I’m back from my travels! My flight arrived late last night, so I’m pretty tired this morning. Nevertheless, I want to get my meal plan made and published so that I’ll start my week off right!
These are the considerations I’ve got:
1. I’ve got a lot of blog posts due in the next two weeks, so I’ve got to leave myself time to do those. It’s also time to start planting a few more things in the garden, to do my flower bed weeding and mulching. . .basically I’ve got a lot of both office work and physical labor to get done. I know me, and I know how I work. I’ll get involved in those projects, be busy all day and then by dinner I won’t feel like a) stopping and b) cooking. Easy stuff is the order of the day–nothing complex this week!
2. It’s a regular week as far as dance, scouts, pool and other assorted regularly scheduled meetings/evening activities. That means Mon, Wed, and possibly Thurs are days where I’ve got a lot going on and really need to be on top of the dinner thing. I’ve got a class on Tuesday night for the next several weeks (digital photography–trying to improve for y’all)
3. There actually isn’t too much in the fridge. Yankee Bill does frozen meals and eating out with the kiddos while I’m gone, so I am not stuck with all those drips and drabs of leftovers to try to use up. The fall garden stuff is pretty much used up and the garden hasn’t started producing. I might be able to harvest a few wild edibles like chickweed, dandelion etc.
4. As always my goal is to have one venison meal, one fish meal, one pork meal, one bean meal, one meatless meal and one soup meal per week.
Taking all that into account here is my game plan:
Monday: Spaghetti with Organic Pork Sausage and a salad
Did I mention I’m tired? This is about the easiest thing I can think of that is still a homemade meal :) I’ll just use some ground pork sausage from the freezer.
This is my pork meal for the week.
Tuesday: Chicken Soup and Homemade Bread
I’ve been a bad, bad homesteader. . . I haven’t baked bread in over a month! I’ll get a batch going and then toss the fixings for a chicken soup in the slowcooker in the morning. That way dinner will be ready regardless of what I’m doing in the garden or the house, and it will be ready whenever folks want to eat even though I’ve got to run off to class.
This is my soup meal for the week.
Wednesday: Breakfast for Dinner ~ Pancakes, Bacon and Canned Peaches
Yankee Bill will be out so the kids and I will have this classic for dinner (he doesn’t enjoy it). I may try a new pancake recipe–I’ve seen one on pinterest several times for a pancake made with cottage cheese. That would up my protien content. I might toss a bit of bacon on the side, but I consider that more of a condiment than “meat”. I’ll pop open some home canned peaches to add a bit of vitamins, minerals and fiber to the whole deal.
This is my meatless meal for the week.
Thursday: Bean & Cheese Burritos, Green Salad and Cilantro Rice
I’ve got to fit some beans in somehow, and I missed cooking on Cinco d Mayo, so I figure I’ll put some burritos into the rotation. Who knows, maybe I’ll try lentil burritos. Buddy doesn’t really like beans, but he loves lentils–so I wonder if he’d be more open to eating burritos if they had lentils instead. Hmmm. Anyway–they will be Bean & Cheese. I probably won’t make my own homemade tortillas this time (although maybe I’ll be all caught up by then. Nah.) Salad will be the “roughage” and I’ll make cilantro rice as a side.
This is my bean meal for the week.
Friday: Grilled Venison Burgers, Macaroni Salad, Carrot Sticks and Pickles
It is supposed to be decent on Friday, so grilling burgers sounds good. If the weather turns I’ll just pan fry them. I’ll make up a macaroni salad to go on the side, chop up some carrots for a bit more veggies and serve some homemade pickles.
This is my Venison meal for the week.
Saturday: Pizza
Using the Pizza Hut Crust Clone recipe of course!
Sunday: Mother’s Day. Someone else can figure out dinner.
🙂
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Are you interested in learning more about menu planning? Check out my post “Why Plan a Weekly Menu” .
Good plans!
Hi — I love and appreciate your weekly meal plans. I’m always trying to plan meals. It helps save money when I grocery shop. I clip and save coupons, use leftovers to prepare other meals, buy in bulk when there is a better deal, shop farmers’ markets when able and plan to garden, but I still feel like I spend a lot of money on groceries from week to week. I have a family of 5–two almost 5 year olds and a 9 month old baby. I am spending more money these days on the jars of baby food for convenience and plan to transition him as he grows more teeth to “our food.” However, for the meantime, do you have any estimates on how much money it costs to feed a family of this size? I’m just curious if I’m in the ballpark? I looked up the government website for the “thrifty food plan” but I need real people advice! Any insight is appreciated! Thanks!
Jenn–great question! Sorry it’s taken me so long to answer (if I remember correctly you also sent the same question in as a readers question too). Been crazy busy lately. Anyway–I really want to pull this out and answer it fully in a reader’s question, but here is the short answer.
I have no idea how much I spend for a week’s or month’s meals. The problem is that we buy in bulk and ahead on so much that big chunks of the food we eat is frequently purchased months in advance. For example I might spend $300 buying a 1/2 pig (and even that is paid over a couple of month period), but then we eat that pork every week for months and months. Hubs goes hunting in the fall and he gets a deer (or two if we have a good year) we dont’ pay for that, but we pay for his supplies when he goes hunting and we pay $72 a deer on processing. We eat the venison weekly–how do I include that cost? I purchase spaghetti sauce on sale and get a flat of it for a great price, so when 6 weeks later I use a can how do I count that? I grow my garden and then we eat fresh from it a lot in the summer and eat frozen and home canned in the winter–again, not sure how to include that cost. Adding even more complication in to things is that I like to keep a deep pantry, so I have been slowly for the last year or so purchasing items to build up my stocks. So when I buy groceries for the month some things are being consumed right away, some are going into the pantry, some are extra. . . well, you get the idea.
As for advice–my first thought reading your question was that you should make your own babyfood/transition food. Although I realize that daycare type facilities require purchased, sealed food–at home there is no reason you can’t make your own food. It’s higher quality, has less additives (really read those labels-especially for the “combo” meals–lots of salt/sugar/filler in there!) and you are getting your child ready for the same flavors that you are eating anyway. (I’ll add another comment with a link to some babyfood making info shortly)
For the rest it’s hard to give specific advice without knowing more about your current diet. Some good general advice is to eat seasonally (ie buy the produce and items that are less expensive at that time of year), learn to cook less expensive cuts of meat (thighs or chicken quarters are frequently cheaper then boneless skinless breasts–crockpots, braising, pressure cookers and marinades make tougher cuts of meats more tender etc), eat less meat (it’s frequently the most expensive part of a meal), plan your meals so that you don’t waste leftovers. . . you get the idea. If you have more specific questions or issues, please comment again–as I said I will work all of this into a more detailed “reader’s question” post–I just wanted to make sure you weren’t hanging out there too long with no answer at all.
Denise over at Wholesome Mommy wrote this post that tells a bit about making babyfood. She is talking about the baby brezza here (which is a steamer/blender type thing)–it’s expensive though so I wouldn’t bother. You just steam or cook food till very soft–don’t use too much water, you want to save all those minerals!–then blend or mash. Personally I would do a big batch of veggies at a time and then freeze them in icecube trays. Pop the cubes out (each is about an oz) and store in ziplock bags in the fridge. The gently defrost (you don’t want to burn the kiddos mouth) and serve. Easy peasy!
http://wholesomemommy.com/homemade-baby-food-2/
Here’s another good article on the kiddos and food: http://www.rubiesandradishes.com/2013/05/17/9-tips-for-raising-adventurous-and-mindful-eaters/