Menu Plan Monday--Real Food

In case you are wondering how I came up with the title for this blog, this post will explain. I've watched a lot of cooking shows and explored a lot of food sites in my time. While I have found A LOT of awesome resources, sometimes the food is not realistic for day to day cook. The woman like me who does like to try new things, and experiment with interesting ingredients, but for the most part just needs some great low-cost, simple, and quick meals to feed my family. REAL food for REAL families with REAL schedules. So, I have tried to create that here, and that is what this post is about.

Frugal meals are based upon the concept of real food. Nothing irritates me quite like a recipe that claims to be cost effective and then calls for a can of this and a box of that. In general, food is less expensive when you purchase it as close to the natural source as possible. For example, you can buy a 10 pound bag of potatoes for the same price as a bag of frozen hash browns or a box of mashed potato flakes.

So, when you make your menus, I recommend doing so with an attempt to stick to using real food as much as possible. Look for recipes with simple ingredients, or be creative in making substitutions that will use the natural source rather than a processed ingredient. One of the greatest resources for this type of recipes is old cookbooks, that were created before convenience foods were so, well, convenient. I hope that the recipes I share here will help you in your efforts to find real foods that you can use day to day.



Menu for 4/19-4/25

Monday:
breakfast~cereal
lunch~ramen
dinner~ham and cheese casserole

Tuesday:
breakfast~cream of wheat
lunch~leftovers
dinner~chicken taquitos

Wednesday:
breakfast~strawberry bread
lunch~picnic-sandwiches, string cheese, and grapes
dinner~steak, spinach salad, baked potatoes, bread

Thursday:
breakfast~scones
lunch~baked potatoes
dinner~cheeseburger pie

Friday:
breakfast~crumb cake
lunch~tuna macaroni salad
dinner~bbq chicken pizza

Saturday:
breakfast~pancakes
lunch~red beans and rice
dinner~spaghetti

Sunday:
breakfast~cereal
lunch~go out
dinner~steak tacos


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