Cook’s Block

It’s amazing how 10 minutes of time on a Sunday saves me hours of anxiety in a week regarding meal prep.  Last year I got totally lazy with weekly meal planning and grocery shopping, and well, it was not pretty.  I was not organized with my shopping and so would end up at the grocery store almost daily after work.  I would start to get anxiety on the way home from work as I tried to figure out how I could mesh the random ingredients in our fridge into something that made sense. 

But alas, it’s a fresh new start for the school year and a fresh new start for the Fleming household too.  I have been taking 10 minutes every weekend to plan our meals for the week and make a grocery list.  And guess what?  Grocery shopping is faster AND cheaper, and dinners are much less painful.  The kids eat breakfast and lunch at daycare which is perfect, and I have a stash of groceries/snacks at work so I eat breakfast and lunch there daily.  Kieran is left to fend for himself for breakfast and lunch…somehow he manages to survive. 

Our meal plan for this week is as follows:  (and I don’t assign a day to each one, I just make whatever I happen to feel like cooking/eating that night). 

1.  Chicken pot pie (Kieran’s request), Salad

2.  Pork Chops, Mashed potatoes, brussel sprouts

3.  Cheesy chicken pasta bake, salad

4.  Homemade pizza

5.  Sloppy Joe’s

6.  Leftovers

(I only did 6 as we are going out on Sat night!)

One of my problems is that with the craziness of working full time and having 2 young kids, you stop being creative in the kitchen.  I felt like we were just having the same old things over and over again.  However I recently saw (on another blog) this neat way of organizing your meals for the week:

Meatless - This is pretty self explanatory - a meal containing no meat
Casserole - Any casserole-type dish
Crockpot - Any meal made in the crockpot
Guilt-free - A prepackaged meal on a day when I am tired or don't feel like cooking
From the freezer - A recipe using up an ingredient that is in our freezer
Something new - A brand new recipe!
Date night - A recipe for a date night in with the hubs after kids are in bed

I haven’t tried it yet, but I am going to next week.  I will provide a full report of my experience!    In the meantime, if you have any tried-and-true, EASY and FAST weeknight meals…send them my way!