Thank you all for the suggestions. I think I'll give it a try this weekend. I like to cook, having a plan will simplify things and make it more enjoyable. I didn't consider that meal planning didn't have to involve setting a weekly schedule and sticking with it week after week.

Now, on getting them to eat things I like - that's for another thread.

I agree with the others, meal planning is planning what you are having that week - not having the same thing every Friday.

I think how you ease into it, depends on what you do now. I personally did not cook a lot, but was throwing togethor odd meals at home (baking a potato, nuking veggies). So I had to start by just coming up with ideas of what people ate, and finding recipes. What kept me sane was starting out with 2 nights a week of something super easy (like frozen veggie burgers). If you do take out now, you could ease into it by planning for take-out one night.

I do think some people do things like "pizza fridays" or "pasta Tuesdays" because it makes planning easier. So that is one way to ease into it. But if you find that unappealing, you could do something simpler. For instance, in the winter I do one crockpot meal a week. Not the same one, not the same day, but one.

A few things that have worked for me:
1. I go through phases where I make myself try one new recipe a week.
2. Once I find a recipe I like, I print it out on paper (or copy it) and laminate it and put it in a binder. Now I have a binder with all of our favorites.
3. I keep a few things in the pantry for nights the new recipe fails horribly.
4. You can keep it flexible. Say your plan for tonight was roasted chicken, or the thought of chicken makes you ill. You can swap it with another night (as long as the other meal didn't need prep)
4. When possible, I try to have one meal that can be postponed. Things happen (last minute playdates, get stuck at work and pick up take-out). So I need a meal that won't go bad if I don't use. And yes, I try to push that one towards the end of the week.
5. "Eat leftovers" is a plan. So is "do take-out". Some weeks call for a nice break.

I found the first few weeks to be the worst, as planning seemed so hard. Now I can't even imagine not doing it. I mean, how do you know what to buy? Why not know what you are going to cook, so you can buy all the ingredients?

For me, meal planning is what other PPs suggested- figuring out on Sunday what we're going to eat and when, with wiggle room for unexpected late nights or unexpected take-out.

I always plan the order based on how quickly I need to use things- so some meat / fish goes in the freezer, other stuff stays in the fridge. If I need the leftovers of meal A to make meal B, then I have to make sure that I make meal A first.

Often times, I write the week's menu on a piece of paper and stick it in a kitchen drawer to remind myself- or I'll write it on a small dry erase board.

Anonymous wrote:I've been reluctant to plan meals in fear that we'd quickly get tired of the same things on same week days. I just can't fathom having pizza every Friday and not getting sick of it. No matter, homemade or delivered. Having just generic plans, such as meatless or grilled nights, still require planning ahead for shopping and will probably lead to having same thing week after week or ending up with bunch of ingredients and no clear ideas on what to make.

But I like the idea of having some order to the whole dinner-time routine involving shopping, cooking and sitting down together to eat.

My question is: has anyone eased into the meal-planning somehow? Maybe starting with one or two days a week, or doing one week on and one week off planning. Could 2 weeks plan be a solution? How did you start with your planning for dinners. I'm mostly directing this question to those who grew up without such a thing and started on their own.

I think the opposite is true, at least if you fully plan out. when you have a pound of ground beef and are put on the spot to figure out what's for dinner, it's probably going to be the same thing every time. Or if you do think of something else, it'll be "oh, we could have tacos, but darn, no shells." By contrast, if you come up with a plan for the week and do your shopping list, you can put those things on your list, and also not have the pressure of coming up with a dinner idea on the spot.

I literally sit down with a glass of wine in the kitchen every Friday or Saturday evening and write down what we're going to have for dinner from Sunday to Thursday, including veggies/sides. I dont have a 'mexican monday' type schedule, I just start from scratch every week. I take that time to look for ingredients we might need, and also check our staples (milk, cheese, yogurt, fruit) and make one good list for the week's shopping. I try to make later in the week include either things from the freezer or non-meat dishes so I dont have raw meat in the fridge all week. Also, like one PP, one dinner is usually something that can be skipped or ingredients can be frozen if something comes up, so we dont waste too much. One other tip - by knowing what I am doing in advance, I can also do some prep the night before which really helps. So if something needs to marinate for 15 mins, I make the marinade the day before. I add the meat on the way into the house before even seeing the kids or getting changed, and by the time I get back to it its ready to cook.

