Are you a meal planner or do you just wing it?

September 3, 2019·Darcie

Two cobs of corn sullenly glare at me from the bottom shelf of my refrigerator. Just over a week ago they were torn from their stalks on a farm a mere four miles away and delivered the same day to a farmers' market, full of potential to add their fresh, sweet flavor to a meal. As I strolled through the market, I grabbed the cobs almost as a reflex because the season for fresh corn is so fleeting. I tossed them into a plastic bag, returned home, and shoved them into the only space I could find in my over-stuffed refrigerator.

Over the ensuing seven days, the sugar in the corn has been inexorably transforming into starch. Each sunrise the kernels become a little less sweet, their plumpness diminishing by a fraction with every passing sunset. As each hour ticks past, the husks dry imperceptibly but steadily.

I stare back at the corn cobs, my gaze shifting downward in shame. I have once again failed my produce. I had no plan. Yes, I will use the corn, but it will never taste as vibrant as it was on the day when I thoughtlessly plucked it from the market stand.

There are three types of people in this world: those who plan their meals, prudently devising a shopping list after deciding on what to eat for the upcoming week (or whatever interval they choose); those who can visit the grocery store, grab whatever 'speaks to them', take it home and make delicious meals off the cuff; and those who think they are part of the latter group but who, in fact, cannot pull off that feat. If you haven't already guessed, I belong to the last group.

It's not that I have never attempted to plan my family's meals, make a shopping list, buy the groceries, and dutifully follow the schedule. I stick to it for about three days before it all falls apart. I have to work late, or we get invited to a friend's house for an impromptu dinner, or some other circumstance pops up and throws a wrench into the works. Then I sit with overripe, moldy, or wilted produce - or worse yet, meat that has gone off or dairy that has soured. I shudder to think of it.

For those of you who fall squarely in the first group: what is your secret? I would love to hear your tips on meal planning, what tools you use to stay on the path (I hope one of them is EYB!), and how you recover from life's little roadblocks. My corn cobs say 'thanks'.

13 comments

readingtragicSeptember 4, 2019

Why yes - the answer is definitely Eat Your Books! Go to My Bookshelf, Recipes and type in whatever you have in the fridge in any combination...that’s when the magic happens! (but you knew this already ;)

LeilaDSeptember 4, 2019

I write lists and plan for the week ahead simply to make sure I stay within my fairly narrow budget for groceries. But when I'm sitting there on Thursday night or Friday morning with my calendar in front of me and my grocery list open beside it, I've got EYB open so that I can figure out what recipe I haven't tried yet (because not trying new recipes is a waste of my bookshelf space) that I can do as far away as NEXT Thursday (stuff that stays fresh) that uses that last 4 oz of ricotta cheese (before it goes bad) and I can put together in the 45 minutes between when I get home and my husband gets home.

... this usually limits my options.

lean1September 4, 2019

I try to use up whatever is going bad with the help of EYB!
Making a corn -tomato galette would be my idea!

nwaterman967September 4, 2019

I belong to a weekly CSA where you pretty much get what you get. This is a good thing because it has challenged me to fall in love with vegetables I thought I didn't like and find new ways to use familiar ones. But it does mean my fridge gets STUFFED with veggies. I do best using them all when I make a digital list of what is in the fridge. I cross things off the list as I use them. I can't say I still don't waste things but it helps me do better because I don't forget things tucked in the back somewhere.

JaneSeptember 4, 2019

I'm like Darcie, I can plan for the next meal or two but beyond that I'm buying things I hope will get used or have a reasonably long shelf life. I have some peaches and mixed grape tomatoes on the counter from a farm stand visit at the weekend that need to be used. EYB to the rescue - with some burrata I have in the fridge, I'm going to make Melissa Clark's Burrata caprese with peaches, tomatoes & basil. I'd love to be someone who can plan a week ahead but life is always messing with the best-laid plans.

