often because my children love quiche), I will quadruple the recipe, then freeze balls of dough.  When it's time to make quiche, I just defrost the pre-made dough.  This saves time on a busy night and makes quiche one of my fastest, simplest meals. Another example: if I'm making a large pot of soup and my family doesn't eat it all at dinner and lunch the next day, I'll freeze the extra soup so that I can pull it out for a quick dinner another night.  Every so often, I'll have a dedicated hour or two to do some "batch cooking" for the freezer, so I'll put together chicken curry, various soups, chicken pot pie, etc. and freeze those for easy meals later.  Anytime I make muffins or gingerbread I freeze about half the batch and can pull those out for breakfasts, snacks, or supper soup supplements.  Having meals or components of meals already stocked in the freezer saves so much time, and I think it saves money, too. 

4. Use the slow cooker.  On a day when we'll be out and about most of the afternoon, I will happily put dinner in the slow cooker earlier in the day.  I like to do this with chili, curries, and soups: perfect foods for this time of year. 

5. Write it down, but hold it loosely.  I am flexible with my plans, although I generally do stick with them once they are made. But sometimes my mother-in-law will send over a casserole or my husband will suggest pizza, and I am happy to change plans to accommodate those things!

Once I have written my menu plan down, I jot down any ingredients or staples I need to purchase at the grocery store or farmers' market, and then I look through my (simple) coupon collection to see if anything correlates.  

Knowing what's for dinner gives me mental peace. I don't like going through my day and wondering what I'll cook that night...at least I don't like that at this stage of my life, because there are too many other demands on my time and mind.  So it's well worth it for me to spend a little time on the weekend planning ahead and creating a menu!