Dinner Rut

[Dia Minha]

I know this subject has been beaten to death, but I am once again stuck in a dinner rut. I need help getting out. I don't just need meal ideas, I need help meal planning and grocery shopping. This is so frustrating to me, because I just can't seem to wrap my head around it. I hate doing it so much, that I feel like I only have the energy to plan and shop for one or two meals at a time.

So what do I do first? Second? Third? I need little babysteps. Break it down for me with the tiniest steps you can come up with.

Thanks Ladies

[Binkie Mama]

Oooh! This might sound odd but I love meal planning and grocery shopping (when I get the time). That's not to say *what* we have isn't in a rut, but I might be able to help you with the planning end.

I take each night in the week and plan the main dish and then the side dishes. Here's this week's example.

Sunday - Ribs, corn casserole, green beans
Monday - Lentil Soup, bread, grapes
Tuesday - Chicken, cilantro lime rice, green salad
Wednesday - Blueberry waffles, peaches
Thursday - Wonton Salad, french bread, cantaloupe
Friday - Pizza, grapes
Saturday - Shepherd's pie, pineapple

Then I look at my meals and see what I need to make them. I also have a list on the fridge where I put random things that we need like vanilla, tylenol, milk, bread, eggs, etc. I add the stuff I need for the meals to the list. So for example, to make the corn casserole I needed a corn bread mix so that went on the list. A lot of the time where there are fruits or vegetables I'll go to the store and see what looks good/is on sale. I'll put on the list 3 fruits and 2 vegetables, or whatever just so I know how much to buy. I also take the meals to the store in case if I see something and want to change it. Like if peppers are on sale I'll get a bunch and we can have stuffed peppers instead of shepherds pie and I'll know I don't need to by XYZ for the shepherd's pie.

For breakfast we usually have cereal, toast or oatmeal and yogurt. Lunch is either leftovers, sandwiches or chicken nuggets. I make sure we have enough of this stuff to last for the week along with snack stuff (fruit, gold fish, raisins, carrots, etc.).

One thing I've heard of is having set nights each week, like Monday is Mexican, Tuesday - breakfast, Wednesday - Pasta/Italian, Thursday - chicken, Friday - beef, Sat - leftovers... We usually have a breakfast night each week and a pasta night each week. That way we don't have meat every night and my DH doesn't notice as much.

I also have a few random quick dishes in case if time gets short (like activity days nights) or I just don't feel like cooking. Spaghetti, tomato soup with grilled cheese, bear country soup (add veggies, beans or meat). Occasionally when I make something that I know freezes well I'll make extra and we can have that on late nights too.

I had to laugh, the first thing I thought of when I read your post was, "That's because you grew up across the street from a grocery store!"

Okay... one last thought. The *what* is in a rut... My DH gets annoyed when I ask him every week what he wants, so together we made a big list (60+) of things we like to eat. When I typed it up I put it together by type of meat, breakfast, pasta, vegetarian, etc. dishes. I try to get different kinds of meat in each week, one beef, one pork/ham/tuna (I know, tuna doesn't come from a pig), one chicken. Saturdays are usually get your own, leftovers or eat out.

Let me know if this makes sense or not. If you want it simplified in a 1, 2, 3 format I can do that too. :-)

Binkie Mama

---------- Post added at 09:59 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:19 PM ----------

One last thought. I try to use things we have on hand and plan meals around that so I can spend more of our grocery money on sale items.

[Dia Minha]

Thanks Binkie. Yes, not only did I grow up across the street from a grocery store, that is exactly how my mom did meals. It is frustrating, because I know other people have a better way, but I just can't seem to get it. And it seems like the more I try, the harder it gets.

Ok, so I am assuming my first step needs to be a list of meal ideas. I'm thinking that I need to start out with about 10 meal ideas to rotate through a bi-weekly basis. Then I can add some new ones as I go.

So keep talking ladies. How do I start a meal idea list?

[Meticulous madness]

Good stuff Binkie.

We have a nice recipe box here on this forum...you'll have to provide a couple of your "tried and true" recipes. I love getting new ideas and it sounds like you're pretty organized about your meal plans.

Dia, I'm totally with you right now about the rut. I have been trying to come up with a monthly meal plan (for dinners) and buying everything other than produce at one time. I really like the idea, but everytime I try to just do it, I go blank. Seriously.

I think I have to break it down by the week, to truly be successful. Maybe it IS all about the baby steps. If I can go from 1 week to 2 weeks...yay!

Anyway, I do think that it's best if you can brainstorm with your family for ideas. I think you'll be surprised how many things you can come up with, for your master meal list. I was nervous trying to think about 30 meals, but I went way past it - when I actually just sat down and started typing them all out.

I think it's harder to stay out of the rut when things are busy. This is the hardest time of year for me because there are so many things going on, with holidays and planning and birthdays and whatnot. Some times I think that I need a star on my forehead if I just DON'T eat out. ehehee.

Good luck.