MarciKSeptember 4, 2019

I am so much like you. I bought corn twice this summer, both ending up in the compost. It's so hard to plan because my schedule never seems to go how I imagine.

rivergaitSeptember 4, 2019

Yes, I am an over-zealous food buyer. I*do* know about that corn in the back of the fridge (picked gloriously fresh from my garden, and now lingering). I now use tiny little card-notes on my planning calendar instead of writing in the calendar spacers, thus allowing changes in plans. without ruining my OCD-influenced neat planner. I also have what must be a common problem....too many leftovers. Declining appetite due to aging, cutting "serves 4" down to "serves 2" and still having a full dinner left over. I can make half a chicken breast become 4 dinners (sigh). My corgis eat very very well.

mlanthieSeptember 4, 2019

I like to plan as much of my week as possible usually leaving a couple of days to wing it. Like you mentioned things do come up and that just pushes that meal to the next day. I belong to a weekly CSA so I get my veggies and then plan for the following week using EYB. We have our own lamb and pork plus my husband is a hunter so there is usually some sort of meat in the freezer which I work with until most are gone. If I don't make use of all our veggies, our piggies will eat them. If I didn't have them I am sure some veggies would go bad too.

sir_ken_gSeptember 4, 2019

It depends. With fresh corn it gets eaten the day it is bought and the next.
Few other things are so fragile.

hillsboroksSeptember 4, 2019

I do try to plan using EYB but my biggest nemesis is my husband. He will pick up veggies that appeal to him at the store or farmer's market ad suddenly I have stuff that has to be used immediately that I wasn't planning on. That and the nights he tells me he would rather have something different than I was planning on making. I'm pretty good at improvising but between the usual life happens stuff and my husband it feels like my cooking life just spins out of control at least once a week.

inflyturSeptember 5, 2019

Go with your strengths. If you can only plan a few days ahead then only plan and buy for that amount of time. It is better to do small grocery trips multiple times a week than to waste food.
I would also suggest that you identify a few favorite dishes that are made from ingredients that are stored in the cupboard. Then you have meals at hand if you are caught short between shopping trips.

RinshinSeptember 6, 2019

I don’t want to plan my everyday eating. I only plan ahead when I have people over. I wake up and decide what appeals to me. I have huge amount of food at all times and they will all get used up because I am cooking all the time and if I feel I may not be able to use up perishables, I normally freeze in natural state or make something and either can, pickle, or freeze. I have to battle my freezers though. My husband calls that my freezer diving.

dtremitSeptember 12, 2019

I have tried doing strict meal planning, but it never works for me. We always have something unexpected come up, and by the time I get around to making that one particular dish, half the ingredients have gone bad.

I've started trying to cook based on what I *have* -- in the summer, that means CSA produce, like nwaterman967. Ours is a little different from others in that we pick our share of vegetables freely from what's available in a given week, so I can load up on one thing one week and another thing the next.

In the winter, it often means making meals from the pantry (it's a large pantry!) and freezer.

Once I know what I want to make ("something to use up the chard and the eggplant") I scour all sorts of resources for inspiration. Sometimes it's off-the-cuff improvised cooking; other times it's sources like EYB to find stuff in my cookbooks. Often I'll have cookbooks from the library; if so, I'll try to jot down recipes for what's in season and turn back to them when the ingredient's in the house.

I recently read Carla Lalli Music's "Where Cooking Begins," and I think her method mirrors what's worked for me. I'm probably not doing it justice, but she focuses on having enough in your pantry to allow you to buy one or two special ingredients and then figure out what to do with *that* on your way home.

More and more, my grocery lists end up being filled with "supporting actors" -- the stuff I know I use all the time, even if it's not the core of the dish. My partner made fun of me once because I said I was uncomfortable when there weren't onions in the house, but it's true! Our house pretty much always has onions, hot peppers, scallions, and garlic in it, along with eggs, milk, cheese, sour cream, and butter. What seems like half my fridge and pantry are filled with condiments and flavorings like soy sauce, miso, gochujang, vinegars, etc. -- stuff that doesn't go bad. Given all that stuff, if you hand me a piece of meat or a vegetable, I can make something good out of it.