Food Management:  What's For Dinner Tonight? 

Also see:  [ Food Storage ] [ Best Price Box ] [ Recipe Box ]

    Most families struggle, to one degree or

    The first "food management" step is to put together a Master Menu.  This is a simple, one-page plan indicating what will be served for dinner (the main meal) over the next four weeks.  The plan can be rotated from month to month with ease.  This outline should include a list of each day of the week with places to list four different meals under each day.  It most useful not only to list the days of the week, but to give each day an official name which helps to categorize the meals.  For instance:

    Monday- Easy Meals (because Mondays always seem to be long, hard days), Tuesday - Mexican, Wednesday - Poultry, Thursday - Beef, Friday - Italian, Saturday - Fast Meals (because there always seems to be something which keeps the cook away from the kitchen), Sunday - Breakfast for Dinner

    From there it is easy to list four favorite meals for each of the days.  For instance:

    Tuesday - Mexican:  Soft tacos, hard tacos, enchiladas, and taco salad

    Next list a bread (if you have need to fill teenage or adult stomachs), a vegetable, and a fruit appropriate for that day's meal.  These three items are served each week although the main meal varies for that particular day.  For instance on Tuesdays you might serve:  corn muffins, corn (frozen or canned), and mandarin oranges.

    Use this same process for each day of the week, listing four main meals, a bread, a vegetable, and a fruit.  In this way you will have twenty-eight meals, seven breads, seven vegetables, and seven fruits listed.  This Master Menu serves as a basis for your weekly meal planning, your grocery shopping, and your cooking routine.  You will find your family settling into a schedule as they anticipate Italian food on Fridays and Breakfast for Dinner on Sundays.  You will have a system to get meals on the table in a timely manner and always have an answer to the question:  "What are we having tonight for dinner?"

    Find more helpful ideas in the "House of Order" Handbook, Chapter 22, "Food Management" and easy, complete recipes for the Master Menu in the "Master Menu" Cookbook.  There is much more to food management which will be addressed later.