Hellobee Boards

We have a Fresh 20 subscription for meal planning.

Do you plan/prep just dinners or all 3 meals? Dinners, but we eat the leftovers for lunch. Its laid out for me.

Do you repeat the same meals every week or twice a month?
No repeats, really - the subscription lays everything out. We've repeated a week we liked though!

How often do you have to go back to the store for pantry items/snacks? (We don't have a ton of storage here) Just weekly

How long does it take you, on average, to shop for the month? I go once a week for less than 30 minutes since my list is laid out for me.

I meal plan monthly

It's really just dinners, but we use some leftovers in other meals and usually also have sandwich fixings in the fridge for lunch.

I don't often repeat meals in a month, but I have several meals in different categories we have each week. And repeat this list monthly. So, Sunday nights are always a frittata - which then makes breakfasts for the coming week. Every week we also have: a big salad, a slow-cooker meal, pasta/Italian, tex-mex, pizza night and wild card (new recipes, family favorites, holidays, special stuff).
I make things with similar ingredients in the same week. If mushrooms go on sale one week, I make a mushroom and spinach frittata, a spinach-based salad night, and mushroom ziti for pasta night. If I'm being awesome, I will make and freeze at least one pasta dish, maybe some enchiladas, and some of the slow cooker meals at the start of the month but it doesn't always happen. Thankfully my usual meals are pretty quick and simple even if I don't do much prep ahead.

I shop either 1x weekly for about 30 min, or 2x shorter 15-20 min shops. Things like fruit, bread, veggies, yogurt, milk are all weekly purchases in addition to our meals.

Do you plan/prep just dinners or all 3 meals?

Dinner is the main portion of my meal planning, but I have a general idea of what breakfast and lunch will be each week. Usually its yogurt or batch cooked oatmeal or cold cereal for breakfast during the week and 1 brunch on the weekend. Lunches are usually leftovers but I keep sandwich stuff in the house. I also always plan to have hummus, baby carrots, and easy to grab fruit for snacks.

Do you repeat the same meals every week or twice a month?

I love planning meals monthly because you see how often you are eating a certain protein or type of cuisine. Also you can go back to prior months' menus and remember things you ate. I also try to go for theme nights each week.

For instance, we usually have an ethnic dish one night, a crockpot meal or two, pizza night, in the summers we have big entree salad or grill night, and I build one night for eating out and one or two nights for leftovers. This help create some kind of formula to work from.

Generally repeating a meal twice a month is fine, no one really notices, but I mostly like to use "double duty" proteins. For instance, slow cooker salsa chicken taco meat can be doubled. Half can be eaten as tacos, and the other half can be added to broth and veggies to turn into tortilla soup later on. Plain shredded pork or beef in the crockpot can be eaten as carnitas or French dip sandwiches one week, then added to sauce to make BBQ pulled pork or an Asian beef dish the next. Any of these can also be thrown on salad. Spaghetti meat sauce can be doctored up into chili with beans and seasonings. A bag of frozen meatballs can be spaghetti, meatball subs, or stroganoff.

I also do something similar for veggies. I like to have chopped onion and peppers ready each week, plus a bag of shredded carrots (or just chop up some baby carrots) and sometimes some celery (although celery seed works fine in a pinch). I then just throw that into everything and use frozen veggies or something like zucchini on sale into the mix for variety. Whatever's left over at the end of the week goes into the weekend brunch omelet or or into the freezer for soup or something.

How often do you have to go back to the store for pantry items/snacks? (We don't have a ton of storage here)

I always keep canned beans, boxed broth, pasta, rice, lots of seasonings and condiments, eggs, and a good variety of frozen veg in the house. I throw the frozen veggies into everything.

How long does it take you, on average, to shop for the month?

I shop weekly. Once the menu plan is set for the month, I can make a list weekly for things I need, including snacks and fresh things I'm running out of. A benefit to planning monthly is that if there's a sale on something this week for something I had planned on eating next week, I can either stock up now or swap the menu item to fit the timing of the sale. Once I have a list, it doesn't take me long - maybe 30 minutes?

@gingerbebe: Wow! I am inspired to try monthly meal planning. You are so organized!

I did a 3 part blog series about this that shows how we do it not sure if you saw that. I think it was in april.

Do you plan/prep just dinners or all 3 meals? Just dinner. Lunch is normally leftovers that I bring to work. Breakfast is on the run that I grab out of the pantry (breakfast bar, PB&J, etc.)

Do you repeat the same meals every week or twice a month? I try not to repeat meals or put two of the same types of meat back to back, but if it's something I know the hubby loves, I'll repeat it later that month.

How often do you have to go back to the store for pantry items/snacks? I buy my groceries one week at a time. I usually go on Sunday. If I forgot something, then I'll grab it on my way home from work.

How long does it take you, on average, to shop for the month? I grocery shop once a week so it doesn't take long since I write out everything I need.