October 19th, 2013 - Weekend Edition - Get Planning Your Meals - Part 1

Hi Ladies,

Welcome to a little mini-series on Meal Planning.

There will be two parts to this:
Part 1: Introduction to Meal Planning and Before You Start
Part 2: Dinners - Tackling Family Meal Times

Stop back each week for the next installment.

 

Introduction To Meal Planning

What is it?  A way to simplify your life by setting out the menu for your week on Saturday or Sunday and then following the plan.

What are the benefits?

• Reduce food waste and save money!   The US wastes $165 BILLION in food waste every year! $2275 per family of four. Read more here.
• Save even more money by reducing your reliance on convenience foods like frozen meals and take out
• Simplify your life
• Reduce stress
• Make after-school and work activities nights easier on everyone
• Improve your overall health by reducing your consumption of overly processed and overly salty foods
• Re-introduce a food-based culture into your family
• Lose weight without a costly program - What? Yes. If you plan smart, portion controlled meals throughout the day and stick to your program, you can diet smart without your family even really realizing you are on a diet. Trust me, I've used this theory to lose 20 lbs (150 to 130 lbs, dropped my BMI to 22) and then maintain my weight loss, and my husband never complained he was on a diet, and he was eating the same food as I was (albeit at much larger portions!) 
  Note: a particularly sneaky wife could probably get hubby to lose weight without him realizing this way...

Wait, a what-where-who culture?
A Food-Based Culture. The rise of obesity in North America and elsewhere can be directly linked to increase in convenience foods since the 1960s or so and the demise in the family dinner. When convenience foods started emerging, the time spent in the kitchen decreased. Just think, your great-grandmother spent all day baking bread and making a family meal. Her daughters helped out.  The centre of the family home was the kitchen, and everyone came together for not one meal per day or week, but 2-3 meals per day!!
Fast forward to today, and most families don't even eat dinner together. Not only that, but tons of people have no idea how to make the most basic things, let alone baking their own bread!!
The loss of contact with our food - how to prepare it and how to be in control, coupled with the loss of family contact and interaction has made us unconscious eaters - we mow down on our Big Mac and Fries on the way to Jimmy's soccer game in the car while driving, rather than sitting down with Jimmy and eating something nutritious that will give him good energy fuels for his game while talking about how excited he is and encouraging and bolstering his confidence.

No way, I can't do all that!
Yes. Yes you can. By planning ahead and making quick easy meals for game-nights, and saving the pot roast for a quiet night, you can serve your family wholesome and nutritious meals, with the ingredients you want, in a snap.

But I'm not making my own bread. No way.
Not a problem. I would encourage you to try it though. I can make a loaf of bread in my breadmaker between the time I get home from work and the time I go to bed (about 5 hours). I get home, fill up my breadmaker with the recipe I want (a family-favourite is a multi-seed bread) and then we have fresh bread for the next two to three days for my current family of 2.

Isn't this going to take time away from my kids?
No. You have a few choices here. Homework time can be while mom cooks, with everyone seated around the kitchen table working on their work (and also nearby in case of questions). Or, get the kids involved in the cooking!! There are fabulous products out there like the Pampered Chef My Safe Cutter which will let young kids help with chopping (as long as you don't mind strange shaped carrot pieces). Kids also love to mix, stir, measure, roll, and of course, taste!! Not only is it fun to cook with your kids but its educational - they are learning life skills of cooking, and maybe a bit of chemistry too!

Not convinced yet?? I challenge you to try it for a month. Just one month. I promise, once you get the hang of it, you will enjoy the control and planning in your life. If you are a very strong Myers-Briggs P type, this may never be for you. But try it.... maybe some of my 90% J will rub off ;)

Before You Start

What? I can't just start?
Well, you can. But lets call this the program with training wheels. Or really, what it is, the "Empty the Pantry" part of the program.

Your Planning Board

OK - to really keep with the plan, you need a meal planning board, or a weekly menu board, to outline your dinners on.

Some great inspiration can be found here and here and even a horizontal version here. A quick google search will find you even more.

Wait? Not the crafty type? Me either. (OK I lie, but easy got hold of pregnant and lazy me on this one!)

So you can either make something like my linkies above, or you can go my way and make one like mine (detailed below).

