Pre-Organize your Dinner Meals

Pre-Organize your Dinner Meals
by Claire McFee
We all get caught with nothing organized for dinner occasionally, when it’s easier to go to the drive thru than prepare something at home. The problem is we are doing this more and more regularly, without proper concern for the consequences. We are leaving a bigger carbon imprint on the environment; having less quality time together and also often results in nasty plastic toys cluttering up our house all the while. The most common cause for this lack of organizing, so below are some ideas to help you plan better to avoid this pitfall.

Rotating Kitchen/Dinner Meals Roster
Every household has their regular dinner meals/recipes that they rotate every couple of weeks. Even still, getting it down on paper can make the difference between remembering to take the mince from the freezer or ending up with McDonalds again. Print it out from a computer – (like I do to hide messy handwriting.) An example below:

Double Dinner Meal Quantities
I swear by the old ‘double quantity’ meal preparation to have two consecutive nights. Admittedly my hubby wasn’t thrilled about the prospect of regularly eating the same dinner two nights running, considering he was used to a different meal every night made by his mother as he was growing up. But times have changed! He soon got over this when he saw how much more I time I had with the kids and him and less washing up for him too!

Quick Menu Check
Have a quick look at your Menu Roster at the start of the week and it will prompt you to make a few decisions about the upcoming weeks meals and what you actually need to buy for it to go smoothly.Then grab your pre-printed Shopping List and ‘Bob’s your Uncle’ (sorry to our non- Australian subscribers – it’s an Aussie term for “Everything will work out great!”) You will have all your dinner menu ingredients and will have more time relaxing, not making a quick dash to the supermarket to get ingredients you forgot.

Pre- printed Shopping List
Keep your Dinner Menu Plan with all the usual ingredients you may need for your recipe – adding any special infrequent items on the back. Put it somewhere everyone can add to –fridge/telephone table etc.

Freeze Freeze Freeze
The freezer is a great time and money saver for dinner meals but try not to over-rely on it and eat as much fresh food as possible. As with anything – maintain a balance.

Mix up your dinner menu ideas
I tend to steer clear of the old steak and three Vege’s option, opting for Meat and Vege’s mixed together because I prefer the flavor more, and if you have kids then this is more palatable. My kids actually love spinach would you believe – due to not having to eat it on it’s own as it makes all the difference!

DINNER MENU IDEAS:
Tuna & Coconut Milk Rice Bake
Curried Vegetable Filo Pastries
Chow Mien
Chilli Concarne
Roast and Vege’s
Nacho’s / Taco’s
Carbonara
Plum Sauce Beef Stir Fry
Smoked Salmon & Spinach pasta (with olive oil & garlic)
Jamie Oliver’s Roasted Pumpkin, Chives and Feta Risotto

Now you can rest assured the week will go more smoothly because you’ve give meals some quick thinking time, then acted on it by buying what you need and therefore know you won’t unexpectedly not have a vital ingredient. Happy cooking!