Real Life. Real Healthy. Real Savings.
You can get a one-week free trial from Meals by the Week right now. Even if you only do the one week, you may get some nice meal planning tips and recipes that will be helpful.
You can choose from lots of different options like Vegetarian and low-calorie meal plans, and the plans include shopping lists and deals from stores like Trader Joe’s and Sprouts.
Need more meal planning help?
Try:
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When I decided a week and a half ago to try monthly shopping/meal planning, I didn’t realize Hurricane Sandy was coming, but now that I know I’m SO glad I stocked up last week on food for the whole month.
When people ask me for my #1 grocery money saving tip, I always say the same thing:
Meal Planning.
In fact, I even have a fancy meal planner you can download for free.
But even I get lazy, and the fact that I had to plan meals and shop every week was getting to be a pain. So this month, I did all my shopping last Tuesday. Monday night, I planned out all our meals for the end of October and the Entire month of November, so I would make sure to get everything we would need.
My Wegmans Trip:
Lots of canned goods, frozen veggies, and staples like pasta and rice.
My trip to the Bread Outlet Store:
4 loaves of bread, 3 packs of tortillas, and 4 Boboli pizza crusts for Saturday’s make your own pizza.
20 pounds of chicken breast which I separated into 1-2 lb freezer bags. I cut most up into strips or nugget size so they’ll cook faster.
One week into the plan, it’s working great. I LOVE having a whole docket of meals available and knowing that I have all the ingredients on hand.
What’s on my menu plan? Well, of course all my favorite pantry meals! Shopping from the pantry is a great way to save money on groceries. In fact, I used my own Pantry Staples list as a guide as I was making my shopping list.
So keep an eye out for weekly updates on how this experiment is going. Already, we’re reaping the benefits — no need to brave the crowds at Wegmans this week!
Pin ItThis post may contain affiliate links, which help support this site.How frequently do you menu plan? If you do a monthly plan, how is it working for you?
Here’s another great meal planning resource — and I know I can use all the help I can get! Ready Set Eat has quick and easy ideas for every night of the week. I love that Ready Set Eat is giving me new recipe inspiration using simple, healthy ingredients all the time. It’s definitely worth checking out.
You can read more about how I meal plan, including free printable planners, here.
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You may have noticed that since the summer officially started, I haven’t been posting menu plans as much. I’m still doing a rough plan (using my printable planners) but they’re much more flexible, and based a lot on what meat is on clearance at Wegmans with a coupon and what we get in our CSA basket.
But most meals involve some combination of the following:
I have been keeping the pantry decently stocked with staples so that even if I don’t do a great job with the summer menu planning, I can always come up with something at dinner time.
What are your favorite easy summer meals? Please share in the comments!
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Food on the Table is an awesome meal planning service helps you to find thousands of easy, healthy recipes; save money by knowing the items that are on sale; and simplify your shopping experience with a well organized grocery list.
For a limited time, you can sign up for an unlimited lifetime membership – completely FREE! Normally, you are only allowed 3 meals per week free, but with this lifetime unlimited membership, you’ll get to plan every meal you make for FREE!
I signed up for Food on the Table, and even though my primary grocery store isn’t on the list yet, I will still use it for meal planning ideas. I can always use help coming up with new meal ideas!
Use code SUMMERFREE to use this service FREE for life!
Want more meal planning help? Check out my Meal Planning 101 Series and download my printable meal planner.
This post may contain affiliate links, which help support this site.
If you have a decently stocked pantry, with all the pantry staples I have on my Pantry Staples list, these are all meals you can make without a trip to the store! Here are my 17 favorite easy pantry meals:
Don’t forget to read the other articles in this series:
How to Save Money on Pantry Staples + Free Printable Pantry List!
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