Hey everyone! How are you this Monday morning?
I was super excited for this week to start because I plan to get BACK in the kitchen. I’ve been so busy/traveling/entertaining that I’ve been doing minimal cooking the past month. I was super pumped to make a meal plan and know that I’ll actually have time to devote to shopping and cooking this week.
I did a twitter poll yesterday asking if anyone was interested in seeing my meal plan and groceries, and SO many people said yes! So here I am – sharing those items with you.
Before I share, I want to give you three links that may help you understand how I shop/meal plan.
1. I have a fully stocked pantry, and I keep a ton of stuff on hand. So these groceries are mostly just the fresh foods I needed, plus replenishing what I was out of that I keep on hand.
2. I eat meat, on average, once a day. And some days, I don’t eat meat at all. When I do eat meat, this meal is typically dinner, since I cook for both Matt and myself. If you want more details about my meat-eatin’ habits, check out this guest post I wrote for Veggie Next Door.
3. If you want more details on my meal planning/grocery shopping habits in general – check out this guest post I wrote for my boss Robin.
Meal Plan 1/8/12
This week I was craving meat – and namely beef. I haven’t been eating much meat the past two weeks because I’ve been traveling and eating out a lot. If there is a viable vegetarian option in these situations, I eat that. If not, I eat meat – but only about half the portion served.
So I rolled with the meat cravings this week.
Breakfasts/Lunches
Breakfasts this week will be cereal for me, oatmeal at work for him. I’m going to test out two muffin recipes for breakfasts as well. I’m trying to find something that is “grab-n-go” that isn’t oatmeal or cereal since I’ve been in a major breakfast rut lately.
I’m testing the Apple Crisp Muffins from the Happy Herbivore Cookbook and Maple-Almond Quinoa muffins from the Weight Watchers Power Foods cookbook. I also had a craving for cinnamon raisin bread, so I’m going to make some of that in my breadmaker.
For lunches – I’m home all week (except Friday when I’m volunteering all day), so I’m planning to whip up lunch based on what I’m craving. I’ll have leftovers, tortillas, veggies, beans, salad mix, avocadoes and hummus that I can make a variety of stuff with!
Matt will be taking our dinner leftovers for lunch all week, as those are his favorite lunches (AKA he has to do no prep for them!)
Dinners
Dinners are all planned out and organized below, by day.
Sunday
Last night I made linguine and meatballs – using whole wheat linguine, tomato basil pasta sauce, beef meatballs (based loosely on my meatball recipe) and broccoli
Monday
Lentil enchiladas (using Sarah Snack’s recipe) with a salad on the side. I make my own enchilada sauce from the Happy Herbivore cookbook.
Let me just tell you – I am from Texas and Tex-Mex is my favorite food on this planet. And these enchiladas are seriously the best I’ve ever had. TRY THEM.
Tuesday
Spaghetti squash, topped with spicy tomato sauce and my Baked Chicken Parmesan (by the way, I have a video tutorial on how to make these if you’re interested)
Wednesday
Burrito bowls – pinto beans, brown rice, avocado, tomato, cheese and pork made with this recipe. Someone recommended it to me on twitter, but I’m swapping the beef with a pork tenderloin and making it in my crock pot.
Thursday
I’m volunteering this night, so I’ll be eating out somewhere (probably Central Market – black bean soup anyone?) I bought Matt chicken tenders so he can make stir fry for himself (he has some stir fry frozen vegetable mixes).
Friday
Matt has school this night, which means I typically make my own meal using whatever is around the house and I’m craving. This past week I roasted brussel sprouts, tomatoes and chickpeas and threw it on top of whole wheat pasta with olive oil and parmesan cheese.
Saturday
We eat out together every Saturday (if we don’t have other plans) as a Date Night.
And here’s our groceries:
Meats for the week: Super lean ground beef, pork tenderloin, chicken breasts and chicken tenders.
Pantry items: Chickpeas, two cans of refried beans, two jars of tomato sauce, green chilies, veggie chips, quinoa flour, whole wheat linguini
Fridge and bread items: 12 grain bread, fat free milk, cheddar cheese, parmesan cheese, whole wheat and corn tortillas, frozen oven fries (they were on sale and I’m tired of the sweet potato ones) and white bean hummus (which is my absolute favorite aside from restaurant hummus)
Fruits/veg in the fridge: baby carrots (for my dogs), broccoli, spring mix, kiwis and a bell pepper
Fruits/veg on the counter: Sweet potato, avocado, tomatoes, spaghetti squash, onions, banana, apples, grapefruit and tangerines
The rest of the ingredients for everything I already have in the house. I currently have these fresh foods waiting to be eaten: celery, radishes and cucumber cut in my fridge for snacks, yogurt, butternut squash, regular potatoes, pears.
What is on your meal plan this week and what groceries did you buy?
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
1) I know you meal plan a lot (and are WAY better at sticking to it than I ever could be!) but I’m wondering how often you switch up what meals you eat during the week. I feel like if I started to meal plan regularly (read: more than just 1 day a week) it would either turn into the stress of trying to find new meals (that we both agree on) to eat every week OR we would have the same thing every week for the whole month. Maybe I need to just go and read the post you linked to about how you meal plan…..
2) Carrots are one of the very few foods that Olive won’t eat, so it always surprises me when other dogs like them – although yours aren’t the only ones I know that do! But really, she eats everything, but carrots she will take and look like she is eating until you realize that she is actually just shredding it to bits.
yummmm everything looks good! my dogs LOVE carrots and sweet potatoes
Oh, I love this post! I’m curious to see what you come up with for easy, grab & go breakfasts. I really struggle with breakfast during the semester. Muffins sound like a great idea!
I love love love this! Your meal planning is awesome and I love the pictures of what you bought.
I am soooo jealous of your beautiful pantry! Mine is about half that size, and so overloaded that I can never find anything. I also just bookmarked that Lentil Enchilada recipe – sounds SO good!
I too have been out of the kitchen for ages, so this week I challenged myself to have a homemade Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner each day, using one of Happy Herbivore’s meal plans. It’s SO different from my usual routine. Today’s homemade lunch was such a treat compared to the slim pickings in the office cafeteria!
I feel like because we talk so much I always forget to comment on your blog because we’ve already had a conversation about it!
We’re totally meal plan twins this week! I’m making enchiladas and those Apple Crisp muffins as well. (Although, I’ll probably actually hold off until next week on the muffins now that Nik is out of town and thos were intended to be breakfasts for him.)
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