I meal plan every week, this saves the mental load of figuring out what to cook every night and I save food and money because I only buy what I need. First I plan all of my meals, then I write out what will be in each meal and then I write out what I need from the store for that meal. I try to ensure my meals use all of the ingredients I am going to buy or use them for breakfast or snacks.

 

Here's a simple example, lasagna. For my lasagna I need tomato sauce, lasagna noodles, ground beef and cheese. But I already have tomato sauce and cheese so on my shopping list I add ground beef and lasagna noodles.

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I love cooking and I don't like eating the same meal every night so we have a lot of variety in our meal plans but most of our meals are quick and simple because we have small children. I also plan a breakfast and a heavy snack option for the week so that when I'm hungry I'm not reaching for quick carbs or something that won't keep me full and then I treat that as a meal on my meal plan as well. I have created a meal planning template to help you plan your meals and grocery list. I have also created some meal planning prompts.