Nicole

Happy Monday, everyone! This week is starting off to another sunny, windy, and wonderful start here in Dixie. Thankfully, with the start of each new week’s, there’s the pleasant certainty of a well planned, money-saving meal plan. A plan I am ever so grateful to have!

This week’s menu again reflects our need to eat down our food stockpile. As we are having to consume everything we have on-hand first, though we did purchase several items food and home consumables, each of which garnered us back online app rebates, which will give us groceries and products that can help us in the weeks to come for our family of three as part of a minimalist meal plan. 

While I’m sure most of my readers will already know what a minimalist meal plan consists of, here’s a recap of the five categories I use to help me create minimalist meal planning for the past three weeks for those looking to create such a plan for their families at home:

Consistency: The goal of minimalist meal planning is to consistently prepare and present my family with home cooked, healthy meals each day this month.

Cost: Posted meal plans are based on seasonal sales cycles with attention paid to both frugality and minimalist efficiency. This week’s menu reflects our budget of $160.00 monthly for a family of three. 

Power Consumption: I wanted to plan meals that do not require vast amounts of energy zapping stove-top and range preparation. A little food for thought: did you know that it costs an average of 18-24 cents an hour to run a gas range, 24-30 cents an hour for an electric range, 16-20 cents an hour for a microwave oven, a mere 3-5 cents an hour to run a toaster oven or convection top. With this in mind, I will be gearing this month’s meal planning to encompass dishes that utilize minimalist power consumption standards. Meals this month will utilize my toaster oven and convection stove top for all my baking and needs. 

Streamlining: I was a little apprehensive about whether or not my family will be turned off of the idea of food simplicity. I quickly realized that my family loves whatever I cook them, and with this, in mind, extreme food plan simplicity will give me an extra hour each day to devote to spending time with my family and not in my kitchen. In order to streamline my meal plans, to have a true minimalist food strategy I am going to assign each day of the week with a single meal. 

Travel: I wanted meals that could be planned monthly in advanced and shopped for locally (I live in a small town with limited mass shopping or chain retailer options) either weekly or monthly, depending on need. As I shop in reverse, buying groceries on rock bottom pricing and then shop from my pantry, this keeps weekly food costs low.

Here’s what I purchased this week:

Sam’s Club:

• 2 10-lb. bags of Nature’s Path Organic Black Beans, $2.81 (regularly $9.98 each)
• Driscoll’s 2-pound Strawberry tub, $2.51 (After $2.00 instant savings)
• Total: $8.31
• Saved: $16.16

Winn-Dixie:

• Tazo Organic Chai Tea, $3.81  ($1.00 rebate from checkout51) 
• Tazo Earl Grey Tea, on clearance, $1.81 (regularly priced $3.81)
• Winn-Dixie Brand Espresso, clearance priced, $0.89 (regularly priced $3.38)
• Total: $5.51 after rebates
• Total Saved: $5.49

Walmart:

• Bradford Pear, $0.69 (submitted for 20% Saving Star Rebate)
• Organic Kale bunch, $0.98 each (submitted for $0.25 iBotta rebate)
• Seventh Generation Dishwasher tabs, 24-count, $4.98
• Submitted for $0.25 iBotta any receipt rebate)
• Total: $6.01 after rebates
• Total Saved: $0.65

Weekly total: $19.81

Weekly Total Saved: $22.31

1. To create your own minimalist meal plan, think about which dinners are your family’s favorites that don’t take too much effort to prepare.
2. Consider which do you prefer to cook?
3. Think comfort meals. Think simple and keep it basic.
4. When creating your meal calendar this week assign one meal to each day of the week, taking into account school, work, and activity schedules. Leave your least busy days for meals that take the most amount of time to prepare.
5. Leave one day open each week for creativity in the kitchen, for ethnic, slow-cooked, heavy on the ingredient, new to you from Pinterest meals for weekends or Tuesday and Thursdays when poser usage rates nationally tend to be 20-30% lower on average. Focus on energy, your own and your household power usage as well!
6. Themes can be your best friend in minimalist cooking plans. Think Meatless Monday’s, Meatball Monday’s, Taco Tuesdays, Tofu Tuesday’s, Stirfry Wednesday’s, and Slow-Cooker Sunday’s!
7. Adjusting two meals a week to meatless options can help lower your grocery budgets by a quarter each month. This month we will be trying to expand Meatless Monday’s to also be Meatless Thursday’s as well. 
8. This month breakfast, snacks, and lunches will be standardized. We will be having sandwiches for lunch, cereal, and smoothies for breakfast. And yes you could do without snacks and increase lunch and breakfast portions, but I find smaller meals several times a day work better for my health, and so that’s how we will be rolling. 

