Week 3: Steal My Meal Plan! {4 Week Meal Plan Series}
Errmaahhgaaawd, this week's meal plan totally hit the nail on the head for enjoying delicious comfort food that isn't going to require you to slave away in the kitchen!! It's jam-packed with super yummy, warming meals that will leave you and your family completely satisfied as the weather turns cooler.
While infusing a plethora of feel-good, warming, rich main dishes, I balanced them with some fresh, raw side salads. My children still don't really eat salad so I simply cut raw veggies for them in place of the salads.
Blackened Fish Burger with Sriracha Mayo from OhSweetBasil.com
Although there are 5 unique meals listed on this meal plan, 2 of the meals use the same meat, cutting down the cooking time. These meals would be the Slow Cooker Butter Chicken and the Butter Chicken Pizza. If you haven't had Butter Chicken Pizza yet then you are seriously missing out. The pizza becomes a very easy meal to make when using leftover chicken from the slow cooker meal and pre-made pizza dough.
The reason this week's meal plan isn't labeled 30-minutes or less is because it's not! The Peruvian-Style Roasted Chicken takes about 45-50 minutes to roast (but it is sooooo worth it). Also, the recipe for the Black Bean and Spinach Enchiladas says 10 minutes prep time but I bet it takes you 15...pushing the total time to 35 minutes.
Okay Mamas, let's start with me the enticing part, the part where you...
Steal my meal plan!
Yes, that's exactly what I said. I'm giving you the very meal plans that I have made and used for my family. Tried and true. You can do whatever you want with them but what I hope you will do is either:
Copy it exactly and see how it goes. Then make modifications based on what went well and what did not. Trial and error.
OR copy part of the meal plan. Maybe preparing dinner (no matter how easy) isn't in your game plan for 5 nights of the week. Take 2 or 3 nights and leave the rest. However, keep in mind that in order to save time (and money) I often integrate the weeknight meals. (Example: the chicken used in the Butter Chicken Pizza was cooked on a previous night.)
OR just study my meal plans and analyze how I save time and energy by batching tasks, cooking once to eat twice (or three times), using similar ingredients, etc. By learning these techniques you can try and make your own meal plans that will be more efficient, get yourself out of the kitchen more, and save time and money on groceries.
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Let's get started: Week 3 Meal Plan
Black Bean and Spinach Enchiladas from LitLivingEats.com
It will all make sense soon. Take a look...
Week 3 Meal Plan
Sunday: Peruvian-Style Roasted Chicken with Sweet Onions and Garlic Butter Roasted Brussel Sprouts (I chose two recipes that could both be roasted on purpose.)
Monday: Black Bean and Spinach Enchiladas (Meatless Monday)
Tuesday: Slow Cooker Butter Chicken over rice, with Indian Cucumber Salad
Wednesday: Blackened Fish Burger with Sriracha Mayo and Simple Arugula Salad
Thursday: Butter Chicken Pizza with Simple Arugula Salad
Friday: eat out or take-out
Saturday: Date Night! (kids eat with grandparents)
Slow Cooker Butter Chicken from OneLovelyLife.com
Don't have a slow cooker?
Okay, you and I need to have a heart to heart. So, you don't have a slow cooker (aka crock pot), WHY NOT??
I feel like there is no answer you can give me that will make me understand! I save so much time using a slow cooker to cook my meals. I Just. Cannot. Fathom. Life without a slow cooker would be...nope, can't imagine it.
If you are in the market for one (as you should be), I would highly recommend getting one like this one which can be programmed to cook for your chosen amount of hours and then switch to 'warm'. This makes it easy on your schedule and you don't have to race home to turn it 'off' at the end of your cooking time frame.
Also, I should warn you that if you are making a dish like Slow Cooker Butter Chicken in a slow cooker and also want rice to serve with it, then you need to be shopping for a rice cooker with a programmable function like this one. We have been using our slow cooker and rice cooker religiously for more than 10 years now! I totally think they were worth the investment.
All your best efforts are squashed if you come home to a nice slow cooker meal that smells delicious and is ready to eat but you still have to cook rice! With a programmable rice cooker, you can set everything to be finished at the same time! #mindblown
Watch Leah cook in real life
Watch Leah cook Tuesday night's meal (Slow Cooker Butter Chicken, rice, and Indian Cucumber Salad) in this video. Until I get my professional recording studio and videographer, you get to cook with me in my yoga gear and bad lighting! But the food is SOOOOO delish! I promise!
Until I get my professional recording studio and videographer, you get to cook with me in my yoga gear and bad lighting! But the food is SOOOOO delish! I promise!
Remember - if you are already a LWL Tribe member you always get FREE access to everything in the Free Library!
General Tips & Advice for Meal Planning
(This is more or less a repeat from Week 1 & 2, so if you've already read it then you can get a refresher here. Or, skip it if you are a stellar student and know it all already!)
KISS
Keep It Simple (Stupid). For many of these meals, by now I know how to make them by heart and without a recipe. They are simple and they are regularly featured on our family's weekly meal plan. But because I like to help make healthy easy, I have included all the links to each of the recipes so you don't have to search and wonder 'which is the better potato recipe??'
