i suck at picking out meals for the week.
Posted by longer_look on Jun 03, 2010 · Member since Feb 2010 · 369 posts
it is the bane of my existence.
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it is the bane of my existence.
Totally not a planner. I usually cook what I stumble across in my cookbooks, buy what ingredients I might need and make it. Usually there's enough for another meal or two. I'm pretty well stocked with core ingredients like spices and condiments. Yesterday I picked up a cookbook and picked something out for dinner tonight and bought what I didn't have today. That's sort of like planning isn't it?
I probably should plan more because I'm working 12 hour shifts this weekend and don't like a lot of drama cooking, but I'll throw something together.
I'm a total planner! I make my menu out a week in advance so I know what to shop for. My husband thinks I'm crazy and always asks "how in the world do you know what you want to eat NEXT Wednesday?!" He has the hardest time contributing, hehe. I also have a notebook for planning purposes, and I write down ideas for new things. Lately, I've been trying to plan using the food pyramid as a guide and that has been interesting! DH can't believe that he's supposed to eat like 3.5 cups of veggies a day, lol.
my bf is the same way. sometimes i'm trying to decide what recipes i should do for the week/month, and i ask him if he might like x or y, and he always has "no opinion". Then when the day comes to make it, he's either totally thrilled or all like "but why are you making stuff with peppers? i don't like peppers." I ASKED YOU A WEEK AGO IF IT WOULD BE COOL, AND YOU HAD NO OPINION.
also, the 3.5c veggies is soooo much easier with salad. I can only imagine 3.5c of cooked spinach or something.
Yesterday I picked up a cookbook and made picked something out for dinner tonight and bought what I didn't have today. That's sort of like planning isn't it?
I probably should plan more because I'm working 12 hour shifts this weekend and don't like a lot of drama cooking, but I'll throw something together.
yeah, that's planning.
and i like the phrase "drama cooking." totally been there.
i should change the title of this thread to.... i suck and picking out what i want to eat. i can stare at 13000 recipes all day long and not decide.
lol...gotta luv ya man
....and i like the phrase "drama cooking." totally been there.
Me too. LOL
I actually I don't mind drama in the kitchen except after a 12-hour shift when I'm working a 12-hour shift the next day. I want it fast and simple. This is where planning ahead, or cooking ahead would help. But I just fly by the seat of my pants and throw something together easy.
yeah i just tend to buy what looks good at the store and is cheap or on sale.. then decide what to make from there.. right now i have cabbage, beets, eggplant, collards & a carrot i need to use up.. i think im going to use all of those (minus the eggplant) and do something ethiopian.
My downfall is that I often end up buying too many fresh veggies. I'll plan out a different meal for every day of the week, completely forgetting that most of the meals make enough for leftovers. So, I end up buying extra veggies for recipes that I won't get to for 2 weeks...and sometimes they go bad. :-\
Usually it works out pretty well if I'm doing a big shopping trip to get enough fresh veggies for 3-4 meals, then just get stuff that won't go bad for any additional meals and pantry staples (pasta, canned and dried beans, canned tomatoes, rice, frozen veggies, etc.). Then, after I use up that batch of veggies, I can just do a quick shopping trip later to pick up fresh vegetables for the next few meals.
I keep thinking I should be more organized about meal planning/shopping - for example, having a list of favorite recipes/meals or a binder with copies of all of the recipes. I feel like I get stuck in a rut sometimes, making the same things over and over, or relying too much on packaged foods. But, for now we are doing ok with a running list of what pantry staples we've run out of, and just planning a few meals before we head out shopping (ok..well..sometimes in the car, or in the store!).
I try to think of interesting things to make while keeping variety in the forefront of my mind. So I get to the grocery store and say "ok what 4 meals can I plan out that are not all the same?". Then I look at what is fresh and in season (ie: cauliflower $5 a head is SO not purchased even if i love it!). Then I make things up from there.
So as I walk through the produce I make lists up based on what I see.
Corn in the husk turns into BBQ night with FatFree Vegna's Ribz, Corn, Baked Potatoes and Asperagus.
Cheap jalepeno peppers becomes tacos when I pick up bell peppers, lettuce, tomato and avocados.
Delish looking zucchini becomes spaghetti night with mushrooms, bell peppers, onions and sauce.
Kale for 59cents per pound gets added to prepackaged local pirogies and Tofurky Keilbalsa.
If on taco night I am not in the mood, I can turn it into rice & beans with salad, enchilladas or even tortilla soup.
I try to vary my starch and proteins day to day. So if BBQ Night has potatoes and seitan, the next night will have rice or pasta for the starch and tofu or beans for the protein.
Plus most everything is easily convertable into something else. Dont feel like spaghetti? Use those bought ingredients plus tofu and spinach to make lasagna. Of course sometimes I wander about the produce section clueless but I try. Writing down a list helps, even if you only write down "BBQ, tacos, spaghetti, pirogies" on a post-it. That way you have an outline at the very least of what to buy.
But even this way I wind up over buying produce myself. So I have crazy weekend days where I have to figure out how to use it up or it gets forgotten in the crisper and gets fuzzy. Thats always sad. :(
my weekly planning usually goes something like this: i guess we can have speghetti on monday. then some mexican casserole on tuesday. then buff wings on wednesday. frozen pizza on thursday. shit... we ate the exact same stuff last week. i'm tired of speheghetti... let's go look at vegweb and see what looks good. viscious cycle.
I usually only plan 2-3 meals a week for two of us. I cook/bake like mad on the weekend so I can take it easy during the week! I have a pretty well-stocked pantry and freezer, though, so it's easy to whip something up in case our tastes change. And it seems we always have mushrooms on hand because they're so quick and easy, especially with some black eyed peas or wild rice from the pantry and spinach from the freezer.
So I took some peoples advice and wrote down maybe 10 recipes I wanted to make and the oddball things that I need to buy since I usually don't have them on hand... It has worked out fantastic for me, I just cross the dishes off as I make them. Yay :) Much easier than I thought!
welcome to the insane list-writing club.
welcome to the insane list-writing club.
aww thanks <3 i am a list writing maniac so i don't know why this type of list writing was so hard to tackle... i get so happy crossing things off lists yes, i am semi-psychotic!
hmmm, the way I've done it since I started planning meals (so about2 years) is to do a massive big shop every 2-4 weeks to stock up on the basics (ie tinned toms, tom paste, rice, pasta, lasagne noodles, soy milk, spices and such like).
Then every week on the way to the veggie market me and N will decide what we want that week and kind of vary it slightly depending on what's available at the veggie market.
If there's then another ingredient we need that we've not got in stock, I'll pick it up on the way home from work one day.
The problem with this is we end up with very similar meal every week - spaghetti bolognaise, pasta n red, chilli, curry, carbonara and such like. I tend to get bored with food quite easily, whereas N would be happy eating spaghetti bolognaise every night for one week and then curry every night for one week and so on.
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