Back to school tips - managing mealtime madness

Managing mealtime madness becomes crazy once the school year starts up. You can save time by thinking ahead. Instead of looking for what to cook, know what you’re going to cook. Designate mealtime menus - loose menus, nothing fancy. I’m not saying plan each dish, just plan a type of food.

For example: 

• Monday: Chicken, rice, and veggie night
• Tuesday: Soup, bread, and salad night
• Wednesday: Fish and veggie night
• Thursday: Left-over night
• Friday: Pasta and salad night

This is flexible enough to be open to interpretation; for example, you could buy cheese or Spanish rice for Monday, and have fruit salad instead of veggie salad on Friday; but at least you have a general idea of what to shop for and what you’ll be cooking. This works better than an inflexible menu plan, because people seem to hate being tied down to food.

Another perk of this plan is that anyone can follow it - your spouse, your older child. Whoever is home knows what they need to get started for dinner.

On the weekends go nuts and do whatever. If you want to streamline even more, create a plan for breakfast and lunch as well - waffles on Mondays, tuna on Tuesdays, and so on.

[image via stock.xchng]