To be so stressed and exhausted by pandemic meal planning

[Featherstep]

Ok so I know we're lucky to have enough food and are all healthy.

But it's week 4 of lockdown and I am just so fed up of planning, sourcing, cooking 2 meals a day for 4 people, all with different preferences! Everyone's around all day, 4 year old DS is really fussy, and 7 month old baby is newly weaned and ravenous.

With shopping options so limited I want to make sure everything is used up in the best possible way... I did meal plan a bit pre-Covid but not to this extent and frequently went for top up shops (say for curry paste if we wanted curry.)

It just feels like a large portion of my brain is spent thinking about what to cook, making food and clearing it up (from under baby's highchair, especially). And doing creative things to make the leftovers last/ turn them into baby's next meal.

DH tells me to relax and not go crazy. He just doesn't get how tiring the mental load is. I am by far the better and more resourceful cook so I do take up almost all the cooking duties- I know this is my problem. But anyone else out there want to just share the frustration?? I just want to go eat a McDonald's by myself and not have to do a mental spreadsheet of how best to use up everything in the veg box!!

Two week rota? Three week if you can manage it?
Roast
Curry with left over chicken
Cottage pie
Pasta pesto
Jacket potatoes
Crumbled salmon and sweet potatoes
Risotto

Simple easy meals on a rota.

Lunch there are three choices - here we have egg sandwiches, tomato soup or hummus and pitta.

Two non fruit snacks a day (here it’s yoghurt, yoghurt raisins or brunch bar type thing)

One treat a day

Definitely try hello fresh/gousto/mindful chef.... they all do introductory offers so if you run them together you could a months dinners without any thinking.

Best of luck

Wait until your DC are 23 and 22 and 15. Then you will be reallllly sick of cooking!

The 22 and 23 year olds are working full time in Supermarkets and the 15 year old has full online school days plus homework. They do help but I am furloughed so it doesn’t seem fair to ask them to cook. 😁.

Bored, bored, bored of cooking, when everyone leaves home, I’m living on salad and chocolate 🍫😆

I admit with teens it's a lot easier as they can also prepare some food, but I realised I was going to go bonkers in this situation so I decided breakfast= cereal, toast, made by themselves, lunch= light meal like beans, cheese, eggs on toast, toasted sandwiches, carrots and huumus, salad if concerned about vitamins, so this only leaves one meal a day to cook.

Second, I treat cooking a meal for the family as a chore, so anyone can choose to do this instead of washing up, so one of mine prefers that two or three times a week. Fine by me. Going to shops to get milk/top up bread which happens once a week or so is also a chore, so again, person gets out of washing up.

I've managed to whittle down the bit with me shopping and cooking (I'm a single parent) quite considerably with this strategy.

I appreciate this is not possible with a 7 month and 4 month old! But you could get your husband to do a few meals a week, plus one takeaway. I would start to strategise to reduce this otherwise it's like GroundHog Day.

In our house, there are some staples that never change. The only meal that changes daily is dinner!

Breakfast: Choice between toast, cereal, or yogurt and fruit.

Lunch: Sandwich or leftovers.

Dinner: Changes daily based on what we have in the house (stew, stir fry, soup, spaghetti and meatballs, gnocci, spinach and ricotta tortellini, meatloaf, pie and chips, fish and chips, burgers, breakfast for dinner/full English, tacos, chilli, curry, macaroni and cheese, pizza, chicken Caesar salad, lemon asparagus risotto with salmon are all ones I've made in the past few weeks). I cook fresh for the first 5 days, then the last two are freezer food. It works for us!

Try not to panic and overthink. You will be ok!

Ds and DD eat different things due to allergies and autism. Monitoring who gets what and when. We are relying on the Brexit Covid stash, a Morrisons box, a fruit and veg delivery and whatever a friend picks up from the supermarket every ten days. That depends on what they have in stock.

Vulnerable, but not shielded child. Both disabled.

