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Meal planning is probably the most important, most frustrating and maybe most controversial part of divvying up the household duties. It is also time consuming, frustrating, but ultimately gratifying (when it works).

For more than a year now, we’ve relied on fresh produce to determine our menu, for the most part. I don’t say this to be coy or cute, but we began receiving a weekly co-op basket of pre-selected fruits and vegetables delivered to a local drop-off station. We use http://www.bountifulbaskets.org for our weekly contribution. 

This wound up being one of the best decisions we made in terms of simplifying meal planning. It may sound flipped to wait until you have groceries to decide what’s on the menu, but it works well for us. Once we collect our baskets Saturday mornings, we inventory our take and decide what pantry, freezer or refrigerator items will complement the produce. There are often a few odds and ends we’ve never encountered, and these usually get left for a week or we visit Chef Google for a recipe inspiration. Let me be frank, I don’t like using recipes verbatim. I tend to view recipes as an idea starter… this is probably why I’m not the best baker; I consider cooking and art and baking a science, and I prefer to color outside the lines, rather than use test tubes and beakers, if you catch my drift.

One week, we received beets, an item we rarely eat and had, up until that time, not prepared for a meal at home. So, they went two weeks before we touched them. The following week, we received rainbow chard; same story here… never used the stuff in a dish before. However, after staring at the bulky items taking up valuable fridge space, Chef Google came through with this recipe inspiration: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Swiss-Chard-with-Beets-Goat-Cheese-and-Raisins-233410. We picked up crumbled goat cheese and used dried cranberries instead of raisins (since there were plenty left over from holiday baking) and used a canned tomato and pepper blend in addition to some fresh jalapeños also taking up bin space. The dish was bright red and scary looking! But, it was one of the best tasting dishes we’d put together in a while. It was also quick and easy, and it helped us clear items from both the pantry and fridge.

Another area that helps us with meal planning–the on-sale or good deal meat selections. We purchase ground beef or chicken breasts on sale and then cook the entire package within a day or two of bringing it home, regardless of whether or nt we know what we will use it for. For instance, we found ground beef on sale for about half the normal per pins price, brought it home and sautéed it with garlic, diced onion (from the basket), salt and pepper. Then, we froze the pre-cooked blend in one-pound bags for later use. We ended up making last-minute quesadillas out of one package, and they were delicious without a ton of fuss. Additionally, we found a package of chicken breast on sale (roughly half the normal price), brought it home and pan seared the entire package. Then, we cubed the meat and put it in the fridge. The rest of the week’s menu ended up being chicken fried rice, chicken tortilla soup and BBQ chicken sandwiches–all quick and easy with the help of the prepared meat. I should also note that I cook rice once in a while in large batches as well. It goes in the rice cooker, then I freeze it into usable portions. This is what we used for the fried rice meal. Each of these dishes capitalized on whatever fruits and vegetables and other items we had on hand.

Our meal planning doesn’t involve any huge prep in terms of shopping lists or the like, but it still seems to work for our busy lifestyle. We aren’t forced to grab something from the drive-thru (although we still sometimes do), so we save money, time, effort and calories when we can with this method (if you can call it that).