Leading By Example with Meal Planning

Week 3 in the Series

I haven't shared with you my weekly meal plan in a while and this is a great week to let you peak into my kitchen.

Thursdays I get a New Roots Organic produce delivery. I base my menu off of what I get and what random foods I may have left in the fridge. The cookbooks I used this week were Mollie Katzen's Vegetables Dishes I Can't Live Without (Veg Dish), Feeding the Whole Family (FWF) by Cynthia Lair, Moosewood Cookbook (MW) by Mollie Katzen (can you tell I'm a big fan of hers :-), and a few made up on the spot.

Saturday I spent 2.5 hours preparing all of the lunch/dinner recipes below. My wonderful husband kept things running smoothly by cleaning up along the way. In our house we have this rule: "Whom ever cooks is absolved of cleaning". So on these marathon cooking days he chips in so the mess isn't overwhelming at the end of it all. Bless that man for what he puts up with! 

Weekly Menu
Breakfast:
1. Deviled Eggs, Sliced Tomatoes, Whole Wheat Baguette
2. Steel Cut Oats, Frozen Strawberries, Walnuts, Brown Sugar (made with Rice Milk)
3. Protein Smoothies with Frozen Strawberries and Fresh Bananas

Lunch/Dinners:
1. Veg Dish p 96 Ruby Chard, Pressure Cooked Black-Eyed Peas, Grilled Halibut on the BBQ
2. FWF p 144 Millet Croquettes with Leftover Lentil Soup (also from MW p 25)

3. MW p 101 Vegetable-Walnut Pate stuffed in Mini Sweet Peppers, Grilled Chicken, and Brown Rice
4. (Own) Sauteed Cabbage Raab (1/2 tsp salt, 1/2 cup diced onion, 2 tsp olive oil, 1 tbsp minced garlic), Fresh Caught Boiled Shrimp (Today was open boating season and friends caught their limit in fresh shrimp today, THANKS for sharing them!), with Baked Spaghetti Squash
5. Leftover Combos: Blacked-eyed Peas on Brown Rice with a side of Ruby Chard, Remaining Vegetable-Walnut Pate on Warm Pita with a low fat string cheese (Yummy Snack!), Put remaining Cabbage Raab in Tomato Sauce, add any leftover shrimp or chicken and serve over Spaghetti Squash, Breakfast for Dinner option: Over-easy egg served on top of warmed Millet Croquette and a few slices of fresh fruit.


Good luck putting your plans together this week. Leave comments with questions and your personal stories. We love hearing from you!

This is my new pressure cooker! If you have any tips I'd love to hear them.

Meal Planning 101

Week 2 in the Series

Ahh, meal planning. It is such a double edged sword. On one hand, I love shopping for fresh foods and getting excited about what I can create with them. On the other hand, carting around a toddler who refuses to sit in a shopping basket is not my idea of a fun way to spend my time. So I’ve had to get creative in my approaches. (Thank God for AmazonFresh and the QFC daycare at U Village!)

To understand meal planning, it’s important to know which food groups you need to plan for at each meal.   Check out the picture to see which foods are needed at the different meals of the day. These plate models are adapted from the Idaho Plate Method . You can print your own for free under teaching materials on the site.

This picture tells you which food groups to include but it doesn’t tell you how much. This will be based on your personal calorie needs. When we work together, I calculate out specific calories based on multiple factors.  From here we figure out how many of each food group you need in a day to make up this calorie level. To get a general sense of your nutrition needs and portion sizes, check out the MyPyramid website.

Now that you have a clear picture as to what food groups you need to fill up on, it’s time to start planning. The first place to begin is your kitchen! Rummage through your cookbooks and online recipes to see what excites you. If you aren’t motivated to prepare a dish or even excited to eat it, then why cook it? Remember from the last post, you are looking for 2 breakfast recipes, 1-2 snack recipes, and 4 dinner recipes to prepare.

Now take your chosen recipes and see how they fit onto your plate models. What pieces are missing? Which are in excess? This is the time to balance the scales. If your dish is mainly pasta, consider serving it as a side and add a salad. Do you have protein? Milk/dairy? A fruit?

Most people prefer to move their dairy and fruit options at the main meals to eat as their snacks. This is completely fine to do.

Formulate your grocery shopping list using the balanced out plate model handout. Note that creativity and variety are not in any way stifled through this process. Instead, you now have a foundation to guide your planning and cooking process.

The next step is yours! Weekly Challenge: Print out a Daily Meal Plate handout, peruse your cookbooks for inspirational recipes, and balance your plates. The kids love this activity because they can color in their meals and feel they have some say in their food choices.

Zen Recipe Corner:
Veggies All Ways
Servings variable

1 small bunch collard greens, chopped
1 small bunch rainbow chard, stems removed and chopped
3 turnips, diced
¼ c diced red onion
½ tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper
2 tbsp canola oil
½ fennel bulb, diced
½ cup dried cranberries
¼ cup apple cider vinegar

Directions:
Rinse and drain collard greens and rainbow chard. Add to large bowl and sprinkle salt on. Massage with your hands for 1-2 minutes. (This makes the greens less bitter.) Heat skillet on medium high heat, when pre-heated add oil. Let heat for 1 minute. Add onion, turnip, and fennel. Sautee’ until almost tender. Add greens to pan in small bunches. Let cook down a bit before adding another handful. With last handful of greens add in apple cider vinegar, black pepper, and cranberries. Sautee until greens have wilted. Add more salt/pepper to taste.
Serving Suggestions: (You can really use any veggies you like in this recipe and it’ll come out great!)
1.    as a side dish (goes great with fish and quinoa),
2.    add choice of meat, brown rice, and peanut sauce for a quick left over stir fry
3.    Mixed in with scrambled eggs & ½ oz shredded mozzarella
4.    Stuff into a hummus lined whole wheat pita pocket topped with fresh goat cheese
5.    Add the last bit to a tomato sauce and toss with whole grain pasta