Either way, make sure your menu board has the following things on it:

• A place to put the meal for all 7 days of the week
• Some way to stick said meal to the spot it is allocated to.
  Great ideas for this: magnets, clothespins, velcro (OK, thats expensive!), see through plastic pockets (good if you have a food chucking toddler around) or push pins (not the best if you have said toddler around)
• A place to stick your shopping list pad
• A shopping list pad  (spend the extra $$ and get the sticky post its. Trust me. I will explain all soon)
• A  big pocket of some sort to hold all the meal cards you will use
• A title. OK - you don't need a title but I mean, you want it to be pretty and you don't want people to say "What the heck is this board without a title?". Yep. I'm a bit of stickler.

My Planning Board

So, as I wandered the halls of Wal-Mart looking for the perfect magnetic board for me to use, I stumbled upon these gorgeous Quartet 14"x14" Black magnetic dry erase boards, with NEON dry erase pens. I was in love. True love.  And it was $10 (that's CDN!). I was SO excited because even my magnetic paint cost me $20 for the little tiny container.

So I settled, right then and there, to totally change my plan of awesome gorgeousness.

Further exploration found these cute push-pin look magnets, in NEON! I had to have them, and at $2 for 10, who was going to complain??

Then off to the shopping note pad section. I settled on 4"x6" as it looked best on my board and was a very common size (easy to find in the future). I ended up getting these at Staples because of a debacle with the ones I had picked at Wal-Mart. They are sticky Post-its but Staples brand ones (although I kind of wish I had gotten the pretty neon stack, in the end my inner cheapskate won that argument and I bought plain yellow).
Why sticky? Because they stick to my board, meaning I can mount just a few papers at a time and hide the rest so that my grocery pad doesn't disappear too quickly.
Also... there is nothing better than driving around the grocery store with your list stuck to your hand, cell phone, cart... forehead?  Whatever. Its quick and easy and remains accessible. I mean, once I have a kid, I could stick it to his forehead... HMMMM.

Anyways, I digress.

So total cost for my board:  $12+tax
Cost for 250 grocery notes: $8+tax

Thats $20 on my fancy schmancy board!

Empty the Pantry (and Freezer) Program

The first and most important step to any life change is to ENABLE IT.  Commit and make it happen.  And as long as you have those Lean Cuisines, boxes of chicken nuggets and goodness-knows what else in your freezer, they are there. Tempting you to abandon your plan. So they need to go.

So here are the steps to take. You may need to rinse and repeat over a few weeks if your house is jam-packed with junk like mine is. 
Note: if you are an "extreme couponer" or a "hoarder" of grocery items like BBQ sauces, skip the pantry analysis portion and just focus on the fridge and freezer. When you do your weekly shop, compile your list based on your meal plan, and then shop first in the stockpile, crossing off whatever you have, and then shop second at the grocery store, mostly for your fresh items.  If you have a freezer stockpile too, then... make it work sistah!!

Start this program on a Saturday or Sunday

1. Take an inventory of what you have in your fridge. Discard anything that isn't edible any more. Anything in there that you don't use often, either chuck it out or find a recipe that will make it work.
2. Any ingredients you want rid of from step 1 and have found a recipe for, put those on your meal plan for dinners this week.
3. Head to the freezer(s). Empty those babies out. 
   Feed the kids 20 popsicles, ice lollies and freezies each to get rid of that colossal waste of space.  Send the kids to grandma's all hopped up on sugar. You and daddy-o finish off all the bits of ice cream. Or, make an ice cream cake
4. Based on what you find in the freezer, chuck or keep everything. The things you keep, work them into your meal plan.
5. If your menu isn't completely full for the week, head to the pantry. If it is, stop there, add some fresh veggies to your meals for the week (unless you are hoarding frozen veggies, I am terrible at that)
6. In the pantry, same process. If you bought a souvlaki marinade for meat 2 years ago like me and you haven't used it, put it on that meal plan. Now is the time ladies!!

So as I said, rinse and repeat until you have gotten rid of most of the bulk and surplus foods you have in your pantry, freezer and fridge, especially the overly processed convenience foods. 

If you're having some anxiety because your freezer is bare and your pantry looks empty, don't worry. We will fill it back up, I promise.

In the mean time, if there are any great deals on foods you want to stock up on that are not overly processed AND you have room in your freezer or pantry (this is not for fridge foods ladies, those expire too quickly), go right ahead.

