How I Learned to Meal Plan for an Entire Week in only Minutes

If you have ever decided to eat better, save money or lose weight, then you probably have been faced with the task of meal planning. Here is how you can create a healthy meal plan in minutes!

There are many benefits to meal planning, and I can tell you that many of my coaching clients struggle with figuring out how to make it work for their family. Either they lack motivation to start or continue planning, their family is resistant to healthier recipes being cooked, or the prep and cleaning are just too overwhelming.

Before we launch into how I meal plan in minutes, let’s talk about why meal planning is important to begin with.

Why is Meal Planning Important

There are 3 main reasons why meal planning is important.

1. You eat better

Who can say that they make smart eating choices when they’re hungry, stressed, or changing their diet? Especially when you consider that the average person makes 200 food choices a day! Studies have shown that decisions such as when, what and how much to eat are often shaped by subtle forces outside of our awareness or direct control.

Meal planning helps you take back control of your awareness around food, so you can work towards your healthy eating goals.

Having worked with a number of clients who are on strict dietary protocols. I also have seen how important having some go-to foods and meals is for their overall well-being. Which is why I designed several very specific weekly meal plans to ease the burden for them.

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While we live in a very allergy-informed world, with many brands offering tasty options to appease any palate, having some basic ingredients on hand and a plan for how to use them improves your overall nutrition.

2. You save money

Meal planning on a budget is one of the most searched terms on Google. Especially with the recent impacts from COVID-19- from job loss to changes in grocery shopping to food insecurity in certain areas.

When you take a few minutes to meal plan each week, you shop better, make better use of ingredients you already have, and make fewer purchases.

The result? You can stick to a budget, and maybe have some dollars saved for other expenses.

With Americans spending, on average, $7,023 (or 12.5 percent of income) to feed a family of four annually, making more budget-friendly meals is key to cutting down on total food costs.

There is a myth that eating “healthy” is more expensive than eating highly processed, low quality foods. While it is true that highly processed foods are more likely to have coupons or deals, healthy food need not be expensive.

Simple ways to save on healthy foods:

• Buy in bulk for grains, beans, nuts and snack items
• Buy in season for produce
• Buy frozen for produce that is not in season or bulk proteins
• Buy less meat

3. You drop stress

In U.S. households of married parents and one or more children under the age of 18, 80% of mothers say they are the household member who usually prepares the meals – the same as the share who say they are the primary grocery shopper, according to a Pew Research Center analysis. Some 71% of moms say they primarily handle both chores.

Add to this number the COVID-induced fatigue of having kids and partners at home more with work from home or school from home situations, and you have a good recipe for meal burnout!

Suddenly, moms may be faced with cooking not just dinner every day, but also preparing lunch and sometimes breakfast, too.

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Moms spend an average of 68 minutes per day on meal preparation, and 45 minutes for grocery shopping.

There is only so much time in a day, which is why I want to share my simple and quick process to meal planning.

Meal Planning in Minutes

First of all, I have a confession to make. There are endless meal plan options online,both free and paid- from calorie-based to family size-based to budget-friendly to monthly. These meal planning templates really don’t work well for me or my family.

Here is why. Either those meal plans use ingredients I don’t eat, require superfoods that are pricey, don’t suit my family’s tastes, or require techniques that take too much effort.

I love cooking. I don’t love spending 30 minutes cooking a meal that my family hates and ultimately throws in the trash. That is frustrating and budget-draining.

Not to mention my family tastes are very different. While my kids might love pasta, my husband and I might prefer something with potatoes.

Each of the below meal planning steps could take approximately 2-3 minutes, except for Step 1.

• Meal Planning Step #1: Family Friendly

Your first step is to determine what ingredients, cuisines, or cooking preparations are ones your family is most likely to reject.

This is often something you are already aware of (and could be why you browse those free meal plans for days- they don’t quite fit your needs).

Ingredients could be spices or certain brands of meat. Cuisines could be Indian or German. Cooking preparations could be fried, steamed or slow-cooked.

Once you eliminate what doesn’t work for your family (often in just a minute or two), then you get clear on what DOES work for your family.

Note; this is typically a one-and-done process, unless you frequently experiment in the kitchen like I do. I usually try 1-2 new recipes and/or food brands each week, and if it’s a hit with the family, I add it to the family needs.

• Meal Planning Step #2: Take Inventory

Many of us have pantries or cabinets that are overflowing with ingredients, especially if you recently tried to change up our diet. Typically, I have almond or coconut flour on hand, because I use it infrequently for mug cakes or baked items. I might also have veggies left over from a dish that only required a small amount.

Start with ingredients you already have that will go bad soon. If you don’t see a meal with those ingredients in the near future, consider freezing chopped fruit, slow cooking or roasting veggies, or drying and blending herbs.

Next, determine what staples you are running low on. Staples are very dependent on your family needs, but could include pasta, rice, dairy items like milk and butter, cereals, bread, soup or broth and snacks. If you coupon, this is when you check your app or printed coupons and preferred local grocery store for deals.

• Meal Planning Step #3: Choose your Themes

Choosing a daily (if not weekly) theme for your meals will be such a time-saver! The theme could be by type of cuisine (aka Meatless Monday) or by featured ingredient (aka sweet potatoes). This technique can be reused every week once you’ve settled on the themes, and you can swap out every quarter or so for variety.

If your kids are older, this is where you get their buy-in (and perhaps their eager participation!). You can either designate a meal for them to be “in charge of” or simply ask what meal they would like that week.

Believe it or not, kids will be more likely to be excited about dinnertime when they had a part of it, and also more likely to try new foods.

This is not about wish fulfillment, but this is allowing your kid to participate in the household. I was shocked when my daughter’s teenage friends gawked over the home-cooked leftovers in our fridge and said “we never cook food at home”. My kids have been baking and cooking with me since they were 3 years old. In fact, they get upset if I go grocery shopping without them!

Get those kids in the kitchen sooner than later, moms, and shave some time off of that 68 minutes of meal planning and prep.

By the way, this step is where you plug in any tried-and-true family recipes, as well as add new ones you may wish to try. Follow my boards on Pinterest, my favorite place to find recipe inspiration!

• Meal Planning Step #4: Create the Grocery List

You can go fancy with an electronic spreadsheet or grocery shopping app that you can share with your partner and build up over the week. Or, you can go old school and simply write it down on paper the day you go shopping.

The benefit of a spreadsheet or app is it can do the organization for you, or set specific targets such as location in grocery store, or dietary or recipe suggestions, as well as sync to a phone for mobility.

The benefit of a piece of paper is anyone in the family can add to it, even if their phone is dead, and you can add to the list based on which store you are visiting. According to Statista, the average number of grocery shopping trips per American is 1.6 times in a week.

This meal planning process took me a few months to really master, and it may take you some time as well. Spending a few minutes every week to be intentional about your meals will help save you time, money and maybe even help you with your dietary goals!