Its only me on my own, I love cooking, and yet Im so bloody sick of it, its just tedious.

The base for most dishes seems to be onions, peppers, tomatoes and a meat of some sort as well as a mix of herbs and spices so if you get these in then you've got the start of most things. Therefore, in your freezer keep mince, chicken pieces, diced beef/pork/lamb (or if you're vegetarian/vegan then the usual alternatives) along with frozen peppers, onions, chopped garlic and ginger and mixed veg as well as a few extras such as chips, mash, fish, pies, burgers and sausages.

In your food cupboard keep a few tins of tomatoes, different varieties of beans, potatoes, chickpeas and lentils as well as a range of herbs, spices, stock pots and cook-in sauce sachets. At the side of that keep a few other things such as spaghetti hoops, baked beans, meal kits, rice sachets, dried pasta and jars of pasta sauce etc etc.

Once you've got all that lot you've got the start of a load of different meals from something you'd make from scratch along with stuff for a quick and easy tea.

Remember that a meal doesn't have to be hot to be healthy or filling so have sandwiches for dinner (with a range of fillings available for choice) and then something cooked and that takes more effort for tea.

Get your dh to take on some of the cooking and refuse to get involved on those meals: it's up to him to think of, buy the stuff for, prepare, cook and serve them. At the start of each week sit down together and work out the menu for the next few days and decide who is doing what. After that, all you need to do is follow it.

There were never any fussy eaters in my house, you ate what you were given. You make a rod for your own back if you start cooking different meals for children.

You don’t need to plan/cook 2 meals a day

A Sarnie or ommlette, beans on toast , cheese on toast Jacket pizza is fine for one meal a day

Then a proper meal with veg for one meal

But not the end of world if has two snacks meals

My 3yr loves bits and pieces / crackers cheese pepper cucumber apple raisins grapes dip crisps etc

Agree now is the time for 4yr to stop being fussy

What does he eat ?

Yes homemade baby food is nice but so is Ella’s kitchen. Better then Heinz

Or do blw and what you and hubby eat so does baby and he won’t be fussy when 4

One meal for everyone ... either eat or starve. That's what worked for us (DC 10,14,17)

I have been sick of it for years, so really the lockdown has made little difference. There's just me and OH, but he works and needs to eat well (always been a greedy bugger anyway). I just hate cooking the sort of meals he likes, or maybe it's because I hate cooking for him. Hopefully stbx!

Yes, I understand.

5 of us here. One gluten intolerant. Feels like all I do is plan lunch and dinner daily!

Yanbu!
I'm struggling as my son usually eats with family 4 nights a week whilst I'm at work and has hot school dinners. I'm running out of patience and ideas

We do have regular staples that everyone eats that form the basic rotation.
Salmon
Fried noodles
Rice with beans/ Rice with chilli con carne
Sausage and potatoes (DS never ate any mash) or pasta
Frozen fish and chips

Unfortunately DS doesn't eat soup or convenience foods like pizza, chicken nuggets or baked beans. He will have a plain bagel or cheese sandwich everyday if he can but I want to make a balanced lunch so I put out chopped veg, salad etc.

I'm taking on board the suggestions, but the problem isn't meal planning per se but meal planning under lockdown. E.g. I don't have any mince in this week and I have to make other plans until next week's trip to the shop. Whereas normally it's no problem finding ingredients.

And normally I plan 3-4 dinners then go to the shop for the weekend meal stuff. Now I'm supposed to plan 1-2 weeks worth of all meals, for a delivery that doesn't come in 2 weeks!

Got pissed off gave a child the task of meal planning for the week with what we had called it "home economics" study, two bird with one stone now the Easter holidays have finished and to be fair we have ate well this week 😂😂 would kill for a Chinese take away but all the ones local to use have shut up shop.

A cold Pret sandwich eaten alone at my office desk has never felt so inviting, honestly. Who knew?? I was so fucking sick of Pret and now I miss it.

