![]() But this meal plan has actually made dinner at our home MORE like the ideal that we all strive for-where everyone is sitting around the table together, enjoying one another’s company. Does the whole thing seem too utilitarian? You may be right. Plus many more! If you need more easy dinner ideas - and who doesn’t? - then take a look: 30+ Ridiculously Easy Dinners for Busy Families on a Budget. The recipes for most of the meals in this easy rotating meal plan can be found in my ebook, 30+ Ridiculously Easy Dinners for Busy Families on a Budget. So OK, I can bet you’re ready by now to see exactly what type of meals our family is getting over the two weeks. I couldn’t do that with every meal, obviously, but many of them are indeed favorites for our family. The trick is to choose meals that everyone LOVES, the type of meals that they would willingly eat every day if they could. And you’d be surprised to find that it doesn’t really get boring all that fast. But the beauty of that is I only have to do that occasionally, not every week or two weeks or month. If one of the planned meals is getting boring week after week, I can find another one and replace the boring one. If there is a holiday or special occasion, I can insert a festive meal. :-)ĥ) Guess what? The menu plan is NOT SET IN STONE. So why try to be something I’m not? If you haven’t figured it out yet, I am all about easy. ![]() The hubby, although he would certainly enjoy something more elaborate, is not picky about that. My kids don’t really care how involved the prep is they just want something yummy. I actually specifically chose recipes with few ingredients (another way to affect the bottom line, see #2 above) and easy prep. Have I ever mentioned that I really don’t like to cook? Only about a million times, right? So having recipes that I use over and over means I don’t have to spend any more time in the kitchen than is absolutely necessary, because I’ve gotten used to preparing them and don’t have to try to figure them out from scratch (pun intended, haha). And the side dishes can be different every time-sometimes that’s all it takes to make a meal seem new.Ĥ) Food prep gets streamlined real fast. Other nights don’t have as much flexibility, but there are plenty that do. But guess what, I can make either regular chili with ground beef, or I can make meatless chili, or I can make white chicken chili. One of the items on my Week 1 plan is chili. With this plan I have been able to reduce the food allotment by quite a bit (about $400 a month, seriously), thus leaving some money for other uses (or in some months, to keep us from using credit).ģ) There is still room for variety. Food is one of the few budget categories that I can still affect all the other bills are pretty much fixed and I can’t trim them down any more. This was probably my main reason for instigating the two-week plan. Gone are the days of the ever-changing list and the usually-not-happy surprise when you get to the checkout. (Did I mention you never have to sit down with the recipe books ever again, if you don’t want to?)Ģ) The grocery list stays fairly constant, so you can gauge how much you will spend pretty easily. But also, desperate times call for desperate measures (see #2 below), and so here is how I look at it:ġ) Menu planning gets done ONCE. There is some variety built in, as you’ll see below. They say variety is the spice of life, right? And so who would want to have the same meal every two weeks ad infinitum? I can hear you asking this of yourself and thereby dismissing the idea out of hand - but don’t just yet. Wait, what? You can use this meal plan forever? Doesn’t that get boring?
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