4 Great Reasons Meal Planning Is a Must for a Happier Family Life

Don’t let meal planning intimidate you. CanCan Mom’s got 4 great reasons meal planning is a must to save your family money and create a happier home.

Moms Crushing It with CanCan Quick Steps

If you’re tired of winging it when figuring out how to serve easy, delicious, healthy meals, then it’s time to give meal planning a chance. Here are four reasons for meal planning.

1. Craft a meal-planning mindset.
2. Save money by avoiding impulse buys and reduce food waste by shopping for planned menus.
3. Get creative and offer your family a variety of tasty dishes.
4. Reduce Daily Stress and enjoy more time with your family.

How to Approach Family Meal Planning

Let’s have fun and digest each of these: (Pun intended!)

Tip 1: Craft a Meal Planning Mindset

Busy parents spend a good portion of their time in the kitchen. Meal preparation, not to mention serving and cleaning up, is time-consuming. Factor in the time it takes to shop for food—and that groceries account for the third largest expense in a family’s budget—and you can add frustration and a heaping dose of stress to the mix. 

Before diving into the meal planning world, you need to shift your mindset. Don’t go into this as just another chore you must tackle; instead, take a positive approach and have fun with the process.

Best of all, your anxiety levels will plummet because you’ll finally be organized! No more wandering around the grocery store trying to figure out the ingredients you need.

The key to effective meal planning is to build it into your routine. Keep these tips in mind as you embark on this savory journey to create menus your family will hunger for:

Pick your meal planning day and be consistent.

Is there a better day or time each week that offers you the quiet space you need to put some thought into your menu? Thursday is my day off, so that’s the day I tend to do my grocery shopping. I want to have my meals planned a few days before, so I use Mondays as my planning day and stick with that day so I don’t get off track.

Be realistic—how much time do you really have to prepare and cook your meals?

You can plan all you want, but if you don’t have time to execute your meal plan, you won’t benefit from it.

Start by checking your family calendar. With a glance at the upcoming week, you’ll be able to figure out what nights call for a fast and easy dinner or what nights require something that can be kept warm and served at different times. When can everyone sit down together for a real family dinner?

With this in mind, incorporate important elements such as a few make-ahead family dinners and limit more time-consuming recipes to your least crazy day of the week.

Tuesday and Friday nights are the busiest for our family, so I always have a casserole or something easy like quesadillas or a “make-your-own” dish such as tacos on those evenings.

It’s also okay to build in days to give yourself a break. Schedule meals from leftovers or have quick soup, sandwiches, or breakfast for dinner on busy nights.

Now for the details:

I like to create a two-week meal plan because I do one big grocery run every other week. If you know your family’s favorites—like Aunt Peggy’s three-cheese lasagna or Dad’s mouth-watering glazed wings and mac and cheese—add those to your list. Ask your family for their input so everyone has a say. Don’t forget to search out recipes in those cookbooks gathering dust on your bookshelf. You might also enjoy perusing dozens of online recipe sites. And don’t forget school lunches, weekend meals, and breakfasts.

Once your weekly meal plan is designed, get into the habit of hanging it in the kitchen for all to see. Making your meal plan visible may hold you more accountable for following through, and best of all, your family isn’t constantly asking, “What’s for dinner?”

My kids remind me if I’m even a day late in posting our bi-weekly menu. They look forward to seeing what’s for dinner. Their excitement is an incentive for me to stay with the program.

Show enthusiasm for this new way of life by making your kids part of the process. Let them help you when you’re planning, shopping, and prepping. If they’re old enough to read and understand how a grocery list works when they have to tag along to the store, let them be responsible for helping to gather the items you’re shopping for. Remind them that you’re strictly sticking to this list and not veering off your family’s meal plan. Taunt them with how delicious the homemade breakfast sandwiches are going to taste when they whimper about not being able to purchase that sugary cereal with neon marshmallows. You’re all in this together!

Once meal planning becomes a part of your lifestyle, you’ll have more time and energy to devote to your family, with a little left over for yourself.

