Follow me on social media, @dr.janine.nd

For many people this is the first thing you think about when it comes to meal planning: it’s often your biggest meal of the day and a time where you may eat with others. But it's also coming at a point where you've already made many decisions and the time might be tight. This can lead to the pizza order, frozen dinner, or the takeout meal. These are totally fine to have sometimes! But if they're happening more frequently because life is super busy, we want to find more strategies.

There's lots to unpack with dinner meal planning.

When are you going to decide what your meals will be for the week?

When are you going to grocery shop?

Do you need to do any prep in advance?

Do you need to get things out of the freezer?

Who is cooking?

And what are you going to make?

The more routine and automated you can be with these things, the less you need to make decisions, which usually makes things much easier.

In terms of deciding actually what to make, there are a few strategies that I find helpful

1.Create a master meal list: what are your go-to meals?

The list of meals here do not need to be fancy, just things that you might eat for dinner. Make sure you have lots of easy options on this list! When you have a list like this, it's easier to put the plan together as you aren't wracking your brain for the ideas.

2.Themed days:

Meatless Monday
Taco Tuesday
Pasta Wednesday
Bowls Thursday
Fish Friday
Stir Fry Saturday
Slow Cooker Sunday
Barbecue day
Salad day
Take out day
Breakfast-for-dinner day
Soup/stew day
Curry day
Leftovers day

You could have some version of tacos every Tuesday. You can add variety here by changing the protein sources: fish, black beans, shrimp, tofu, pulled pork, ground beef, etc. Changing the form: hard shell, soft shell, taco salad, burrito, taco bowl on rice. And changing the toppings.

The themes just make it easier to come up with ideas for each day.

3.Take a break.

If you’re feeling pretty tapped out on dinner cooking and planning, looking at a meal service might be helpful to just have a couple of weeks off and build a bit more capacity for future. There are a number of meal delivery services with pre-made meals. Ones that I know about include Lady Sara’s Bounty, Chef Pi, Conscious kitchen, Nook Kitchen, Factor meals. There are also meal kits like Hello Fresh and Goodfood. These take some of the prep and decision making out of the way. You can also totally lean on takeout; we just want to plan the takeout a little bit in advance and so you can still get the fruit or veg and protein that we want you to have with your meals. Pizza with raw veggies + cottage cheese = a more balanced plate. Rotisserie chicken + bag salad. Easy can still be a relatively balanced meal.

Making a meal plan doesn't mean gourmet cooking. The goal is to decrease the decisions and stress around the meal and make it easier to have a balanced plate more consistently.

book a visit today

Disclaimer:

This content is for informational and educational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician, naturopathic doctor, or other qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition or health concern. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay seeking it because of something you have read here.