[Erudite]

I do the planning very similar to Binkie. I have a list of a month's dinners and plan the grocery shopping and food storage shopping from that. It had taken me years to develop it to the ART that it was...and then I had to change it all over the summer. But I'm back to the big month long list and because it is new I'm still loving it. It makes grocery shopping SO much cheaper! But I send DH to do it...he's like 30 seconds from Macey's...after work.

I recently added breakfasts to my list; I have a rotating 5 breakfasts for school mornings, so now I'm in good shape for shopping on them. I do leftovers and the kids get a sack lunch so lunches aren't a big deal for us. Anyway, I've cut my grocery budget down to about a third of what it used to be, so with the excess, I'm stocking up my food storage shelves. It feels good to be in control.

So...like Binkie said...for me, baby step number 1 was to make the list and then categorize for variety.

Go Dia! Go Dia!

[5ft Diva]

Fun ideas!

A couple of thoughts that came to my mind while reading your questions, Dia. One: mealtime is like scripture study. You will try many different approaches because your family will be faced with many different circumstances. Is it possible that the approach you are taking to creating meals has got you in a rut because the circumstances have changed?

Second thought, two questions: are you in a rut or are you in survival mode? In a rut implies that you're stuck - which you say you are, but I have often found myself to be in survival mode when I thought I was stuck. If you are in survival mode, I recommend fully embracing it and giving yourself what I call "mealtime prozac" to get yourself back on track (i.e., frozen meals, take out, hubby cooking, etc.)....just enough to figure out where you are and make a plan for where you're going.

In response to your question and after reading what everyone says I think I'm going to try something new and I'm going to share it because maybe it'll get the wheels turning for you as well. As you well know, my kids have been picking the meals every week. Well, we're at the crossroads where we're eating the same things over and over, week after week. So, I had this idea. I have decided to make a menu. They can circle a main dish, side dish and veggie. This will take some time (not much, thankfully) to come up with this "menu", but I really think it'll put me more in control of what we're eating around here while giving everyone choices they can live with. Thanks for the discussion....who'd-a thunk it would help me in an indirect way?

[bookworm]

I do things almost exactly like Binkie Mama- one suggestion on coming up with your list of meals, Dia is to think through what you would eat if you went out- what kind of meals do you enjoy that others make- like we LOVE greek chicken souvlaki, so I searched up some recipes online and now we have a tried-and-true greek lemon chicken that is almost as good as eating out!

Another idea is to pull out your recipe books (all of them) and flip through. What sounds good? What can you adjust to fit your dietary/family needs? Write them on the list! Get creative and brave! There are some yummy dishes out there just waiting for you to discover them!

Good luck! I love making good food, and especially making a wide variety of good foods. My new thing is soups- I have started incorporating at least one stew or soup or chili each week so we aren't eating as much meat, we're eating more veggies and the variety (and comfort) of the foods is great!

I don't plan lunches or breakfasts. We always have standard items in the house, bread, pb, jam, sliced meats, mayo, tuna, etc. for lunches, and always cereals and eggs and waffle mix for breakfasts. It's dinner that gets menued at my house. I do what Binkie does- a running list on the fridge as we run out of things, and a menu list of what I'm missing to make the week's dinners.

[Dia Minha]

I have been reading and rereading this thread since I started it and although I knew I needed to make a list of dinners, I just couldn't figure out how to even do that first step. I have been frustrated and don't want to take a lot of time to explain why this first step is so hard for me.

However, this afternoon I was once again upset at myself for having another Sunday dinner arrive unplanned and even after knowing that everyone was going to want to eat right after church and not doing anything about it, when something I learned at women's conference hit me hard.

It was an organization class and she talked about making changes one step at a time and how to decide what changes to work on first etc. She said for her it was a matter of deciding the one thing that made her life the hardest and work from there. Her one thing was meal planning and so she worked on creating a family meal plan.

Now here months and months later, knowing I too needed a plan and not knowing where to start it occurred to me: What is the one day that I struggle the hardest with dinner? That obviously is Sunday. I need something on the table 15 minutes after we walk in the door. So what do I need to do to have that happen? I've thought of Crock pot meals, or frozen dinners that can go in the pot or oven before church and have it ready for the table when we get home.

As I was thinking this I finally figured out how to take this meal planning one step at a time. My first step is to work on Sunday dinners. I need 3-4 Sunday meals that can be cooking while we are gone or otherwise simple enough to be ready to serve in a short amount of time. After I work on that a couple of weeks I can then work on Fridays, which are my second hardest. Duh.

I don't know why it took me so long to come up with this, but I'm so thankful that everything finally fell into place so that I now know what my first step is. Thanks everyone for all your good ideas. And hopefully soon I'll be at the point, where I can plan weeks at a time.

[5ft Diva]

That is a great approach, Dia. I can see how that would work in so many different areas in our lives. Isn't it funny how just a couple of different ideas are enough to get you thinking in a different direction so that you can come up with a solution that works for you?

[Floyd133]

I would start out a plan for just a few days at first.