Menu Planning for a Month

As promised, today I'm going to tell you how I menu plan for a month. It's really no different than planning for a week, except that you need more space. Space in the form of a calendar, to be exact.

Like this. Just click on it before you save it to your desktop, and you'll get the best resolution possible. You could print it on card stock or photo paper and then laminate it so you can reuse it with a washable marker, or you can just print out a new one each month. I designed it as an 8-1/2" x 11" calendar, so you will get the best results if you print it that size as well.

I think I've shared with you before that I loathe menu planning. Would rather dust kind of loathe. Yep, that much. But we need to eat to survive, and I'm pretty sure I can continue living amongst the mountains of dust, so I'm forced to menu plan.

Dang it.

Well, I finally figured out that if I sit down and menu plan for a month at a time, I don't have to do it as often. How cool is that? I love it. Well, I don't love it, but I hate it less.

I sit down with my recipe box and just start filling things in on my calendar. In pencil.

The nice thing about doing it for a month at a time is that if I'm in the mood for chicken and I can't decide on a recipe, I can put a different recipe down for each week. It's also a way to make sure we're eating that cow we have in our freezer.

I usually only plan on cooking full on meals three or four times a week. That way we have at least one day to eat leftovers, there's a day to eat unhealthy crap from the freezer, and sometimes we even go out to eat. Since I went back to work we've been going out to eat about once a week. I know, so bad, but I've gotten good at rationalizing it because I'm working now, and I'm dang tired.

As you can see from my menu above, I've sketched out which days we'll eat what, but really, it's not etched in stone. It's in pencil. I'm pretty much only limited by what groceries we might have in the house at any given time. Grocery shopping is a crap shoot these days. We keep a running grocery list and when we run out of something that we cannot live without (chocolate), somebody makes a list and goes. Peanut Head even grocery shops. By himself. [Gasp] I know. He's a man of many talents.

As I was saying, sometimes I cook what it says for a given day on my menu, and other times I'll jump around and pick something out of order. More than anything, the menu plan takes the guesswork out of  "What am I going to make for dinner?" These here are my choices, pick one and get on with it. I'm big on no brainers like that.

One of my snoopy readers (Ter) wanted me to actually share with you what was on my menu for a month, so here's what we're eating, in no particular order:

• Roast, stuffing, and green beans (remember, we have that cow)
• Spinach Quiche (I can't wait)
• Tomato Basil Pasta Soup and bread (I have buckets of this stuff in the freezer from when all of our tomatoes became ripe at the exact same moment in time. It's good stuff too.)
• Sesame Beef Stir Fry
• Steak (the cow again), mashed potatoes, and peas
• Johnny Carino's Bowtie Festival (must go the gym to work this off)
• Tacos (moo)
• Zuppa Toscana (You must try this--it's my favorite soup from Olive Garden) and bread
• Spaghetti & Meatballs
• Curry Chicken over Rice
• Hamburgers 
• Ham & Cheese Casserole (leftover ham in the freezer, gotta use that)
• Beef Enchiladas (leftover moo from the roast, I shred it and freeze it so we can use it again)
• Fish Tacos (put sweat pants on first, will be too stuffed to move)
• Sloppy Joes 
• Roasted Tomato and Feta Pasta Salad

The items with links are recipes that I've made recipe cards for. And speaking of recipe cards, I have a little surprise for you.

Remember these recipe card dividers I gave you awhile back? Well, I made tabs for them, just for you.

Click on them before saving to your desktop, then print them out as 5x7s and you're in business.

If you thought this was fun, you should go check out The Organizing Junkie. She does a Menu Plan Monday round-up every Monday, and you can see how other people menu plan.
Bon Appetit!