Life can be hectic and eating well, without too much waste, can be tricky. The solution is to get organised, as planning your meals can make the week run a lot more smoothly.
Claire Packer's @TodayWeCooked account is full of ideas for meal prep and planning. Making tasty, healthy and interesting meals for people with different tastes, on a budget and with minimal waste is the constant challenge that drives her. She's all about involving the whole family in the cooking process too.
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"Meal planning is my bag," she says, "It is no exaggeration to say that I have cut our food bill almost in half since I began a couple of years ago. People think it’s more complicated than it really is, or that they don’t have time but meal planning saves me so much time and brain space (and money) that I really couldn’t stop now!"
Inspiration for recipes come from everywhere. "Food has the ability to transport us to our Granny's kitchen, a holiday in Greece or just being at home eating beans on toast on our laps as kids," she explains, adding I am inspired by making memories. "I want to make food memories with my children too. They inspire me more than anything. They love to cook and have taught me to enjoy the process rather than just the end result."
Claire's Top Meal Planning Tips
Sharing her expert advice on the process of meal planning, from the basic to the more detailed, here's how Claire preps for the food week ahead.
Step 1: On a Sunday, open all your cupboards and note what you already have. Often we think we haven't got anything in, when in fact, if you raid your cupboard stash, fridge stash and freezer stash, you probably already have plenty to work with.
Step 2: Next, check the fresh stuff – veggies, fruits, herbs, etc. – and base your meals around those, using up the least fresh first. Then check the dry supplies and pantry.
Step 3: If you batch cook, or tend to freeze meals that you don't get around to, check the freezer. Leftover bean chilli could make for delicious quesadillas or cheesy tacos later in the week.
Step 4: Be creative. Think what can I do with the 8 tomatoes sitting in the salad drawer and half a packet of feta? A pasta dish perhaps? A tart or a frittata? What about three tins of chickpeas and an onion? Maybe a chickpea and kale curry?
Step 5: Plan as many meals for that week as you can with what you already have, then write a shopping list of the extra things you'll need, along with the essentials (ie. milk, bread, butter).
Step 6: That list comes to the supermarket and that is all that goes in the trolley. Use up that stash throughout the week and start the cycle all over again!
Follow Claire's food adventures on @TodayWeCooked
Story originally published by Irish Tatler