Don’t give your baby a jar of baby food. Just make one dinner and adapt for the baby.

It’s a pain in the ass eating every meal at home IMO but it shouldn’t cause this level of stress.

Get DH to cook and plan the meals

I was like you a year ago with meals making separate dishes. For the first two three weeks I cooked as I went along but then I got fed up. Now I cook once a week and every one has to eat what is on the table. No arguments and no other options. They can take it or leave it. My child is a year older and used to be very fussy. Now I just let them know that if they don't want to eat then they can have it when they are hungry. Trust me, they eat anything given when they are hungry unless they have special needs or sensory issues around food.

Breakfast is cereal or porridge - and with porridge if you chuck in frozen berries whilst it’s hot, they defrost instantly so no prep. I buy big bags of frozen raspberries and blueberries.

Lunch is always cold here - sandwiches or salads, yoghurt, fruit, crisps.

We double up a lot with dinner - Make double the spagbol or pasta or whatever it is and stick half in the fridge and eat it two nights on the go. Halves the workload with no effort.

I also freeze every extra single portion of leftovers in Chinese containers (as sometimes the ‘double’ spag Bol is a bit more than double). Then once every 2 weeks we have a mix-up night where we each have a different meal from the freezer - one will have the spag Bol, one curry, one paella etc, whatever’s there.

And for the baby I’d cook once a fortnight. Big bowl of mashed carrot, another of swede, broccoli etc. Cook some chicken and fish. Then get a load of small pots and do random mixes of the meat and veg adding some cheese sauce or curry sauce or gravy and freeze them all.

I normally meal plan evening meals with the help of simply cook. I am so fucking bored of thinking about breakfast lunch and dinner x 4 x7 when you don't know what's in the shop is a complete and utter ball ache. I'm over it.

I want to o to work, get my pret sandwich and the kids have school lunch.

hear hear, @inwood

I wouldn't feel so ranty if I had my usual treats at home. Or wine. Or a meal out.

Just eat what's going , drink the wine or the fizz to fill the gaps

I dont blame you op I find it hars enough for one adult let alone with kids. Usually I eat out but I'm cooking more now as mainly working from home. I'm enjoying cooking but dont seem to have much appetite. And planning pisses me off.

I'm guilty of popping to waitrose midweek. Last week Asda didnt have all I needed so after going ro the office Monday I went to waitrose. My view is I make enough sacrifice by only walking once in a day,by working in office 3x week until my equipment comes and not seeing my family on my birthday so if I want tagliatelle and not spaghetti I'll get it.

Is frustrating planning though. I really honestly can. I've sat down to meal plan next week and it was boring as sin. Cooking and eating it is boring as sin. I'd much rather just grab lovely convenience foods.

I just want a m and s croissant and a medium caramel latte extra froth for breakfast. I want a lovely chicken baguette from local deli for lunch. I want to grab a ready meal and wine on the 2mile walk home. And I want yo go shopping and find the shelves full of stuff I need,not full of slow ditherers and not waiting 40mins for 5he pleasure. How on earth does the supermarket now take 2hrs round trip by bus?! Not helped as bus companies run 1 frigging bus an hour. Getting to work is hard.

5 of us here, and I'm only working on a rota (as in school and only have a few kids in)
Sod planning for everyone!
Breakfast,, cereal, toast and/or boiled eggs.
Lunch.. a sandwich
Dinner.. mostly jacket spuds with cheese/salad/beans/spinach or a cheap curry.. I got two whole roast chickens for £1 each yesterday and they will do several meals.. fresh tonight, curry tomorrow..even the dog was happy!
A bag of frozen mince goes a long way... spag bol, chilli.
And honestly, beans on toast (with cheese) tinned soup, toasties, pasta with a jar of sauce... there are no prizes for 'cooked from scratch' meals...
Don't over think it! And the 4 year old will learn to eat if the options aren't there.... trust me... I have 4 kids and have been there!