mandamonius in the house of the flying internets (AKA amanda wood or the artist formerly known as amanda wheeler)

planning menus

I’ve explained this to a few people lately and thought I’d post it here in case anyone else is interested in this idea: we plan our menu week to week by using Google Calendar.

How we do it

  1. Find recipes we like, either in cookbooks or magazines
  2. Create an event in our shared Google Calendar with the name of the recipe. We add the recipe reference & main ingredients into the details of the event.
  3. Once the week is planned out, we make a grocery list.
  4. We go to the supermarket, but the items, make the food and enjoy!
  5. Once we’ve had the meal, it gets rescheduled for 4-6 weeks away (sometimes less, sometimes more depending on how good a meal it is).

Pros/reasons

  • If I’m at work and there are fresh items needed for a recipe (especially near the end of the week) we can pick up items on the way home - especially since Darren works in Ellerslie, land of bakeries.
  • We waste less food by buying exactly what we need - especially if we can group recipes that use the same kinds of ingredients
  • We spend less money than we used to when we didn’t do this.

Cons

  • Getting started can be a slow process - especially if you have a lot of recipes.
  • When we’re super busy it can fall by the wayside pretty easily.

So, in a nutshell, that is our system - I’m keen to hear from anyone who has other systems for recipes because honestly, they are the bane of my life!