Happy New Year! I love New Year’s Day and New Year’s Resolutions. After all, my New year’s Resolution for 2007 was to start blogging, and look at how far that’s taken me!
I’ve decided to separate my resolutions into categories- food here, finances at Almost Frugal, blog related at Pretty Your Blog and personal at my personal blog. So if you really want to learn that much minutia about my life, make sure to check each of those blogs out!
My biggest food related problem, and not only in 2008, is related to our addiction to eating out. Not only do we like to eat out, we like to eat out often. Add to the mix our fairly harried schedules and my laziness (sometimes at least) and we have a non home cooked meal at least two or three times a week. Therefore, and not surprisingly, my three food related New Year’s Resolutions revolve around how to manage that problem.
1. Eat out one time per week. I’m going to write down ‘Eating Out’ one day each week on the calendar. Then I’m going to put a big sign on the fridge, with ‘Pizza Night Sunday’ or whatnot on it, to help us stick to the goal.
2. Use my crockpot at least twice a week and cook meals in advance to heat up later. Part of the reason why we so often fallback on fast food is that we get home late and are hungry. Or we are out running errands and don’t have lunch or dinner planned. Fast food is so popular because it’s easier, or at least seems so at the time. Crockpots are great solutions- your meal is ready when you get home, no need to even heat it up!
3. Menu Plan. Or rather, get back into the habit of menu planning. I do menu plan from time to time, but I think that if I make it a regular part of my routine, the habit will encourage me to not eat out so often. I notice that when I menu plan every week we spend less at the grocery store, because we go less often, and and (obviously) we spend less money on eating out. Here’s a nice post on menu planning from Lifestyles of the Organized.
What are your resolutions about food and cooking this year?
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{ 4 comments }
So we’re both going to attempt menu planning in 2009! Good luck to you–I look forward to reading about your strategies.
Thanks for the mention! 🙂
Sarah H.s last blog post..New Year’s Resolutions – The Key to Success
1. Continue menu planning
2. Healthy choices when dining out
3. Portion control
My food related goals are similar to Laura’s above. We’re sick of sugary sweets at our house. I threw out all of the cookies/candies on Monday. Goals: Menu plan for 2 weeks at a time; eliminate/reduce refined flours and sugars.
Nancys last blog post..Improvising
1. Not so much to limit the times I/we eat out, but to eat at places where the food is of good quality. The cost of that will automatically limit the number of times.
2. Not only to make a meal plan, but to stick to it (and not ditch it to eat out!). If I find a new recipe I want to try, it has to wait until at least the next meal plan. No running out at the last minute for ingredients for a new dish, when I already have food in the house to cook.