Meal Plans for a Stay at Home order

My husband and I both grew up in homes where cooking was a form of love. We rarely ate out and from-scratch cooking was the regular mode. Cooking and meal planning is very normal to us.

Years ago, on a three-family vacation in Wisconsin, I made a meal plan for the 12 of us for the week. My girlfriends were shocked by how it all worked out and suggested that I come up with some kind of meal planning app. I never pursued that because a) I figured there were plenty of those out there from much more legit sources and b) I got tangled up in thinking it needed to be “perfect.”

Now, with stay at home orders in much of the country, our local grocery stores are getting much more action than usual, and we recently realized that while many people are scrambling to figure out different habits of feeding their families, not much has changed for us.

Long story short: this seems like a good time to start sharing my weekly meal plans. They are certainly not perfect, but they might help someone out in these overwhelming times.

Generally speaking, my plans always use readily available ingredients that are reasonably friendly on the budget. They are family friendly and can be fairly easily adapted to gluten free and dairy free as needed. We are currently involving our kids in the planning, too, with the expectation that they are each making dinner once a week.

This meal plan is for dinners. With everyone home, I may start adding lunch in, but usually lunch is a mix of leftovers and easy options like a chef salad, quesadillas, mac n cheese, etc.

All recipes are from my recipe binders—recipes I have been collecting for decades! I am linking to online sources for them for ease.

The Meal Plan

Saturday: Spaghetti with meatballs and steamed green beans (use brown rice pasta if gluten free. These meatballs do have parmesan in them.)

Sunday: Chicken soup and jiffy corn muffins (I usually double the veggies. Don’t skip the lemon—the brightness is key. You can poach double the chicken in this recipe if you want leftover chicken for quesadillas or a chef salad. Sometimes we add egg noodles to this soup. If you are gluten free, swap in rice for the noodles or add a salad in place of corn muffins.)

Monday: Korean roast chicken thighs with rice and stir friend snap peas

Tuesday: black eyed peas and greens with kielbasa (a one-pot meal) You can sub in kale for the spinach but I often buy the bulk bag of spinach that splits between this recipe and the next one.

Wednesday: Glazed salmon, baked sweet potatoes and sauteed spinach. (For the salmon I use frozen and I broil it instead of grilling it. Recipe serves 2 so double as needed. For the sweet potatoes, pierce with a fork a couple of times, scrub under water, wrap in a paper towel and microwave on high for 5 minutes. Flip and microwave on high for 3 minutes. Timing may vary with microwaves and number of sweet potatoes. Just squeeze—you wan them to give but not mush. For the spinach, heat olive oil, sautee garlic slices until golden, add spinach until wilted, add salt.)

Thursday: breakfast for dinner. This is Eleri’s night to cook and she chose pancakes, eggs, and sausage patties. Feel free to add veggies to an egg scramble.

Friday: Beef lettuce wraps in the crockpot with quick pickles

Here’s how I organize the menu and shipping list, in case this is helpful. (Don’t use this as your shopping list though—we may have different pantry staples etc.)

My weekly shopping list—not fancy but effective!

I hope this is helpful to someone! Happy to answer questions about meal planning in general or recipes in particular.

Stay safe,

Heather