New way of Meal Planning & Grocery Shopping!

Lately I have been meal planning and grocery shopping little different.  I used to be a super serious coupon shopper and while I still think coupons are great and I still clip those that I plan to use, I am not the serious coupon shopper I once was.  At one time, I went to 2 different stores 4 times to get cearl for 50cents each.  I ended up purchasing close to 30 boxes of cearl.  I shared some with friends and family and of course had lots of cearl for some time.  Then Abi came along and I just have not gotten back into it like I did.  I still have my price points that I stick to, meaning I do not like to pay more the $1 per lb for fruits and veggies.  I try to get pasta and rice for $1 or less per bag.  I rarelly pay full price for much of anyting. 

Lately I have done things a little different.  I have tried to only purchase for one week at a time.  I plan our meals, breakfast, lunch and dinner based upon what we have and also based on a few simple meals.  We usually have pasta, rice and veggies, beans and rice and potatoes, green beas and sausage once per week.  (more often if we want).  Lunch is simple leftovers, sandwiches, pasta or another simple meal that we have around.  Breakfast is pancakes, toast, eggs and occaisonally French toast when my hubby wants to treat us.  (He did cook French toast several times in the past few weeks!)  We have smoothies, yogurt, dry cearl, popcorn, chips and fresh fruit for snacks.  My husband has a sweet tooth, so we try to have dessert often.  I would like to make up some cinnomon rolls and freeze them so that he will have a quick dessert ready in minutes.  (we do eat little meat, I will usually buy ground turkey, chicken or steak when it is on sale, but we do eat many meatless meals)

Eating from our cupboards and only buying what we need has really saved us in the grocery budget department.  I also do not  necesarilly stick to the menu.  For instance if we planned to have rice and veggies tonight but I would rather have pasta I switch it up, it is that simple.  I do plan it out so that I can remember to defrost things but I am very flexible!  Also for lunch Zeke has had PB&J for the past two days so lunch has been pretty simple!  (he recently learned how to make PB&J all by himself!)

Here is a sample menu plan:

Sunday 
Breakfast - eggs & toast
Lunch - leftovers/sandwich
Dinner - Pizza (we get day old french bread from Jimmy Johns for 50cents each and add shredded chicken and spinach and a little mozzarella to make yummy pizza)

Monday
Breakfast - toast
Lunch - School
Dinner - Red Beans & Rice, fried potatos and green beans

Tuesday
Breakfast - Pancakes
Lunch - Pasta/Sandwich
Dinner - Rice with Veggies, Cornbread

Wednesday
Breakfast - eggs/toast
Lunch - Pasta/sandwich,
Dinner - Potatos, sausage, green beans

Thursday
Breakfast - toast/banana
Lunch - Hot dogs, chips, fruit and carrots
Dinner - Chilli, with chips

Friday
Breakfast - toast/banana
Lunch - school
Dinner - Eggs & Pancakes ( sometimes I add spinach to our eggs if we have them for dinner)

Saturday
Breakfast - Pancakes
Lunch - Leftovers/Sandwich
Dinner - Pizza, veggie or salad

Snacks - Smoothies, fruit, dried fruit and nuts, dried cearl, popcorn, chips

I am enjoying this simple way right now.  Having about 10 meals to choose from makes shopping and cooking so much simpler!  When I do purchase ground turkey or chicken I will cook lots up at once and freeze in small portions.  I will use to make pizzas, tacos, chilli, enchiladas, etc.  I also use my crock pot at least twice per week.  It is so nice to put stuff in crock pot and be able to come home and just eat!