Happy Friday!
Every Friday I link up with The Frugal Girl and/ or Simply Being Mum for Food Waste Friday. I’ve been environmentally conscious about food waste since I was in college and this is a great way for me to keep tabs on what we waste in our house.
It’s been a rough week for me mentally. I think I forgot how crazy life with an infant could be. For some reason I thought things would get easier. Ha! That’s the biggest joke about parenting. Somehow things always get harder. Or rather the tough issues get replaced with other equally tough issues. Thankfully, I had planned out all my meals for this week and it saved my sanity! Here is my Instagram post for meal planning this week.
I’ve decided that I’m going to post my menu on Instagram each week to help me stay accountable. I’d love for you to join! I usually meal plan on Sunday, but I like the ring of #MenuPlanMonday or #MealPlanMonday better than Sunday. Which hashtag should we use? Do you have a better one? I’m up for ideas!
Simply Being Mum and I were on the same page this week! She posted about meal planning too. Isn’t that funny? Make sure to check out her meal planning on Instagram and her blog.
Talking #mealplanning over at the #blog today. #mealplanningmonday #mondaymotivation #reducewaste #savemoney A photo posted by Simply Being Mum (@simplybeingmum) on
Before I get into my successes and losses, I’d like to share part of my meal plan from the week. I was able to plan it out in a way that we had zero food waste from dinners this week. The leftovers from one night were made into a meal for the next night. I’ve done this a little in the past, but this was the first time I was able to do it for 3 days worth of meals.
We started meatless Monday with a Southwestern chopped salad from The Garden Grazer.
On Tuesday we added chicken to the salad and made spicy chicken wraps/ tacos paired it with my favorite Two Buck Chuck wine from Trader Joe’s. The chicken was pre-cooked, also from Trader Joe’s. I know I could save more money by cooking it myself, but I’m trying to ease back into cooking now that I have two kids. Sometimes I don’t know if I’ll have a free minute during the day to cook!
On Wednesday we used the leftover tortillas for breakfast burritos. Breakfast for dinner is quickly becoming a staple in our home. It’s easy and fun. Bacon and eggs are two of Robert’s favorite foods. I love making something for dinner that I know he will eat. That boy lives off of hotdogs and peanut butter sandwiches!
On Thursday we had one more wrap left so I used it to make a turkey wrap. The leftover dressing from the Southwestern chopped salad worked well.
I’m excited to do more meal planning like this because it is a fun and easy way to use up leftovers instead of throwing them in the fridge assuming I’ll eat them for lunch the next day. Do you meal plan like this? I’d love some more fun ideas!
On to my success and losses.
Here is how we did this week:
Food Waste Successes
1. the freezer is my best friend
I’m finally in the swing of putting produce in the fridge before it goes bad. This week I put watermelon, blueberries, kale, spinach and bananas in the freezer. Some of it made for an amazing smoothie!
Food Waste Losses
2. soup and balsamic
The soup was leftover from last week. I kept meaning to eat it but I had that stomach pain last week. Chili didn’t sound appealing to my raw tummy (it’s finally better, BTW).
I found the truffle balsamic in the cabinet. Tom must have put it there when cleaning up after dinner one night. It is supposed to go in the fridge. I tossed it because I don’t like to chance it with condiments that say they need to be refrigerated.
That’s it for this week! I think we did pretty well. I still haven’t completed a deep cleaning of my fridge since before Jackson was born. That is going to have to wait for a few more weeks. I’m not ready for that level of cleaning yet!
I really need to get better about meal planning. If I plan for leftovers, it will help me cut back on lunches out too!