When planning your own weekly meal plans, don't use more than one new recipe per week! KiSS!
Using the same ingredients and recipes more than once
As you can see, I like to use similar ingredients throughout the week and double up on a recipe when I can. For example, I use the Simple Arugula Salad twice and I've incorporated the chicken from the slow cooker Butter Chicken meal into a second meal (Butter Chicken Pizza) but I only have to make it once! Cook once, eat twice.
All these little tricks save time and energy.
Consult your calendar
As you may have noticed, I do more of my cooking or save the recipes that require longer cooking times for Sundays. I also choose easier meals on nights when we have baseball or swim practice or a busy evening for whatever reason. Make sure you consult your calendar and choose either very simple, easy meals on your busy nights or make it a "leftovers" night.
Seasonal
I was desperate for some warming comfort meals as the weather started to cool off. Just because they are "comfort foods" (at least for me) doesn't mean they aren't healthy too!
Give yourself a night off
I also firmly believe in giving yourself at least one night a week off of cooking or preparing dinner. Unless you absolutely LOVE being in the kitchen all the time (not I!) then give yourself the grace to not be. I usually choose Fridays as our "eat out" or "take-out" night because it works well for our family's schedule.
FFY (Fend For Yourself)
No matter how much I try to calculate how much food to cook, there is always more food than we need. Much of the time I actually make an effort to cook more than enough so we can have leftovers for lunches or whatever. By Saturday, whatever didn't get eaten throughout the week is on the menu for dinner! Fend For Yourself is a great way to clean out the fridge and make room for all the groceries and food for the upcoming week.
This week we have a date night on Saturday, so we will likely eat leftovers for lunches on the weekend.
Notes on this Meal Plan
On the second page of my weekly meal plan I have it divided into 3 sections so that I can get food prepped and cooked ahead of time. I either build this time into my day or if I have some free time I will take a glance at my notes and I know exactly what needs to be done without spending precious time thinking about it!
For this reason, I love doing my meal plans on paper. I find taking notes to be so much easier on paper and then I can hang the meal plan up in the kitchen.
Now everyone knows the plan and I can also more easily assign kitchen help tasks. Sometimes just referring to the Weekly Meal Plan is enough for my husband to know what he can help with. On paper, I can also cross off the prep tasks that have been completed.
Here is what my "notes page" looks like for this meal plan:
I've added some more detailed notes for your benefit. If you want to see the exact page that I use with my notes and everything, you can download the free printable document in the Free Resource Library.
Marinades/Sauces/Dips/Dressings I can Make Ahead:
salad dressing for Simple Arugula Salad
sriracha mayo
sauce for the enchiladas
rub for the fish
Sauce for Slow Cooker Butter Chicken (if running low on time just dump ingredients in a slow cooker! Cooking the sauce in a pan adds a little bit extra flavor.)
Food/Dishes I can Prepare/Cook Ahead:
Indian Cucumber Salad can be prepped ahead
Veggies/Produce I can Prep Ahead:
pizza toppings
veggies for enchiladas
Additional Notes for this week's meal plan:
TUESDAY - Don't forget to put the slow cooker on in the morning!
This meal plan can easily be made GLUTEN-FREE - buy GF hamburger buns or serve Blackened Fish Burgers as a salad, buy GF pizza crust and GF tortillas
The Black Bean & Spinach Enchiladas are a great dish to make double and freeze one whole (uncooked) pan for a future meal!
The Slow Cooker Butter Chicken is also a great freezer meal. Double or triple the recipe and freeze extra cooked meat in sauce for future meals.
Sea Bass is often very expensive, I will usually buy whatever firm fish is on sale.
Remember - if you are already a LWL Tribe member you always get FREE access to everything in the Free Library!
Do you prefer to meal plan digitally?
My friend, there is a digital answer to EVERYTHING! Meet my new digital friend, Plan to Eat. This amazing app can do so much I'm going to have to write a whole different blog post on how incredible it is.
See how I did this week's meal plan on Plan to Eat? You can watch my Plan to Eat video tutorial here.
You do need a subscription to use the service but it's like $3.25 per month. You could save more than that per meal just by meal planning and saving money! If you are a digital person, this app is SO worth it! If you are interested, click on my link here. (That's an affiliate link and I may earn a very small commission at no extra cost to you!)
You can watch my Plan to Eat video tutorial here.
Stay tuned for week 4!
You can also go back to Week 1 and Week 2 if you want to use those again. I think it's a great idea to use meal plans over and over, especially when you are just learning how. You can understand how the meal plan flows, get faster at making the recipes, and learn what works for you and what doesn't.
So come back here next week to steal another week of meal plans! And, could you do me a favor? Can you share this with a friend who is struggling to get healthy meals on the table because life is crazy busy? Sharing is caring ❤️.
Happy meal plan stealing,
P.S. When it comes time to make your own meal plan, be sure to read The 9 Worst Mistakes People Make When Meal Planning. Yeah...avoid those! Also, check out No Time? 9 Easy, Quick Weeknight Meals for some great (easy) recipes to add to your meal plans.
P.P.S. Get your own blank Weekly Meal Planner template in the Free Resource Library.
