An Introduction to Meal Planning

In exactly two moths from today, our American adventure will come to a close. I will be very sad to leave my sisters and their families behind but am looking forwards to seeing my loved ones in Sydney and of course getting a job again. 

I have been having a great time living the life of a lady of leisure (unemployed) but I am very much looking forwards to working again. I look forward to the feeling the responsibility, sense of  accomplishment and belonging that go along with working. It is funny how we take all the little things for granted and I am grateful for this opportunity to find perspective. 

But leaving the USA after so many months means starting to pack up mentally. There is a lot to prepare for and one thing that may sound silly is the food. I love to cook and also was brought up to have reserves in the pantry. This means that I have quite a bit of food in the cupboard that I have to get through before we leave.

What I decided is that for once in my life I have to get organised about cooking. Usually what I love about cooking is that I just do whatever I feel like. I never want to just follow a recipe but use them instead as inspiration and a starting point in my own personal creative journey in the kitchen.

But once we hit less than 10 weeks to go I knew that I needed to plan ahead in both shopping and cooking. I have been doing this for two weeks now and it is incredible. I had forgotten about half the products I had on the top two shelves of the pantry - being short it's not as though they are in eyesight! 

Now I am already halfway through what I had in the cupboard and my weekly shop went from over $150 to $40 (yes really!).

Having a plan made me spend less. First I only bought what was on the list, thinking I only have time to eat these planned meals and anything else I buy will go bad and be thrown out. Therefore I eliminated expensive impulse purchases.  

Secondly, I find that I go on autopilot at the supermarket and buy the same basic items whether I actually need them or not. This means I end up with 20 cans of diced tomato but forget something I needed. This would lead to a second smaller shop later in the week. In this way I am spending too much on both occasions and buying too many unnecessary items.

Besides from saving money I am working towards eliminating food waste. In a world where enough food is produced to feed everyone yet one in every 8 people goes hungry I feel like is a crime to waste food. Of course I am guilty of throwing things out from time to time but it is my goal eliminate food waste in my household. Even before I ever thought of food planning, I always try to make my perishable ingredients last by storing them correctly and not buying more than we can consume before they are spoilt. This took a lot of practice when we first moved out of home but now is a normal part of our routine and we don't even notice it. Having a meal plan is just a way of strengthening my efforts. 

Here is a planner that I developed, although as you can see, it is very easy to make your own to suit your own particular needs (available on PDF here)

I hope this is helpful to anyone wanting to organise themselves, save money and stop wasting precious food.