I do think you could do this for 2 nights a week and see how it goes. You may find you hate knowing on Sunday what you will eat on Thursday, or you may find that not having to think about it all week is worth the price.

When we started meal planning I made a big master list of all the dinners we tended to eat and did a very quick ranking of which take more time. Over the weekend we check the upcoming week and look through our list and decide what meals we want on each day. We definitely don't have the same meals very frequently and we don't do the "Taco Tuesday" thing, either, we just chose whatever we want on each day (making something easier or slow cooker if one of us has to work late). We write out our schedule on a little slip of paper we keep on the fridge. I've kept these "schedules" with the master list and, if I'm very lazy, will sometimes just pull out an old schedule to use again.
It's only as boring as you want to make it.

I also hate the idea of "wed = tacos, thurs = fish." Bo-o-ring.

I think you could "ease into" meal planning pretty easily. Think about the least-busy nights, where you are more than likely to have time to actually cook something, then go from there.

For example, my DH works a swing shift most days, so is only home for dinner 2 weeknights per week. However, it's always the SAME two weeknights, so easy to plan around.
I "meal plan" for Sunday breakfast and dinner, my workweek lunches, Tues and Thurs dinners, and Saturday dinner. That's it - the rest is assumed to be a mix of leftovers, freezer goodies (such as frozen leftovers), and scrambled egg + fruit dinners

We typically have a good mix of pantry/fridge staples on hand, so we can always throw together pasta + something, or scrambled eggs, stirfry, etc. I always have meat in the freezer, so pulling out a pack of pork chops will only require 24-36 hours notice. A flat pack of ground beef only needs 15 minutes of notice. Etc.

This week:
Sat: homemade stromboli (great rainy-afternoon activity with DD, plus portable leftovers) and fruit salad. Roasted two chickens.
Sun: breakfast out (MD), cold roast chicken/bacon/veg club sandwiches for dinner (DH was scheduled to work all day). Most of the leftover chicken was pulled from the bone and frozen in meal-sized portions.
work lunches: hummus and veggies. easy peasy.
Tues: hot dogs and veg. We have some zucchini, broccoli, and broccolini in the fridge - will decide atm which one.
Thur: leftover chicken and veg pasta. "kitchen sink" kind of deal.

The great thing about this method is that we eat just about everything - there's enough leftover-space that everything is consumed. Also, at least one meal a week is shelv-able, meaning if I am sick or DH works late or whatever, we can just order a pizza and leave the meat in the freezer, pasta will keep, etc. Again, less waste (which I think is a big plus to meal planning). Also, cook once, eat as many times as possible, is my motto

Here's how meal planning works in my house.

On Saturday, we (spouse + me) check our calendars to see if anyone has late meetings, work travel, other dinner time appointments, and we each choose two or three weeknights that we will volunteer to cook. Then we each separately decided what we will make, add the needed groceries to the shopping list, and check in to make sure we're not overlapping too much or both counting on the same items that we currently have on hand.

Then one of us (me) shops for the groceries.

Why would planning mean having the same thing every night? To me planning means deciding on Sunday what we're going to eat that week (from a wide range of options) and buying the ingredients. I don't usually decide which night we'll have spaghetti, just that we will one night so we need garlic bread and salad on hand.

I've been reluctant to plan meals in fear that we'd quickly get tired of the same things on same week days. I just can't fathom having pizza every Friday and not getting sick of it. No matter, homemade or delivered. Having just generic plans, such as meatless or grilled nights, still require planning ahead for shopping and will probably lead to having same thing week after week or ending up with bunch of ingredients and no clear ideas on what to make.

But I like the idea of having some order to the whole dinner-time routine involving shopping, cooking and sitting down together to eat.

My question is: has anyone eased into the meal-planning somehow? Maybe starting with one or two days a week, or doing one week on and one week off planning. Could 2 weeks plan be a solution? How did you start with your planning for dinners. I'm mostly directing this question to those who grew up without such a thing and started on their own.