{"id":6827,"date":"2009-08-13T08:58:22","date_gmt":"2009-08-13T12:58:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/?p=6827"},"modified":"2020-03-22T13:59:52","modified_gmt":"2020-03-22T17:59:52","slug":"menu-planning-101","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/menu-planning-101\/","title":{"rendered":"Menu Planning 101"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Menu planning is a great way to save money and save yourself from the what&#8217;s for dinner blues.\u00a0Most people want to menu plan, but they simply don&#8217;t know how to get started.<\/p>\n<p>Many people don&#8217;t have unlimited storage space for food, but that doesn&#8217;t mean you can&#8217;t have a small stockpile of food. I would encourage you to read <a href=\"http:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/make-the-most-of-minimal-kitchen-storage-space\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">this post<\/a> from a mom who is raising several kids in a small condo. Space is extremely limited and she makes the most of her minimal storage space.<\/p>\n<p>However the majority of readers don&#8217;t meal plan simply because it is overwhelming. Either they didn&#8217;t like to cook, their family was picky, or they didn&#8217;t know how to begin.<\/p>\n<p>Since I believe that some of the biggest savings can be found by cutting the grocery budget or at least having a grocery budget, I am starting a menu planning series. I hope to walk you through the basic steps and hopefully get you on track with a grocery budget and a weekly or monthly plan for your family&#8217;s meals.<\/p>\n<p>Now, if you really do not want to menu plan and have no desire to learn, my advice to you would be to sign up for the <a target = \"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/e-mealz.com\/amember\/go.php?r=259179&amp;i=b0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">E-Mealz menu planning services<\/a>.\u00a0For under ten dollars a month you can have dinners, recipes, and grocery lists delivered to your inbox every month. And best of all it is tailored to meet your families tastes and budget.<\/p>\n<p>If you want to get started meal planning for your family consider taking it step-by-step. Good habits aren&#8217;t created overnight. They are developed over time. Even if you&#8217;ve never made a meal plan in your life, you can start today.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Assignment 1: Create a list of 15 meals (with your family)<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>If your family is picky or complains about the meals you are currently serving, this assignment will make them happy. Ask your family members what they would like to eat for dinner.<\/p>\n<p>Using their responses (and your own) make a list of 15 meals. That&#8217;s it. 15 meals and you are finished with your first assignment.<\/p>\n<p>Sounds easy enough, right? Remember, we have some pretty printables to make this fun!<\/p>\n<p>Grab your free printables, including your 15 meals list here.<\/p>\n<p><a target = \"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/menu-planning-101-15-meals\/\">I&#8217;m ready for the next assignment!<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Menu planning is a great way to save money and save yourself from the what&#8217;s for dinner blues.\u00a0Most people want to menu plan, but they simply don&#8217;t know how to get started. Many people don&#8217;t have unlimited storage space for food, but that doesn&#8217;t mean you can&#8217;t have a small stockpile of food. I would [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wprm-recipe-roundup-name":"","wprm-recipe-roundup-description":"","_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2779],"tags":[2814],"class_list":{"0":"post-6827","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-menu-plan-food","7":"tag-menu-plan-tips","8":"entry"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v15.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Menu Planning 101 - The Happy Housewife\u2122 :: Cooking<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/menu-planning-101\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Menu Planning 101 - The Happy Housewife\u2122 :: Cooking\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Menu planning is a great way to save money and save yourself from the what&#8217;s for dinner blues.\u00a0Most people want to menu plan, but they simply don&#8217;t know how to get started. Many people don&#8217;t have unlimited storage space for food, but that doesn&#8217;t mean you can&#8217;t have a small stockpile of food. I would [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/menu-planning-101\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Happy Housewife\u2122 :: Cooking\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheHappyHousewife\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-08-13T12:58:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-03-22T17:59:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@tonihanderson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@tonihanderson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Toni Herrbach\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\">\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/\",\"name\":\"The Happy Housewife\\u2122 :: Cooking\",\"description\":\"Where Martha Meets Real Life\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/?s={search_term_string}\",\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/menu-planning-101\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/menu-planning-101\/\",\"name\":\"Menu Planning 101 - The Happy Housewife\\u2122 :: Cooking\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2009-08-13T12:58:22+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-03-22T17:59:52+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/#\/schema\/person\/4e0cc17af167f72194b9d40ffb066454\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/menu-planning-101\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/#\/schema\/person\/4e0cc17af167f72194b9d40ffb066454\",\"name\":\"Toni Herrbach\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6827"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6827\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34942,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6827\/revisions\/34942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/cooking\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}