So what does this leave me with? My monthly minimalist meal plan will consist of default meals streamlined around items already on hand that requires less than a half hour to prepare, and cost under $5.00 per meal to create. Also worth noting, before I venture out to the market I first shop from my pantry and cabinets, only add weekly sales that are 60% or more below cost, and then create easy meals. With this in mind, you’ll find my menu for this week below. 

Monday
Breakfast: Cereal with almond milk and strawberries.
Lunch: Grilled Turkey Burgers, with Crystal light lemonade. 
Snack: Grapes and String Cheese.
Dinner: Kale, Walnut, and Greek vinegarette salad. 
Dessert: Greek yogurt, granola, and blueberries.

Tuesday
Breakfast: Cereal with almond milk and strawberries.
Lunch: Turkey and cheese sliders, with Crystal light lemonade.
Snack: Grapes and String Cheese.
Dinner: Taco Tuesday.
Dessert: Greek yogurt, granola, and blueberries.

Wednesday
Breakfast: Cereal with almond milk and strawberries.
Lunch: Turkey and cheese sliders, with Crystal light lemonade.
Snack: Grapes and String Cheese.
Dinner: Chicken, carrot, broccoli quinoa bake, with Crystal Light lemonade.
Dessert: Greek yogurt, granola, and blueberries.

Thursday
Breakfast: Cereal with almond milk and strawberries.
Lunch: Turkey and cheese sliders, with Crystal light lemonade.
Snack: Grapes and String Cheese.
Dinner: Bakes Zucchini, Greek yogurt, and quinoa gyros, with Crystal light lemonade.
Dessert: Greek yogurt, granola, and blueberries.

Friday
Breakfast: Cereal with almond milk and strawberries.
Lunch: Turkey and cheese sliders, with Crystal light lemonade.
Snack: Grapes and String Cheese.
Dinner: Meatball hoagies, side salad with Greek Yogurt dressing, and Crystal Light.
Dessert: Greek yogurt, granola, and blueberries.

Saturday
Breakfast: Cereal with almond milk and strawberries.
Lunch: Turkey and cheese sliders, with Crystal light lemonade.
Snacks: Grapes and String Cheese.
Dinner: Chicken mole, served with steamed rice, corn, and Crystal Light.
Dessert: Greek yogurt, granola, and blueberries.

Sunday
Breakfast: Cereal with almond milk and strawberries.
Lunch: Turkey and cheese sliders, with Crystal light lemonade.
Snack: Grapes and String Cheese.
Dinner: Crockpot cheddar, chicken, and broccoli rice, with green beans and Crystal Light lemonade.
Dessert: Greek yogurt, granola, and blueberries.

Cost of food shopped from pantry and freezer: $26.45

So that’s all, everyone! I’m hoping that this streamlined plan into my weekly meal planning will help me be a few steps closer to realizing my minimalist dream. That said, if this streamlined plan doesn’t work for my family this month I can always change my plan again!

I’m ready to take back an extra hour from my day, each and every day this month. I’m ready to devote more time to creative endeavors, taking advantage of work opportunities, spending time with my family, and not slaving over a hot stove.

So, that’s what we will be having this week. I’d love to hear what’s on your menu as well!

Here’s to Monday meal plans, 

Disclosure: This post was made possible by MomsMeet and Sun Basket Meals. I was compensated for my participation in this campaign, but all opinions are 100% mine. Read full Disclosure Policy here.

