I like cooking a lot. I even am ok with grocery shopping, because I get to grab myself a snack (heheh) and then calculate out the rest of the week during some quiet time.

What I DON’T like – is planning the meals out in advance. Which is ironic, because normally I’m a total planner, but something about recipes and grocery lists and so forth so on make me want to cry.

However, the other day thanks to Pinterest, I found my salvation.

A spreadsheet – a way to organize my ingredients, my meals, AND my grocery list in one fell swoop. I’ve done this the past couple of week and let me tell y’all….its a miracle for the meal-planner-hater like me! Plus – it takes me maybe 10 minutes. AND I’m saving on average $20-$30 a week.

A WEEK PEOPLE!!

I usually do mine in Google docs because its easier, and I have access to it no matter where I am which is super important to me. However you could do this on graph paper, excel, any ol way you want. Here is a link to my most recent meal planning list that you can use as your own. I’ll get the recipes I reference up later this week.

(The extra blank spots are for the random personal staples every household has. Like Dog and Cat food in my house.)

So far my favorite part is I’m able to pull recipes based on groceries I had in my fridge and pantry, so I’m not wasting money buying things two or three times over. Well…except for spaghetti. I have LOTS of spaghetti.

How do you plan out your meals and grocery lists?