I would recommend that you buy a kitchen scale if you see one on sale to help with portioning bulk meat

Foods you are allowed to stock up on:

• dried pasta of any sort. Preferably whole wheat or other "fancier" pastas like the tri color or spinach fettucine, but if your family will only eat white pasta, then OK
• rice - you are going to want a few varieties, namely a long grain like basmati and a quick cook rice like brown rice quick rice. If you don't want to eat quick rices, just stock up on a long grain and a medium grain rice of choice.  Wild rice is another option you can easily add in, as is any bagged rice blend. 
• Other grains if you like them - quinoa, bulgar wheat, etc. If you eat them, they can be substituted in our meal planner for any meal that says "and rice" or any meal that says "and pasta". I specifically did not include these grains in the specific recipes since a lot of people are not comfortable with their use
• boneless skinless chicken breasts - these are a big source of protein in our meal plan so go ahead and buy. Freeze them in good freezer bags in packs of 2 and/or 4, or by the pound. Mark on the outside
• boneless skinless chicken thighs - these can be substituted for breasts in any recipe and are cheaper. Pack them by the pound
• Pork - chops, loins, shoulders, bacon, hams - if there is a farmer nearby who sells a whole pig type deal, you can definitely go with something like that to get a variety of cuts. The menu planner uses a few different cuts mentioned above, but if there is some part of the pig you like to use or that you get that we don't have a recipe in the planner for, you can add it your self and then share with the rest of us
• Beef - again, you could buy a quarter or so, but a whole cow is a bit much for most people to store. The main cuts you will need is ground, stewing meat and roasts, with a selection of a few steak meals, and again, add more if you like
• Ground meat - why is this its own category? Because you can make a ton of things with different ground meats. So stock up and package by the pound, 1 1/2 lb and 2 lb packages of ground turkey, chicken, beef, veal, pork, boar, bison, venison, etc
• Frozen vegetables - spinach, corn, peas, mixed veggies, broccoli - these are all staples you can use any day as the vegetable side to your meal. Don't feel like salad? Switch it up with frozen veg, they take no time to prepare and are often more nutritious than a fresh version. Why? Individually quick frozen (IQF) green beans are frozen within 8 hours of picking. In that same time, the beans lose 50% of their Vitamin C. And unless you're out picking them yourselves, you are not going to get fresher! 
• Canned staples - diced tomatoes (no salt added, packed in juice), tomato sauce (watch the sodium and additives!), canned corn (vacuum packed, no salt added), beans and chick peas (no salt added, in water, or select dried versions to save even more money) are all staples you will use from time to time, so keep a few on hand
• Spices - this is only on here if you are not a spice and herb user. If you have a well-stocked and relatively fresh supply of spices, don't worry about this. You can add spices as we go. The best way to start an herb and spice collection is to buy a spice rack and fill the jars by buying your spices at the local bulk store (Bulk Barn in Canada). Spices are best in the first 6 months, so don't bother buying in bulk unless you are a caterer. To start, you need a nice pepper grinder and some peppercorns. Personally I like a blend of colored peppercorns. Then herbs I recommend include: Italian herb blend or Italian seasoning (salt-free), oregano, basil, thyme, parsley and perhaps dill (I personally hate dill). Then some other spices you will need are chili powder, cumin, red pepper flakes, cayenne pepper (skip if you don't like spicy-hot), paprika, meat tenderizer and a nice spice blend for meats and beef (i.e  Montreal Steak Spice). If you are tight for cash and can't afford to stock your pantry all at once with spices, buy them bit by bit as you need them, and feel free to Google or message us for suggested substitutes.  
• Pantry Staples - these are the basics, and again, stock up if you have the money, or buy as needed. These include at least two oils - olive oil and a vegetable or canola oil, vinegars - balsamic, red wine and white at least, soy sauce, chicken/vegetable and beef broths, and your basic condiments - ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard. I would suggest at least a yellow mustard and a Dijon, the world of mustards is huge and we have about 5 varieties in our fridge. Of course sugar, salt and flour should be present as well.

Those are the basics you will need. Of course there will be a lot of emphasis on fresh in the meal planner, and always choose lower-sodium options, and fruits and veggies packed in their own juices or vacuum packed over packed in syrup or brine. 

For kitchen equipment, hopefully you have most of the essentials you will need - pots and pans with lids, mixing bowls, a good cutting board and few nice knives, random gadgets. PLEASE go out and get a garlic press if you don't have one. There is nothing like fresh garlic both from a taste and a nutrition standpoint. 

In Summary

You should meal plan because it will make your life easier and less stressful. It will give you a sense of organization, and send you on a purposeful trip to the grocery store. Start by making a meal planning board and practice using it and planning meals to empty your pantry and freezer of many of the salt and preservative-laden convenience foods you have come to rely on.  If you are a couponer or a deal-seeker, start stocking up on the ingredients mentioned above. Make sure to portion the food out into usable sizes, and label well. (See Meal Planning -extra tips when released for more tips on shopping smart and food portioning).