Tips for menu-planning?

[garliclover]

My energy is at an all-time low, sapped by all the worrying and cooking, recent social events and trying to get the allergy message across to the uninitiated!

Anyway, I used to plan DS's menu rigorously and meticulously every week. Now I just can't be bothered, am winging it from day to day, and he's living on baked beans, the poor mite.

Does anyone have any tips on how to make menu-planning a bit easier and less time-consuming? I think I spend too long agonising over every snack (and what's the point anyway -- even though I take masses of stuff to nursery, they just find it easier to give him ricecakes. Just because he's allergic, doesn't mean he doesn't like more interesting things! grumble grumble).

I have only recently started menu planning, being much more the 'wing it' type of mum, but I have to admit it has made my life easier - and once I realised that I could decide to deviate from the menu plan if I couldn't be bothered one day I was less stressed about it.

Two really good tips I was given by other mums - don't worry about your child having a perfectly balanced diet every day, look at it over the course of a week, some days will be better than others, if they don't eat much veg one day make up for it another day etc. The other is the 80:20 rule - if they eat healthy food 80% of the time then don't worry about the other 20%.

Kids are not usually bothered whether they have huge variety in their diet, I repeat lots of meals and have had no complaints from DD (2.5 not allergic) or DS (1 and allergic to milk). I try and do one 'proper' meal each day ie home made (although I batch cook and freeze) - stir fry, pasta, chicken and rice, fishcakes etc and one that is sandwiches / soup / beans / toast etc. My two seem to be surviving fine.

Sorry to hear you are finding it all a bit much at the moment!

I would second what fofo4 says about not over-worrying about healthy food, and also that it is not necessary to have huge variety (a dietician told me this, and although I was a bit sceptical I now think she was probably right).

Whenever I have felt overwhelmed by this stuff in the past, I have often found it helpful to batch cook and freeze so that there are easy meals available for those days I just don't feel up to dealing with it. Alternatively make double quantities for a few meals and then freeze half.

Not sure whether you are agonising over snacks at home or at nursery, but could you write out a list of possible snacks and then just rotate mindlessly through them so that you're not having to rethink it each time?

I always plan the evening meals but then do the lunches day to day (usually sandwiches, soup or heated up leftovers from the night before). My two are older now but I bake cakes or fruit loaves (reducing the sugar) and freeze them in slices and just wheel those out for afternoon tea every day. In the morning I used to just give fruit, although now at school they seem to want sandwiches as well.

It's a nightmare, isn't it? Have to say, I'm a bit of a 'wing it' kind of mum when it comes to most things but do try to have a loose plan for evening meals for the week otherwise end up very stressed every night thinking 'what now?!' I also work full time at the moment so need to be a bit more organised. I agree that you don't need to have different meals every day as long as the overall balance over the week is ok and it's fine to 'recycle' the same few dishes. We always have a roast dinner once a week (normally on the weekend), pasta 1 or 2 nights (wheat/egg free of course!), casserole/curry with leftover meat from roast dinner, gammon (the kind you boil in a pan) and homemade potato wedges with veg, then there's always the stand by of Sainsbury's freefrom chicken nuggets or Morrison's grill steaks with micro chips and beans as treat.

recycle old menus why do the job twice . Make a menu write it down in a book then before you do your shopping pick a menu. I have six weeks worth and it seems to work quite well. The other thing I do is like freefrommum have set types of meals each week so many pasta nights, at least one fish, etc. then always have something in the freezer - pasta sauce, fish fingers (free from of course) for when it all falls apart!

A very belated thanks for all your replies! I've followed your advice and now am much less stressed about it all. It also helped that DS was weighed and measured last week and seems to be on track, which is a huge relief considering his very limited diet. Thank you again for your reassurances!