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Meal planning is often considered to be tedious and stressful. This is certainly why many people are reluctant to try it out. However, nothing could be further from the truth. On the contrary, meal planning helps you live a slightly less-stressful and more organized life.

 When you think of meal planning, you probably imagine a month-long planner filled with details of what your family will eat for the next four weeks. While this planning method works for some people, it is not necessarily what everyone must do. The best thing about planning meals is that you get to choose what works best for your household and stick to it. There are no hard and fast rules here.

 If you are looking for ways to optimize your meal planning strategy, here are a few tips you should consider.

Create Recipes

 The first step in meal planning is figuring out what exactly you will include in your plan. Most people find that planning dinners for a week works perfectly for them, although this is not everyone’s case. If you plan meals weekly, create recipes on Fridays so you can shop on Saturdays and meal prep on Sundays.

 When creating recipes, be sure to ask your family which meals they love the most. This will give you a reasonably accurate idea of which ingredients to buy in bulk. Additionally, you can always expect someone to light up at the dinner table when their favorite meal is served.

 If you want to save money, include a lot of in-season foods in your weekly meal plan. Not only are they cheap, but they are also fresh and filled with nourishing nutrients.

 Consider having themes for dinners. For instance, you can have Tacos Tuesdays and Chicken Salad Sundays. You can also explore different recipes, such as this homemade meatball recipe. Exploration keeps things fresh and exciting.

Go Shopping

 After making recipes, you now have a clear idea of what needs to be bought for a week’s dinner. Before you go shopping, take an inventory of your fridge and pantry first. That way, you will only buy things you don’t have, which can go a long way in reducing food wastage.

 Consider buying groceries and ingredients from stores that have sales or offers. You could also buy things in bulk to save money. However, be sure to purchase items that you can use within a reasonable period. Remember, wasting food is the last thing you want to do.

Prepare Your Food

 Food prepping is a real time saver when making dinners on weekdays. Fortunately, it does not take much time and can even be done in an hour.

Take some time on Sunday to prepare the ingredients you will need when cooking. Chop onions and other vegetables that need to be cut. Wash herbs and potatoes as well. Prepare a lot of tomato soup to use on several meals during the week.

 In addition to saving time, prepping meals helps you fight fatigue on weeknights when you are not motivated to cook.

Conclusion

 Meal planning is a great way to ease the pressure that is synonymous with dinner preparation. When you have a plan, you are a little more organized, and dinnertime becomes more manageable. Follow the steps in this post to create an excellent meal plan.