Meal planning for people who hate meal planning

Most meal planning advice is written by people who enjoy meal planning. If you've tried it four times and abandoned it four times, the problem is probably the method.

Why the usual approach fails

Plan seven dinners, write a full list, shop once, cook on Sunday. It works beautifully until Wednesday, when you don't want the Wednesday meal and something runs late. Then the remaining plan feels like a failure and you order in.

The flaw is that it's a schedule, and schedules break on contact with an actual week.

A looser system

1. Have five dinners, not thirty

Nearly everyone rotates through a handful of meals they can cook without thinking. Write yours down — actually write them down. Most people can't name them off the top of their head, which is why the 5pm question feels so hard.

2. Shop for components, not recipes

Two or three proteins (eggs, chicken thighs, tinned fish, mince, tofu, lentils)
Something green and something colourful, plus frozen backup
Two carbohydrates (rice, potatoes, bread, pasta)
Things that make food taste good (lemons, garlic, yoghurt, hot sauce, decent olive oil, parmesan)

3. Prep components, not seven identical meals

A pot of grains, a tray of roasted vegetables, something protein-y. Those three combine into a dozen dinners rather than one dinner seven times.

4. Keep an emergency shelf

A genuine part of the plan, not a failure of it. Tinned fish, tinned beans, pasta, tinned tomatoes, frozen vegetables, eggs, good bread in the freezer.

A bowl of yoghurt topped with raspberries, berries and oats beside a handmade mug, on a table outdoors among pine trees. — Breakfast outside — yoghurt, berries and oats

The 5pm question

Most food decisions go wrong at the point of maximum tiredness and minimum blood sugar. The fix isn't more willpower at 5pm; it's making the decision earlier, when it's cheap. After breakfast, spend fifteen seconds deciding what dinner is.

Lunch, honestly

Cook extra at dinner. The easiest lunch is last night's dinner.
Have a default you can assemble in five minutes without deciding anything.

Permission slips

Frozen vegetables are good vegetables.
Rotisserie chicken is a legitimate ingredient.
Pre-chopped anything is worth the money if it means it gets eaten.
The same breakfast every day is fine.
Toast for dinner, with an egg and something green on it, is dinner.

The best plan is the one still running in week six. That's usually the least ambitious one.

A reminder

This is general nutrition education, not medical advice, and it isn't intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any condition. If you're pregnant or breastfeeding, taking medication, or managing a diagnosed condition, talk to your doctor or pharmacist before making changes.

Written by Mellissa Wallace, Registered Holistic Nutritionist, Okanagan BC.

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