Does anybody do Menus4moms?

[Dancemom03]

Do you use the menu4moms menus?
If so, which menu/levels have you tried and is it worth the monthly fee?

I need to start being better at planning ahead & cut down on the carryout to save money/eat healthier but time is a huge issue right now too.

If you want to switch between menu programs is that a hassle? It looks like you only get to choose from the one you sign up for which worries me in the event we don't like it.
DH has heart issues and can be difficult. Many items like beef, shrimp, ect. he won't touch at all b/c he thinks they're bad for him, while the girls and I are so sick of poultry served 100 different ways every night that we end up hitting the drive-thru or just having a salad so we don't have to eat chicken yet again...

 

[PinkRhombus]

I, personally, couldn't do that because of pickiness issues.

A lot of the receipe sites have a feature where you add recipes to a shopping list, and it combines the ingredients needed throughout all the recipes, and prints them out in a handy dandy list.

You can usually find most of your favorite recipes on those, and a few more. Once you get your "cookbook" or "recipe box" set up online, it's pretty easy to menu plan.

 

[mommyrants]

We use "Saving Dinner". I have the book, but there are sample meals and plans on her website. We've liked most of the recipes. They are pretty simple.

 

[threecrazykids]

I used to get the free one from menus4moms and stopped receiving it because we didn't ever like the recipes.

I now use www.e-mealz.com and absolutely love it. I've been posting a lot about it lately because it's been a lifesaver for me. If you use coupon code "Dave" (Dave Ramsey endorses it as well) you get one menu for 1.25 a week.

We have never had any recipes we didn't like...but if I have things on hand for a "regular" recipe I have substitued the shopping list to save additional money.

You can pick the store you want to buy from and it will give you a shopping list to show how much you're going to spend.

 

[yooperfamily]

I kind of make my own. Our local store puts their ads out on Monday mornings, I go online & see what's on sale & I make my menu out according to that. I have a lot of friends & customers of mine that are on my email list and LOVE it! They might not like every recipe, but it doesn't cost them anything to join my email list either, so they aren't "out" anything!

 

[brymolmom]

OP - Have you tried doing some of this on your own as a starting point? Personally, I wouldn't pay for a service until I tried it on my own for at least a month or so to figure out exactly what might 'work' best for me. For example, when making a menu - do you have a lot on hand or do you need to buy most everything for a recipe? Also - is the budget of the menu more important or will you choose things based on taste mostly and not worry about the budget as much? Also - will any recipe work or only 'quick and easy' ones OR maybe a couple more complex with the rest quick?

Anyway - just some ideas to think about. I do menu planning on my own, but especially during the summer and sports - I don't have time for trying new recipes most nights anyway. So I have my own list of 'usuals' that I take for the majority of the plans and they are simple and many are very quick for tee-ball nights (meatball subs, pancakes and sausage, taco bake, turkey burgers, soup and sandwich, broiled fish and fish sticks, pasta and sauce, baked potato and salad (plus mac n cheese for kids)). Then I have a few more complex (for me at least - likely easy for some people) ones I might make once every other week and try to make 2 batches and freeze one batch for another week (lasagna, calzones, chicken casserole, chicken stir-fry, pulled pork, a few others I can't think of right now). THEN, I go to allrecipes and try to do one 'new' recipe once a month or so (better some months than others).

I do encourage you to do it. The weeks/months that I am better at this - even with my VERY SIMPLISTIC way of doing it - we do eat out a ton less, save a bunch more money, and eat better. Good luck!

 

[Teresa Pitman]

You might want to check out this website:

http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes

You can choose recipes by main ingredient, by the type of cooking, or (scroll down to the bottom left) the magazine they were published in. One of the magazines is Healthy Cooking, so that should give you plenty of nutritious options.

I find the recipes are usually easy to make and use easy-to-find ingredients.

Teresa

 

[ptlycloudy]

I just found this website that I am exploring mealsmatter.org . It is free and has menu planning and shopping tools. You can enter your own recipes or use some from a data base then create your own plan and shopping list. It looks interesting. I am going to see how well it works for us.