If you’re anything like me (and aren’t we all somewhat alike, as humans? … too philosophical for a Wednesday?), this period of pandemic has sparked a bit of culinary creativity in you, the circumstances of this crazy world allowing you to put some new thought to what-all you’re eating at home and when you’re going to eat it. For the moment, gone are the days of venturing out to restaurants willy-nilly, of traipsing across town when you’re just too tired to cook. Heck, gone are the days of swinging by to pick up takeout on the way home from work, because for a lot of us, we’re already working from home! And, too, there’s the desire to save money in this uncertain economy, leading us to cook at home more than we used to. (I’m not The Kitchen Recessionista for nothing, y’all. We’ve been to this movie before.)

Now, the way I plan my menus is certainly not the be-all, end-all One Way of all time. But it’s worked for me for more than a decade, and I certainly believe it will work for you, too.

So here’s how I do it.

First, grab a piece of paper – I like to reuse regular letter-sized paper that’s already been printed on one side – and fold it in half, width-wise. Then turn that fold over so it’s on the lefthand side – as though you’d made a little four-page book – and grab a pen. Get ready to write!

On that sheet of paper, I chart out two weeks’ worth of dates and days, like so:

And then I write in the “Gimmes,” like the fact that I know we’ll be doing takeout on Friday and Saturday nights, cooking out on Sunday, and having some rendition of Taco Tuesday.

Then it’s just a matter of writing in which meals I’d like to have which nights. For instance, on Monday nights I have a standing FaceTime date with my godchildren down in Florida, so I know I want to have an easy-to-make meal that evening so as not to be late. 

And then I pencil in (well, pen, actually) the rest of the week based on our preferences, what we have in the pantry already and, well, what we want to eat!

Then I flip to the backside and draw a line halfway down the page to mark the separation between weeks.

And then I break down the ingredients from the meals I’d written on the flip side and make sure everything is accounted for. If there are duplicate ingredients needed, I just note “x2” or “x4 or whatever to make sure I order enough.

While I plan my menus for every two weeks, I do my main shopping (via curbside pickup nowadays) once a week. In the Before Times, I’d head to the grocery store on Saturday or Sunday, but now we arrange for pickup on Friday. So roundabout Thursday, I order the haul for the next week, pick up on Friday, and we’re all ready to go by the time Monday rolls around!

Do you have meal-planning tips of your own to share? Drop them in the comments!

:)