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My all time favorite meals are the carne asada with rajas pasta, carne asada nachos, and the steak fries made with carne asada.

We struggle with the vegetarian meals because they don't fit my dietary needs (I need something high in lean protein) so we've been modifying those.

Any ideas what to do with the ginger/soy meals that tend to pop up once a week? I do not like the flavors of ginger, soy, or teriyaki and so I would like to modify those meals somehow.

I'm going to stalk this thread. I'm pretty sure we're going to sign up and try it, but I need to wait until we're moved and unpacked enough to think about cooking again.

It looks like we've only done 4 weeks so far (totally thought it was more than that!)

My all time favorite was the Carne asada with rajas pasta from June 13. Although, that whole week was amazing! DH did not like the fist chowder from that week, but he hates soup in general, so big shocker. The steak fries and bacon pasta salad are at the top of my list too!

DH's all time favorite was the pineapple pork from May 23. I was kind of 'meh' about it - not bad, but not my favorite.

Some of my other faves are the pea and basil feta quinoa cakes from May 9 and the buffalo meatballs with blue cheese mash from May 30.

One of my general substitutions is less meat (cut back 1/3 to 1/2 to save money and calories). We eat plenty of protein throughout the day, and I add beans where appropriate to bulk up a little more affordably.
I also use about 1/2 the cheese, unless you really need ALL the cheese

Did anyone else laugh at the fish nuggets + 'vegetable dippers' aka raw veggies. So, some fried fish and raw vegetables? DH would have kicked me out of the house if I made him that! I changed that night to just pan sear the fish and made some cilantro brown rice + some steamed carrots.

@TemperanceBrennan: Haha, well I would too, but cheese is $$$! I wish I lived by an Amish farm - I have a friend in Iowa who lives by an Amish cheese farm with such great prices!! We stock up every time we go there... haha

How do you guys make your brown rice ahead of time? This was our first week and the rice was super crispy, I'm not sure if I just heated it too long when I warmed it up, or if I didn't cook it long enough to begin with.

@PurplePeony: Not too often that I've seen! I don't think it'd be a huge deal to sub with chicken either. In my limited 2-month span I would guess I've seen it... 2 or 3 times? I could be wrong, but that's all I'm remembering.
Once you needed ground pork for a meal, and it was too $$ so I just bought ground turkey. Once we needed pork chops but the store I went to didn't have any, so I just did chicken breasts.

@swurlygurl: thanks! Some other meal planning sites I've seen seem to rely pretty heavily on it, and we'd end up eating a TON of chicken if we substituted for those meals as well as had the chicken meals on the plan. But 2-3 times a month is totally doable.

@PurplePeony: The meat for this week is turkey, tilapia and lamb. Lamb - wtf? I'll prob substitute pork for that meal, but there's no other chicken this week so you could do lamb or chicken and it wouldn't be too much chicken!

Just signed up for a trial week and am going to try out the recipes next week. Looking forward to it!

We're only one week in but we really enjoyed the carnitas tacos this week and the salmon.

ETA: We don't do the vegetarian meals. Not enough protein for us, and we usually eat out on Fridays anyway, so it work out for us to only use four of the five meals.

Just downloaded this week's menu and it sounds yummy! We don't eat tilapia though and I don't like lamb, so I think I will substitute another fish and beef, respectively, for those two meals.

How was last week's plan? When I went grocery shopping last week I accidentally bought groceries for the plan from the week before because I had both lists in my planner and had skipped that week (good thing, because that was a delicious week!)
This new week looks pretty good - wondering if I should skip last week, or just stay a week behind until there's a boring week.

I looked at the archives and downloaded a ton of weeks. But I haven't done a meal plan in about a month, because (and I know this is going to sound super weird) the last week I made had a heavy emphasis on artichokes, olives and capers. And that did NOT sit well with my first trimester tummy. I never had morning sickness, but that week was the closest I got. Now I think Fresh 20 = BLARRRGH! Which I know it isn't true, but it is an awful mental block.

I really liked last night's chicken and the salad. But I'm a bit sick of salads one, it's getting cooler around here so looking forward to warmer meals.

@TemperanceBrennan: Thanks! We have my step kids for dinner tonight and we are starting a "this is what's for dinner, eat it" attitude, and I am REALLY hoping they like at least... something! haha

Our current meal plan with the boys is fries? chicken fingers? perogies? Mac n' cheese? haha it's really starting to wear on us.

We always skip the salad meals (vegetarian plan). I just hate eating a salad for a main course.

I'll be honest, there's usually at least one meal per week that is just soooo lackluster. Not enough seasoning, etc. It makes me wonder if the people planning these meals actually try them out/taste them! The plan saves me a ton of hassle and frustration re: shopping, so we'll stick with it. But I haven't been super impressed.

@allison: @Boheme: If you ladies are skipping a ton of meals, do you think it's worth it? Do you keep older favourite menus to rotate?