Food Binder and Menus

A good friend recently wrote a post on planning menus with a reference to Auntie Leila's post on making menus. Thus, I was inspired to work on my menu planning skills.

I have a food binder that I use regularly to cook from. But it is full of recipes, not so much menus.


I write all over the recipes with notes about adjustments I made, or if we liked it lots or not at all, or if the leftovers were good or not. Plus, if we didn't like the dish at all, it gets pulled out and thrown away.

I have a few pages up front where I list the various dishes we like and where they are found. The idea was to make my weekly meal planning a quicker and easier process.

The post-its were for putting the meals on the calendar in such a way that they could be moved around as I almost never cook what I planned on the night I planned it.

I see ways that I lack finesse, though. For example, side dishes are almost always baby spinach from a box or bag with salad dressing. But that gets old. And I as often as not forget to start the rice, till I announce "Dinner's ready!" and Hubby says "Rice?" and I say "Oh, drat". 

Each week, I sit down (or at least aim to) and figure out what I can make each day for the next week. I make my grocery list from that menu and from looking in the pantry to see what is needed. But, as often as not, side dishes are an after-thought and forgotten as often as not.

I really have no idea how to get this to a better system. But if I ever figure it out, I'll let you know.