Tip 2: Save money by avoiding impulse buys and reduce food waste by shopping for planned menus

One of the biggest perks of meal planning for my family of eight kids is the amount of money we save each month. (Literally hundreds of dollars!) Any parent knows how difficult it is to go grocery shopping, particularly if you have hungry kids in tow. It’s even more challenging when you have to wing it without a list.

When I first started meal planning, I created my grocery list on the computer and organized it according to categories, such as produce, frozen items, canned goods, condiments, etc. I kept it posted on the bulletin board in the kitchen so I could add the necessary items I needed before I went shopping. Since then, I’ve created my own.

You can download my free printable grocery list

Plenty of amazing meal-planning apps are available and convenient to use with your smartphone. Here are a couple I like.

•        Yummly.com is a free mobile app and website that provides hundreds of personalized recipe recommendations, including gluten-free, vegetarian, keto-diets, and more. It’s user-friendly and combines a grocery list as well as an actual meal plan. You’ll never serve ho-hum meals again.

•        Cozi.com is another free, easy-to-use meal-planning app that combines recipes and a dinner planner.

After working off a grocery list for a few weeks, you’ll also start creating a well-stocked pantry. You’ll develop regular “go to” recipes that require many of the same ingredients and spices you can purchase when on sale or that will last you weeks.

Knowing what’s already in your cupboards is a great money- and time-saver because you won’t end up purchasing extra cans of chicken broth or rummaging through the spice cabinet wondering where the chili powder is—you’ll know what you have. You’ll be able to put your hands right on it.

Tip 3: Get Creative and Offer Your Family a Variety of Tasty Dishes

When I embarked on meal planning years ago, I decided I was going to shake things up by trying one new recipe each week. Allrecipes.com is one of my favorite sites. They always have fresh and easy ideas to try. My family became intrigued and began looking forward to the new plates we’d be trying.

Once I became devoted to the world of meal planning, I also committed to not being as wasteful with our food. There’s nothing more discouraging than having high hopes for a selection of fresh veggies and that perfectly-sliced corned beef from the deli only to open your crisper at the end of the week and see your food drooping and turning colors that look decidedly unhealthy.

Thanks to some awesome websites, you can easily solve this problem and tap into your creative side. Check out supercook.com and bigoven.com; you’ll never have to be wasteful again. These sites will help you find new ways to use the ingredients in your fridge and pantry or bring new life to your leftovers.

Use different cooking methods:

Double Up: Make two and freeze one when making a casserole or lasagna. Then if you have a sick day or any kind of emergency, you can quickly substitute a family favorite into the schedule.

Crock-Pot: They’ve made a comeback and are a great part of a healthy and delicious eating plan. Many people use slow cookers these days because you can toss in a few ingredients in the morning and come home to the savory aroma of a meal ready to be eaten immediately. I use mine at least once a week. There are hundreds of recipes available online, including delish.com.

Instant Pot: This increasingly popular alternative is a combination between a slow cooker and a pressure cooker. Use it to make unbelievable meals in half the time! There is a huge wealth of recipes for the Instant Pot, online communities, and recipes for those learning to use them.

Tip 4: Reduce Daily Stress and More Time with Your Family

Eating together also allows families to stay connected with one another and share stories about what happened during their day. Studies show that kids who regularly sit down to dinner with the family get higher grades, have better vocabularies, are more resilient, and are less likely to take up unhealthy habits like smoking.

Parents have the opportunity to glimpse into the window of their kids’ busy school lives. Likewise, kids get the chance to see what happens during mom and dad’s working hours.

Even if busy schedules make eating together as a family every night might be impossible, try a sit-down meal several nights a week or enjoy a regular Sunday brunch. It’s doable if you make meal planning a priority.

The Outcome–Meal Planning Makes for a Happier Family Life!

Meal Planning makes family dinners possible more often as ingredients are now always on hand. Taking everyone’s schedules into consideration, quick meals on busy nights and family favorites with occasional surprises when everyone is at the table. Come and get it!

How do you feel about meal planning? Do you have any tips that work well for your family? Please leave your thoughts in the comment section below.