Help our Family at meal time!

Mummy+2

I really need some help and I though this might be the right place for it!

Although I try to meal plan it isn’t really working for us, we go off plan more than we should because it doesn’t fit in with our lifestyle or I can’t be bothered/don’t have time to cook. Also what we eat isn’t very healthy or appealing sometimes. I also find I spend all my money and the meal plan shopping then spend money we haven’t really got eating other things (terrible I know!)

We are a family of 3, me and 2 little people (5 & 20 months) I work and juggle a million things each week so life is very busy and I don’t want to be or have time to be spending hours cooking and then washing up every night -

*Sunday – have time to cook as this is the only day where we do not have regular ridged plans
*Monday – have time to cook in the afternoon between play group and school run but very busy in the evening after school run so would be better if I could prepare/cook in the day then reheat
*Tuesday – Needs to be a quick meal as I don’t get in till late, have about 30min from coming home to kids needing feeding, have a lot of other things to do in the evening so no time to tackle washing up mountain either
*Wednesday – same as Tuesday
*Thursday – No time to cook, need a heat and serve type meal as I get home and the kids need feeding asap also I am exhausted from work (generally we end up scrapping the meal planned and eating out as I just can’t face cooking but there is never any budget for this!)
*Friday – Have a 1 hour window to cook, eat and clean up between scheduled stuff
*Saturday – Have about a 1.5 hour window to cook, eat and clean up, although pots can be put off till Sunday morning if needed

I shop at Aldi, I have a slow cooker but I do not do gravy (I am the only northerner that doesn’t apparently!) also don’t do spicy. I need to lose a lot of weight so need to eat healthier. Kids will eat just about anything form curry & rice to smiley faces & nuggets, little miss will protest if it’s not what she wants but will eat whatever I serve eventually (except sweetcorn or mushrooms!) I do not have a store cupboard of herbs/spices/staples like flower and I don't want to be wasting money on a jar of nutmeg we'll only use once etc. My shopping budget could do with being £40 a week to include household so £35 purely for food

Hit me with your best tips, plans and anything that might help us out….Thanks

Blackbeard_of_Perranporth

1quick cheap meal. Pancakes homemade with oranges and fruit.

Sunday, make some pizza and get them to help pattern it. They can eat.

also. Cottage pie. Can reheat in the microwave

p-pincher

What about when your cooking on Sunday either make something for Monday at the same time or make twice as much. Say roast chicken and either another roast or use the chicken in a quick pasta bake.

When im rushed, which is really every weekday night we have omlette (with or without oven chips), Jacket potatoes with cheese and beans (everyones favorite, nuke in the micro and then crisp up for 10 mins in a screaming hot over), Fry up (takes about 10 mins, fry or grill sausages and bacon, scramble some eggs and a tin of beans.

On a Sunday I often make a huge tomato sauce ( passatta, onion, garlic etc) and ill do a spag bol, lasagne, pizza (can buy or make base or use french stick) or you can batch it up and freeze it.

krustylouise

I'm not being nasty but how can we help you if you can't help yourself? You've admitted you won't stick to meal plans and don't eat healthily. We can suggest all the best ideas but if you don't intend to stick to it - what's the point?

gayleygoo

You can do it, but it will take some planning, organisation, and effort! I found meal planning harder in the beginning, but the more I did it the easier it became. Now I don't have to worry much about what's for tea and it seems to be easier too when I've known all day what I'm going to make rather than deciding at 4.30pm.

Do you have a decent sized freezer? That would really help. Double the recipes when you can - spag bol, curries, cottage pie etc. If you have the oven on to bake potatoes, do twice as many as they'll keep for a few days in the fridge or months in the freezer. Leftovers from one night of a roast or bacon, potatoes and veg can be bubble and squeak the next night - very quick to make too.

Some prep the night before will make the next night's dinner much easier. Chop stir-fry veg and put in a bowl in the fridge, cooking it will take only minutes (boil water for noodles or frozen rice while you're heating the pan, meat can be cut into strips and marinated in a separate bowl overnight). The same can be done with things you can then put in the slow cooker in the morning, turn off, and leave.

A small stock of store-cupboard things will go a long way, and I think is essential if you are going to cook from scratch more often. Homemade foods taste better with herbs and spices, and anything involving flour is way cheaper to make and buy. Flour is incredibly cheap, it's worth having so you can make sauces, pancakes, soda bread or use in various dishes. If you don't use it you can make it into playdough for the kids! Mixed herbs, sweet or smoked paprika and soy sauce is a good start. If you can, buy new herb/spice each week and you'll be able to make so many different dishes and enjoy cooking much more. Okay, nutmeg is one I don't use much. Curry powder or paste is useful (freeze the paste in ice cube trays so it doesn't go mouldy before you use it all).

If you really are short of time, why not get a cleaner in or outsource your washing/ironing or something else that takes time. You'll save the money to pay for those by cooking cheaper meals and they'll be be more nutritious and filling!

