Do you ever feel like you’re in Hell’s Kitchen? Don’t know where to begin when it comes to meal planning? or even how to make time to do it all? To have a successful cooking session, follow these basic steps:
Procedure for a Cooking Session
- Choose meals that you and your family like and that can be prepared in quantity. I’ve already given one sample of a cooking session HERE. (Let other family members sit down with you to help create your meals, giving suggestions. Jot down ideas to help create the meals.)
- Make your shopping list.
- Grocery shop. Make sure you have your coupons in hand from local newspapers, online advertisers, grocery stores online always have extra coupon savings. Use them now. Don’t forget your reuseable shopping bags.
- When your schedule permits, do the cooking. Kids can help with this too.
- Package the prepared food; label and freeze it.
Don’t try to accomplish all of these steps in one day if it’s not feasible to your schedule. If you’ve got way too much going on in one day, break the steps down. You will tire yourself out. I even sometimes split my shopping and cooking sessions to two days. As a busy mom, I’m lucky if I can get a full day to do this. If I know I have a full day to do this, I’ll wake up early, head to the grocery store and come back to start on my cooking session.
Next time, we’ll talk about a little bit about portions and how you can stock that freezer for a month with weeknight meals. Are you ready?
A good tip to having a successful cooking session is to make sure you have your zip-loc freezer bags, storage bags, freezable containers, labels and a pen set up so you’re not wasting time looking for them during your cooking session.
