Can everyone please help me meal plan for a month?

[thestylethatdecadesforgot]

Hi all, I'm swapping over to doing a monthly big shop to see how it goes as I'm pregnant and sick of going to the shops every few days for top ups in the second week ( I do a two week shop with a fresh top up the second week). So could you help me think of enough meals please? We usually eat meat only 2/3 times a week. We like fish. I have no problem with salady meals during winter! In the freezer I have a homemade lasagne which should do two meals. I have 3 chilli con carnes to do with rice or jackets. I'm using those for nights I can't face cooking (bad morning sickness). I also have two lots of chicken thighs and three lots of chicken breasts. I need to use those this month really as they've been in the freezer since September. I think I will make some pizza dough and we usually have jacket pots and filling once a week. Any ideas very welcome please! Thank you everyone.

Could you do online shopping and get it delivered if you don't want to go to supermarket? Much easier.

I would make at least double quantities if everything you make and freeze half. That way you reduce your cooking time by half.

Also suggest that if you're finding cooking difficult atm, could you bear to live off ready meals for at least some if the time?

Sorry I forgot to say I would be doing an online shop! Crucial point. Thanks yes, double of everything makes sense.

Bump. I'm doing an online shopping list and so far this is all I have:

Jacket potato and filling x4
Pizza (home made) x2
Chicken thighs in hm sauce x2 (make both batches at same time & freeze)
Chicken fajitas (have a breadcrumb mix thing in cupboard and wraps on freezer)
Tabbouleh kisir x2
Mackerel salad

That's 12 meals. I need 28 because I know we have two meals out this month. I have another 3 chillis in the freezer, 1 meat stew and a lasagne which should stretch to two meals so that's another 6.

Ten more meals anyone??

Curry?You could do batch and freeze the rest.
Pasta. If you get good quality italian egg pasta, all gou need to do is boil it a few minutes, tip it in a bowl that has a knob of butter in, toss, have a salad next to it, job done.

Think of your dinners in terms of ingredients, ie: monday egg night, thursdays pasta, saturdays potatoes etc and think of various dishes using these 'main' ingredients, that's how I keep a tab on dinners :)

Add a pumpkin or two as they are a pound each and last a long time as long as they're not put by a radiator.
One large pumpkin should do you for a pumpkin risotto, a pumpkin chowder and roasted slices of pumpkin with roast sausages and red onion (or a pumpkin stew, or a vegetarian laksa if you have coconut milk and noodles in)
Do the chowder at the same time as another and freeze it to avoid being over pumpkinned in one week.

Medjara is a lentilly, oniony, ricey thing that's cheap and delicious- I use an ottolenghi recipe, but a google should see you right (can't link as on phone)

I would add some salmon portions, or any other fish (perhaps frozen?) And do a large pie early on, eat half, freeze half. Hopefully you will leave enough for baked salmon with broccoli (frozen if late in the month) and sauteed potatoes another night.

For easy nights why not add a few pastas or rice dishes? Pasta pesto, tuna pasta, add some bacon to your list (which usually has a good date on it) and carbonara? (presuming you have eggs) and with the remaining bacon and a few potatoes, and a carrot you could make a pan haggerty the day after your carbonara.

Or easy rice dishes? Egg fried rice, jollof rice, veg risotto.

And add a whatever is about to go off veg soup- long term meal plans always include these in my house, usually once or twice.

If you're really not going shopping at all in the period bear in mind milk and bread freezes and most veg can be blanched and frozen from fresh. (I was once incapacitated and too poor to pay repeated deliveries so have done this myself- though I do prefer fortnightly planning as it leaves me with fresh food throughout)

Also (can you tell I'm a meal plan enthusiast) if you have sausages for the pumpkin and sausages meal if you buy the large packs (i buy bags of twenty) then there's three or four sausage based meals for your month- toad in the hole, sausage and bean casserole- which could also include pumpkin to delicious effect, sausage mash and onion gravy (I'm pushing onion meals as in a dry dark space they last ages)

pregnantpause, I love the sound of the medjara but do you serve it with anything else like salad or meat (or both)?
Never heard of jollof rice either and that also looks good, thanks.

Op, how about chicken pie with the thighs and stir fried chicken with noodles for the breasts?
You could make double the chicken pie filling and freeze half.

Oh and fish pie?

Mmm sausages! I love 'em! Thank you all for the ideas.
I will be adding to the list. I've almost finished the online shop and I'm beginning to realise I really don't have enough kitchen space for a monthly shop. I can't put it all anywhere which is a shame. But I think I can certainly have my meals already planned and top up knowing what extras I need.

Does anyone have slow cooker instructions for a gammon joint please? I keep hearing a famous coke one but anything would be great. I'm new to slow cooking and so far have only done boglonese , chilli and soup in it.

Ps apologies for the delay replying to you all, me and kids have all been ill. X

I just do it with flatbreads, no meat or salad needed.

For 1kg gammon, you need 2ltr coke and an onion. Soak the gammon in the slow cooker overnight (in cold water in a cool place) pour water out in the morning and replace with coke and the onion, if the coke doesn't cover the meat, top up with water. Cook on low for ten hours. Delicious.
Nigella suggest cherry coke too which I've yet to try. Don't use diet- it doesn't work.

Thank you pregnantpause, I will add come to the shopping list and give it a try.

Coke not come!

Could you find a local Greengrocer who could deliver fresh fruit and veg each week? I found one who supplies a local business and so I email the order and he delivers on a Friday morning. No flexibility on delivery times, but completely flexible on how big/small the order is and very cheap compared to the bigger veg box suppliers.

Meal ideas - fajitas using frozen peppers, soups (veg-based soups made in bulk, then frozen), veggie tagine (roast 4 carrots, 3 parsnips, 3 red peppers all chopped, then fry 1tsp each cumin, paprika, cinnamon, chilli powder, stir in 1 tin tomatoes, handful of apricots and 2tbspns honey 5 mins, then add roasted veg) with couscous or jacket potatoes - freezes well.

I once had a lovely night with a friend doing batch cooking.

She bought the messages, we split the cost. Drank wine, made cheese sauce, bolognaise sauce, sweet and sour sauce, plain proper mince and I think that was it. It was a lovely way to catch up and we both filled our freezers.

In fact, we should really do that again.

Hmm I can't think of any good local grocers, (N London), but there's a fab free range butcher that I use for all my meat now. I was getting an Abrl and Cole box but I struggled to meal plan around what was in the box so I was having to order extra and it was costing a fortune.

I love the idea of a joint batch cook. Maybe when I feel less sick all day I will get someone to come over and do that.

Fajitas I thought I had on my list, will check, thank you.