anyone else really bad at organising when it comes to dinners?

[misdee]

we went shopping last wednesday. bought meat etc.

checked the freezer today and the mince is dated today, as is the chicken. so i am now cooking shepheards pie to cool, chill and heat through tomorrow, and tonight we are having roast chicken with loads of veggies.

i also had to chuck some kievs (peters) into the freezer as they are dated for wednesday and wont get used in time, as we will be using the leftover chicken on wednesday.

why cant i get organised? it is impossible at times. i think i need a bigger freezer.

btw, it all smells ok, not off.

PLAN AHEAD

i do plan the meals but always get the dating of stuff wrong. i guess i need to check the dates as i put it in the fridge and menu plan that way.

We used to be like this.

I now have a system of doing my shopping once a week on a sunday morning.

I sit and plan on a saturday night all the meals for the week, and shop accordingly.

This weeks menu is...

Mon : Stuffed chicken with pots and veg
Tues : Spag Bol
Wed : Pork Steaks, Jacket pots
Thurs : Fajitas
Fri : Steak and mushroom pie, mash and veg
Sat : AT MY DADS HOUSE!
Sun : Roast pork & trimmings

I am having the same prob Misdee and ended up having to throw some stuff out last week, which I can so not afford.

I am now trying to make sure I check all the dates as I put them away and then whatever may not get used by use by date gets chucked in freezer. I think i need a bigger freezer too though.

we also spend too much.

how much does a week shopping cost on average for 5 people (one stil on high protein diet so loads of meat etc), not including household stuff?

i think we still spend around £50-60 on food alone. which is far far too much. (i say think, as we have started xmas shopping which bumps the weekly bill up by £10-20most weeks)

oh nutty, i dont want to throw stuff away. i mean i stupidly made pasta back the other day, as it is easy to do, but why did i do it, as i had the fresh stuff to use first.

pasta bake

Misdee

Grab a pen and paper and write down EVERYTHING you have in your cupboards/fridge/freezer.... even down to how many tins of beans.

Once you have a list, then make a menu plan from what you have in already, and shop for any extras needed for that weeks meals.

We spend £35-£40 a week at Asda now for the 4 of us, when we were spending £90 every 10 days at sainsburys

Good Plan JARM, will do that this afternoon.

£35-40 a week for 4 I wish I coudl do that, I spend up to £100 a week. My plans jsut aren't workign out at the moment, never seem to eat the stuff I cought for or I find myself short of stuff so I don't know where the £100 goes really! My little freezer is adequate since I don't buy a lot of frozen stuff but I forget to put things in it if the fridge is too full and end up chucking stuff because it's gone off.

Its easy when you actually see what you have in already.

Any meat we buy gets taken out of its packaging and into freezer bags and frozen on day of purchase. (amazing how much space you can free up by doing that)

We take out the meat we need for a meal the day before we eat it, and most days prep a meal a day in advance.

The stuffed chicken for tonight was prep'd last night, and the spag bol for tomorrow will be cooked up tonight and reheated tomorrow - making things a lot quicker and easier when you have hungry children!!!

now the shpeherds pie is done for tomorrow, it will be easier tomorrow, as it will be just the veg to cook really. i'll be able to come in from the school run and get dinner cooked quickly, whici is great as peter has clinic all day tomorrow, so will be in anytime from 4pm-7pm.

see.... its working already!!!

I menu plan for the month not the week, have one supermarket delivery, go to farm shop for meat, have weekly organic box and buy fresh milk etc. locally as I need it. Probably spend £60-70 pw, but that includes food for mindees too. I always cook double quantity of whatever we are having, and put one the freezer for another day, so when I am menu planning I can do freezer meals on my busy days. Means I only ever cook half the week. All meat I buy goes straight in the freezer, except what I need for the next day or 2. Always plan meals onday when veg box arrives that can have any veg added - for example meat and veg or fish mash and veg, and things that need specific veg - eg spag bol, at the other end of the week, so I buy the specific veg needed plus top up my veg box part way through the week. I hate meal planning with a vengeance, but find doing it once a month less stressful and makes me much more organised. I also find I can them sometimes have a week off, and only eat out of the storecupboard/freezer, so only end up buying milk and bread etc that week. hth

Glad someone else is like this. I never plan anything before I visit the fridge to decide what to cook. I do have vague ideas floating around.

Mind you I do constantly invent new recipes to use up whatever is going off in the fridge that day.

If I sit down and think about what I have got indoors, then I mgiht be able to get away with a shop for jsut £60 this week, but then I would have to spend £140 next week because I would have othing left in the cupboards! So I hate emptying out completely, it jsut doesn't work for me.

is that just food kelly?

I just cant see how food can cost that much for a weeks worth of meals!

We buy nappies and wipes from tescos once a month, which costs me £45 but that is a once a month expense.

not jsut food, cleanng stuff and nappies too.

I must be going drastically wrong, I spend up to £150 a week for food for 4 of us! Never seem to have anything in for dinner and often end up throwing off veg away. Mind you both dh and I work from home so always have lunches in too, and we have various dietary restrictions in our house. But even so....must get meal planning! You lot are an inspiration!

Lots of talk about freezing meals on here. But...if you take meat out of freezer, defrost it, then cook it, it has been through 3 proceses, and I thought that was the maximum you could do without encouraging bacteria to grow. Some people on this thread seem to be doing this, and then letting it cool, or freeze to use later or reheat. Is it safe to do this? If so,it would make my life much easier, as I have always followed the 3 processes rule. Can someone enlighten (big word!) me.

it is totally safe.

My DH is a chef, and as long as it can be...

frozen
cooked
frozen
re-heated
binned

We are doing spag bol tomorrow. The mince was fresh when we bought it - stuck it in freezer. Tonight we will defrost it, cook it up as bolognaise and freeze half for another day and reheat the other half for tea tomorrow.

Does that include defrosting in microwave?

depending on if i remember or not, but yes, we have defrosted in microwave!

misdee, if your meat is in the freezer then I don't think you have to use it by the use-by date (-correct me if I'm wrong).