Why I Meal Plan to Reduce Stress
The fall season is upon us and I can feel the anxiety shifting within me. I love fall. It is absolutely my favorite season. The subtle change in temperatures, the smell and feel of the crisp air during my morning walks, the beautiful changing leaves of the trees, and the complete chaos that ensues with back-to-school and fall sports. I love all of these things!
What I notice as it gets closer to the start of school and fall sports is my reach for consistency and meal planning increases. Over the summer months, I often find the structured meal planning that I keep during the school year can be relaxed a bit as our schedules are more flexible. But once our family schedule ramps up so does our family meal planning. I rely on meal planning to reduce stress throughout the week. When I am not consistent with my meal planning I often find my mind wandering countless times throughout the day about what we are going to do for supper. That is not helpful! It takes away from my work and just adds so much weight to my shoulders as the day progresses. People often wonder how meal planning fits with Intuitive Eating. I wrote about that when I guest blogged for The Real Food Dietitians and if you are interested in learning more about how they can co-exist click here!
Ultimately, meal planning falls into principle 10 of Gentle Nutrition. This is where we focus on honoring our health through nutrition. When we provide our bodies with enough fuel throughout the day and a variety of food to satisfy our enjoyment with eating we arrive at a beautiful place of balancing eating for enjoyment and nourishment.
Lately, I have been feeling the push to start sharing more of my favorite meal planning tips and recipes with all of you. I know how important having shortcuts are to my routine and I plan on sharing as many as I can to help each of you so you too can take the stress out of meal planning and wondering what you are going to eat!
For starters, let’s begin with the basics. You need a plan! Everyone does this differently. I have a magnetic dry-erase board that I keep on my fridge. Here is the one I have and it’s on sale right now! I organize all of our family activities on here and then write out the meals we plan to have for supper. I also write out what I plan to meal prep in the bottom right notes section. I also like to keep my meal plan flexible so I do a general outline of the meals we will have but know that the exact day we have them may change and that’s ok! I like to plan out the entree then I make sure to always have our sides on hand such as veggies to roast/air fry and starches(potatoes, rice, pasta, quinoa, etc.).
This week we are planning:
Shrimp and Kielbasa (this will be paired with roasted veggies I cook in my air fryer; air fried or grilled potatoes; and fruit)
Pulled Pork(purchased from Sam’s Club)(paired with baked beans, slider buns, veggie and fruit platter)
Orange chicken stir-fry(I like to purchase a sauce from the store and then I steam up the veggies and rice for a quick, easy meal I can put together in less then 30 minutes)
Stromboli(this one is more time consuming but it is my son’s favorite and he requested it for the night before school starts so he can take leftovers to school; we pair it with a fruit and veggie platter)
Rotisserie Chicken(purchased from Sam’s Club)(paired with mashed potatoes, roasted veggies and fruit)(any leftovers get used for avocado chicken salad, another one of my son’s favorite cold school lunches; it is seriously so simple I don’t have a recipe, it’s just shredded chicken, avocado, lime juice, pinch of sea salt; that’s it!)
I also meal prepped:
hard-boiled eggs
Banana Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Bake (from the Real Food Dietitians and it is so easy and delicious!)
Peanut Butter Banana overnight oats (also from the Real Food Dietitians, their website is where I get the majority of my recipes, and they never disappoint!)
If you are someone who has not been consistently meal planning but knows it is something that you want to be more consistent with remember you do not have to tackle everything at once! Start small and build your way up. I like to think about meal planning on a spectrum from least convenient to most convenient. The least convenient is planning everything on your own which can be daunting if it is not something you are used to. The next step is to utilize a menu planning service such as emeals. You choose the meal plan you want(family friendly, quick and easy, etc.) and then they send you a weekly meal plan with the grocery shopping list that automatically integrates with Instacart so you can order your groceries right online! Easy peasy! The next level would be utilizing meal delivery services for a few meals each week to help offset the workload you have. There are many different ones to choose from such as HomeChef, Dinnerly, HelloFresh, etc. Remember because this is a spectrum you do not have to stay at one spot forever. You can reach for the meal delivery services just as you are getting started or as you need them and then go to doing more meal planning from scratch as you are able and ready.
Next week I will share some of my go-to one-sheet meal pan recipes that our family relies on for quick meals and quick clean up!
Bests!
Erin
