Meal Planning
MEAL PLANNING | COUPONING | STOCKPILING | PLAN-BUDGET | THE STORE | THE KITCHEN
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Meal planning is key when it comes to keeping your sanity, staying organized, and saving money. So what’s the secret?It’s really not that complicated. It’s as simple as knowing what you have on hand, pairing that with what’s on sale at the grocery store, then putting together a menu of recipes your family loves.Enjoy the following meal planning articles as well as these tools that will help you begin— and you’ll be on your way to saving money!
- Why Should I Meal Plan?
- 5 Easy Steps to Meal Planning
- Meal Planning 101 — Part 1 | Part 2
- “Planning Never Tasted So Good” – Chapter 4 from my book, Saving Savvy
- Five Tips to Avoid the Weeknight Dinner Scramble
- How to Plan a Kitchen Prep Day
- 5 Ways to Save Money Dining Out or Eating In
- How I Beat My Challenge to “Waste No Food”
- Reducing Recipe Costs
- Eat From The Pantry Challenge for January
- How I Fed Four Adults for Only $4.62!
- How to Create Your Own Recipe Box and Shopping List
- How to Save When Holiday Entertaining
- Master Holiday Meal Plan (2-Part Series)
* Holiday Meal Plan – Part 1
* Holiday Prep Day and Strategy – Part 2
Meal Planning Website Resources:
$5 Dinners: An amazing resource for meal planning, that also has a store specific bargain meal of the week!
All Recipes: Plug in your ingredients to find recipes that match what you have on hand!
Crockpot 365: A full year (yes EVERY day) of crockpotting!
E-Mealz: Subscription service whose meal plans are based on Sales Cycles at the stores they cover (in the South and West – but includes WalMart, Kroger Affiliates and an “any store” plan).
Food Network: Recipes and demonstrations on many different kinds of meals. You can follow different chefs and grab their recipes here!
Organized Junkie’s Menu Plan Monday: Lots of ideas for your weekly menu.
Recipezaar: Contains a massive ingredient search database, to find recipes to match items you have on hand!
SuperCooks.com: A new recipe search engine that finds recipes you can make with the ingredients you have at home.
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks for including us on your resource page! We stumbled across your website today and love it!
The Meal Planning Mommas!
I have the perfect meal plans for all walks of life with Homemade Gourmet, they even give the grocery list that is needed with the dry mixes. For 50.00 you can get between 6-12 meals to feed a family of 5-6 by just adding the wet ingredients. Most of the wet ingredients you probably have in your pantry as we speak, email me if you are interested. Karen
At your class you discussed stockpiling and keeping an inventory of your freezer and pantry, which aids in meal planning. You mentioned it being an “In/Out” list. Is this something you post on your pantry and freezer or is it listed in a notebook in your kitchen? I’m trying to get organized and will take any suggestions you have. Thanx!
It is a spreadsheet that I keep on my freezer/pantry, but it is up there w/ a magnet, so I can take it down when I meal plan to use!
I am working hard at using what is in my freezer…we have a lot of meat stock piled in there! YAY!! But, I would love some input on a few things. I am a morning person….so as much of my cooking that I can do ahead of time the better. I was wondering if anyone has any experience with freezing casseroles? Like chicken and rice, etc. I’m wondering if I just cook a few up at a time and the freeze them if they will reheat okay? thanks!
Hi, Kelly! I wanted to tell you that my husband and I finally started emealz! We LOVE it! I've wanted to since I read about it on your website a few months ago. My husband heard of it from Dave Ramsey. I wish we started long ago! I've had a really hard time getting it together to meal plan and cook on my own. This is our second week using emealz, and it fits our lifestyle perfectly. Thank you for including it in your meal planning advice. We have two children two and under.
All the best!
Just wanted to let you know the link for 2 store grocery list takes you to Trader Joes deals.
Thanks for the wonderful information. I’ve been planning my weekly meals and came upon your template. There is only one problem. I like to add the books, recipe names and pages I used, so I can recycle at a later time, but I don’t have enough room to write the information. Is it possible to add lines. You currently have 2 lines per day. Thanks a lot. God Bless You!
Dee, thanks for your feedback I will keep that in mind if we do any updates to the template in the future!
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