Index Card Meal Planning

I've learned many good ideas for meal planning from other women, so I thought I'd share my latest attempt to improve the process in my own home, just in case this idea is a good fit for another family as well.


First of all, it took me a solid three years to even submit to the truth that I really do need to plan my meals ahead of grocery shopping in order to reduce chaos in the kitchen--as much as one might like the adrenaline rush of standing in front of the open refrigerator at 4:30 p.m. wondering what on earth to serve and then the mental gymnastics required to assemble random ingredients into a dish.

For the last year I've been trying so hard to plan my meals and sticking to it pretty well. The trouble is that planning meals strains my brain and can take me hours. I didn't even realize that it did not take other housewives hours to plan their meals until it occurred to me to ask some of them. I later put together the puzzle pieces when I was listening to a Catholic conference on the four temperaments and heard that melancholics have a terribly hard time making decisions because they are paralyzed by perfection, lest their pride be wounded by "failure." This resonated with me: I would spend an hour or several planning five or six dinners for the week and I'd be wrenched with angst that my meal plan wasn't perfect. What was the perfect accompaniment to a chicken breast? What was the perfect way to serve spinach? In the end, the plan didn't seem perfect anyway and I was still filled with doubt and frustration about it.

It's all quite ridiculous.


So, now I have a new plan I am instituting: I have begun writing down dinner plans on index cards, so one index card might say, "quesadillas, rice, guacamole" and another might say, "vegetable frittata, chicken cutlet, green salad." Once again, I was paralyzed for a few days as I hatched my plan because I thought I might type all my plans, then print them out and cut and paste the paper onto index cards (that would be so neat and clean!). And then, no, maybe I'd hand write them, but use color coding of some sorts . . . No, no, no! I finally sat down with a random pen (was it blue? black? who cares!) and just started writing. I need something functional for me right now, not one more detail-oriented project I never get to or finish.

Within each simple meal description, I can make the meal as easy or complex as my current station in life allows. For example, say my youngest baby is a year old, kids are napping well on routines, and kids are playing together happily, then I might cook dry pinto beans in the crock pot all day with my own spices, then fry the beans myself with some fresh onion, while taking a cut of steak, cutting into strips, marinating and grilling them. And I could make my own fresh guacamole. I could be like my friends Elaine and Sarah and make my own tortillas! See, I could make that meal very much from scratch. Or, say I'm sick with pregnancy or I have a six-week-old baby, then I could dump some beans out of a can and grab some precooked, frozen chicken strips from Trader Joe's, as well as some premade guacamole in a jar from the store. And that is fine too!


Now, my plan gets even better. I can use my index cards as my grocery list! For example, this morning the kids and I had to leave the house by 7:20 a.m. for an appointment and I also knew that today was my last opportunity to go grocery shopping this week (as shopping last Saturday got lost in the busy activities of the Triduum). But I didn't have a meal plan or grocery list ready! I knew if we went to our appointment and came all the way back home so I could make my plan and list, we would not be able to go shopping before lunch and nap time, and I'm certainly not taking my kids grocery shopping in the afternoon when they are not their freshest, and then get home late to start cooking dinner. So, what did I do? I grabbed my box of index card dinner ideas: I pulled out five almost at random, taking about two minutes to approve of them. Two minutes, not two hours! I had confidence about what was in my pantry, I stuffed the cards in my purse, and we went to the grocery store after our appointment. I was able to walk the aisles, knowing which ingredients I needed to buy for the meals.



Lastly, I plan simply to stick my index cards on the bulletin board in the kitchen, which saves me the step of finding a piece of paper and a pen (embarrassingly, this is sometimes a challenge!) and writing out my list of meals for the week. After I cook a meal, I'll pull the card off the board and stick it back in my index card box.

I'm excited about my new plan! Maybe after I've been married for five or ten years, I'll really be confidently in charge of managing my kitchen . . .