 
If you’re anything like me, you love effortless, uncomplicated meal planning and prep. There’s nothing better than having healthy gluten-free, vegan, vegetarian, or paleo meals already prepped and on-hand. Especially during hectic weeknights at home. Which is why I was so excited to try the new meal delivery service from Sun Baskets.  

Sun Basket Meal Kit delivers meal kit options with busy, modern, eco-friendly family and couples in mind. With products that proudly include sustainably sourced, hormone-free meats and seafood, free-range poultry, organic, non-GMO vegetables, and gluten-free spice and seasonings. Sun Basket kits come in a wide range of food options including kits specially designed for Paleo, Gluten-free, Vegetarian and even a family-style, larger portion options. Sun Basket also offers kid-friendly breakfast options as well.  

As with most meal delivery kit services, you pick your meals based on weekly meal options. Each week Sun Basket offers customers options that include Gluten-free, Paleo-friendly, Vegetarian and Chef’s Choices. So there’s something for everyone each week to try. 

Unboxing the meals:

In terms of delivery, my Sun Basket kit arrived at my home within it’s emailed time slot. Sun Basket Also packs their meal kits quite well. My kit contained ample ice packs ensuring that each item contained remained at safe food temperatures, for up to eight hours, and each item was also packaged in compostable or recyclable containers, making this kit completely zero-waste in nature. 

Within each kit, staples are divided by recipe. So you will initially be presented with your recipe and instruction card followed by your organic produce, meat products, and finally your compostable ice packs. This method of storage is repeated on each side of the kit. My kit contained both the Vietnamese Steak Stir-Fry meal and the Turkey Kebobs with carrot-snap pea hummus salad and lemon couscous.

Meal preparation:

The first meal we decided to make was the Vietnamese Steak Stir-Fry. This was super easy to prepare. To prepare this meal We started by processing our vegetables and garnish, which was then pan fried in a provided sesame oil.

While stir-frying, we cooked our jasmine. Finishing up this meal was as simple as plating, garnishing, and enjoying. 

The second meal we made was the Turkey Kebobs with carrot-snap pea hummus salad and lemon couscous. 

Cooking the turkey kebobs was simple. I simply chopped the mint and parsley, added it to a waiting bowl or ground turkey and breadcrumbs, combined the mixture, created balls, skewered, and friend until browned. 

While the kabobs were browning I placed my couscous on to boil. I also prepped my carrot and snap pea salad, and whipped up my hummus salad sauce, and dressed my side salad. 

To finish up this meal, we simply arranged our kabobs atop our couscous, added our salad, and dressed by squeezing fresh lemon over the entire plate. This was a fresh tasting meal I would gladly enjoy again! 

Review of service:

Both dishes were very simple to follow and generally, most of the meal prep for each meal was finished for you as well, making the time to cook each meal under 30-miuntes each. Everyone in my family enjoyed both meals. I also loved that after eating both meals I was able to dispose of the entire meal kit in a completely zero-waste manner, and as this is the first meal kit that has allowed me to do so, it’s one I would definitely order from again.

I love the convenience of not having to meal plan and shop. I loved how tasty both Sun Basket Meals were. I’m happy that the packaging is 100% recyclable and compostable and Sun Basket offers instructions on how to recycle packaging within each kit. I was also impressed at the attention to detail Sun Basket places on ensuring that each meal is kid-friendly as well. And who doesn’t love 30-minute meals developed by award-winning San Francisco chefs delivered right to your door?

Cost:

Sun Basket meals are also relatively inexpensive, in terms of meal kits. Meals cost $11.49 per person, which considering the ethical, organic sourcing of each product puts them in line with many national chain organic grocery stores in terms of pricing. While continuously purchasing meal kits may not be in line with my weekly grocery budget, I would definitely consider purchasing kits for entertaining or during the holiday season.

Friends, I encourage you to take at look at Sun Basket meals today. You can visit their site for all the details! Want to find out more? Visit Sun Basket at sunbasket.com and get your first three family meals delivered right to your door half off! So now I have to ask, have you tried Sun Basket Meal Kits? Or any other meal kits? I’d love to hear about it below!