On Sunday I start figuring out what we're going to eat next week - this involves a combination of what we have in the fridge, what's on sale at the two big groceries store where we shop, and what has been requested. I do it by hand on this page - writing the groceries we need for each day in the box. This allows me to make sure I don't forget a key ingredient in some recipe and decide that, hey, we're having fish on Thursday, so I'll pick it up on Wednesday or Thursday on my way home, not on Sunday. Then it will be fresher.
I use the back to make the actual grocery list. I fold the page in three for three lists - one for each grocery store and one of stuff I can get either place. Yes, I do shop at two grocery stores.
We budget about $250 every two weeks for groceries and I keep a running tally sheet in this section - it's just three hole punched. Our budget is not a firm one. If we need more money in the grocery account before the week is up, we'll transfer some in. If we don't use it all, the extra gets transferred to our savings and we start the next two weeks at $250 again.
This is what the finished menu looks like - you can see I've scribbled on this one. Every evening as I make lunches, I do any prep for the next night's dinner that I can - chopping onions, putting together a casserole, anything to make the evening go smoothly. I have 2 -3 hours after J goes to bed before I have to go to bed myself, so I try to use that time well. Our mornings are pretty tight. I have it down to a science that has about 10-15 minutes of extra time...making lunch isn't an option and prepping dinner is only done when absolutely necessary - like loading the slow cooker or something.
The prep column is set up so that the box next to Monday is for Tuesday's meals (or Wednesday if need be). The idea is that anyone could pick up the menu and figure it out.
After the menu I try to put as many of the recipes, in order of use, as I can. I've been slowly typing them into the template below or scanning them (depending on where they came from). Then I have a copy of the ones from magazines or the internet than I can print if my other copy gets ruined. I keep them in page protectors because I take them out and use a magnet to hold them to the side of the fridge or the range hood while I cook. I still use my cookbooks, but these pages are nice because we can annotate the recipes.
This is the template...pretty boring, right?
So I included a sample recipe. This is just a random recipe I wrote down, but if it had come from a cookbook, I would have put which one and what page you can find it on for reference.
These pages I write any annotations on and I also include a grocery list for items that I wouldn't normally have in the cupboard or fridge. Pretty much everything in this recipe is always in our house, so I didn't make a special grocery list.
The last thing in this section is a list of what's in our freezer. Our freezer is outside in a storage closet and I don't want to go out there if I don't have to. This list also means I don't tend to buy things in multiples by accident (I do buy in multiples if the price is good though). It saves us a bit of money because instead of buying new chicken that's not on sale, I can use up some of the stuff I bought a lot of because it was such a good price. As we use stuff I cross it off and add the new things after I grocery shop.
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