Feral_Moon

You could cook the entire week's meals on a Sunday and freeze so all you need to do is re-heat. Or, as has already been suggested, cook double portions when you make a meal so you can freeze half to have ready made microwave meals for the days you don't have time to cook. A little planning goes a long way. And yes, a few store cupboard ingredients will make your life so much easier and will more than pay for themselves when you stop buying expensive processed food and start cooking from scratch.

Mummy+2

krustylouise wrote: »

I'm not being nasty but how can we help you if you can't help yourself? You've admitted you won't stick to meal plans and don't eat healthily. We can suggest all the best ideas but if you don't intend to stick to it - what's the point?

No need for that at all! I didn't say won't I said don't because my current planning doesn't work for us! I'm asking for help because I want to change and make it better! Yes I haven't done to well in the past but I'm hoping with better meals that I can manage and I look forward to I'll be more inclined to stick to it

Ps Didn't any one ever teach you if you have nothing nice to say don't say it?

Mummy+2

Thank you to everyone else, some good tips.

I'm going to search the forum for recipes and hopefully things will get better

RAS

Hi

What do you mean by you "do not do gravy" - you don't like gravy or you do not like anything cooked in a sauce?

Do you have a freezer?

I would suggest that you might benefit from putting aside a couple of hours a week (along side the Sunday cooking or after the kids are tucked up) to make some meals up that can be frozen and then de-frost and cook later in the day or next week.

On top of this when you cook, make double portions and freeze half for the next week or later. Or make a loads of tomato based sauce, curry sauce, cheese sauce and portion up.

Have a small tranche of very quick meals like stir-fries with 3 minute noodles, omelette and oven chips or salad, pasta with very simple no-cook sauces (fresh tomato and herbs, eggs and ham etc). Oven bakes take longer but need very little attention; small chicken thighs, potatoes, a quarter onion and some other veggies, slung in a dish, turned in oil and slung in a hot oven. Ready in half an hour or so.

And learn to cook one meal and have left-over for the next day. So something cooked with potatoes on day one (stew?) and then the next day a oven bake that you can throw in the oven using the rest of the potatoes. Or an oven bake that has enough chicken to add to a pasta the next day, or roast veggies to use as a side dish?

pigpen

I cannot meal plan either.. because how do I know what I fancy eating next Thursday?? .. I might plan spag bol but when it gets to Thursday I might want pie and chips!!

Anyway.. I peel a stack of potatoes at once and keep them in the fridge in water until I decide what I want to do with them..

I stand for hours chopping onions and putting them in individual bags and freezing them. .. it all helps!! I do peppers and various other things too.

Use your slowcooker to do massive amounts of mince/onion base and freeze it.. get it out and add stuff to it to make stews, Bolognese, cottage pie, pies etc...

My super easy go to meal... tuna pasta bake .. cook pasta add tuna and peas.. scoff with cheese and the children get garlic bread too.. if I am feeling extravagant they get salad with it! it takes about 20mins. max.

I have days where we have after school club and I have about an hour to get the children fed and back out to youth club.. it can be done but it does mean prepping stuff after the children are in bed or making 2 or 3 meals at once when I do have time.

sausage casserole .. can be done with a tomato-y base rather than gravy if you prefer... mash lumped on the side.

Some people freeze mash, personally I think it is gross, but you can try it.. it is better than heading to the chippy!!

Spaghetti and meatballs goes down well in here too when we are strapped for time.


I usually have a huge box of prepared salad in my fridge so I can heap it out as needed. Pasta salads save well too.. all make for easy meals.


I'd start by cooking 3 or 4 meals on a Sunday when you have time, there is a fair bit of prepping but it saves time in the long term. Roast for Sunday, extra hunk of meat in.. let this cool, slice and freeze and wanted.. can be added defrosted to eat cold or warmed in the oven.. mine like pork reheated in a tin of tomatoes or apple juice.. it stays moist then too .. I gravy mine.

Islandmaid

Hi Mummy +2

Try a more fluid meal plan - my meal plans are more

Monday - chicken, Tues - mince etc

I (normally) work 7am till 5:30 pm, and cater for 3 teens who all work different hours.

I plan a shop around what I have in to start with, then if I cook roast chicken on a Sunday, I plan a curry or stirfry etc for the Tuesday ( don,t like eating the same protein the next day), whilst the chicken is in the oven, i,ll chuck in something else, like a chilli or lasagne for another night.

Don,t be afraid to do a quick meal like omlette or beans on toast one night, if you pair that with a banana or something similar for pudding, its still a rounded meal.

Homemade pizza is always a winner, the dough can be made on the sunday, a quick roll out and top with tomato puree, cheese and whatever else you fancy, with a bit of salad for example.

Baked potato with cheese and salad another night.

You get the picture - i appreciate that fitting everything in is a killer when planning is concerned, but, for me the worst bit is deciding what is for dinner, not the actual making it, once I know the rest is pretty easy.

Don,t get too stressed, anything you can premake and stick in the freezer for those nights when you can barely think, let alone cook is a bonus

Take care x