Must-Try Healthy Meal Planning Tips: How to Save Time & Money

Looking for healthy meal planning tips and strategies? I’ve got you covered! Planning out your meals for the week is a key part of maintaining a healthy diet and lifestyle.

For some, it can be a fun and exciting adventure to figure out what you would love to eat this week. You might experiment with new foods you might love to chow down on. Or maybe new ideas for nutritious snacks for your kids’ lunches.

So if you need some healthy meal planning tips, keep reading!

I’m happy to say that at least for me, health has never been about fad or popular diets. Instead, it’s about practical and genuinely helpful tools, tips and yes, sometimes even shortcuts. All of these keep up our energy levels, good looks and big ole’ brains for the long term.

We know that healthy meal planning can help us get to optimal health.

So how about some helpful “do’s and don’ts” to make this sometimes dreaded chore a bit easier?

When it comes to healthy meal planning tips, I have a few.

1. Do use meal planning templates.

Meal planning templates make organizing your meals so easy and quick.

I love using a meal planning template that includes a daily spread. I also like individual meal planning templates for specific days of the week, especially when I plan to do a lot of cooking. These daily meal planning templates can also be helpful for batch cooking days.

Find ones you like on Pinterest, Canva, or even these free meal planning templates.

2. Do schedule a time for it.

Just like an oil change or a dental cleaning, if you don’t set a specific day and time for planning your weekly meals, it probably won’t happen. It’s easy to forget about it or fail to make time for it because scheduling things automatically makes them a priority.

For most of the year, I usually meal plan on Sundays. I then shop on Mondays (a day that I’m not normally in my nutrition office). During the summer, this can change because I like to see what’s in my CSA basket first. Then, I plan my meals around that.

3. Do stick to old favourites, and do try something new.

Sounds like a contradiction, right? When you’re planning your meals for the week, it’s always wise to include recipes you’ve made a hundred times. These are recipes you could make in your sleep. I also like to add a few new recipes to keep things exciting and interesting.

Schedule your old favourites on your busiest days of the week.

Then, plan your new or “would love to try” recipes for the days or nights you’ll have more time to cook. Maybe you want to experiment with a new cuisine, or just adapt old favourites so they’re healthier.

Reading through a new recipe and figuring out the necessary steps usually takes longer, in my experience.  

4. Do try to include recipes that can benefit from batch cooking.

Batch cooking—or cooking larger amounts of a particular food at one time, can be a lifesaver. When you cook grains or roast vegetables in bulk, busy weeknights will be less stressful than calling for delivery pizza.

It takes about as much time to cook 1 cup of quinoa as it does to cook 3 cups. (And if you’ve never cooked quinoa, follow my pro tips to make the best quinoa!) Doing this saves time, energy and stress as you can use batch foods in many recipes throughout the week.

You can also freeze extras and make meals even easier to prepare.

Quinoa in your lunchtime tabbouleh salad? Check.

Quinoa primavera as a delicious side at dinner? Check.

Quinoa breakfast “oatmeal” with fresh strawberries, toasted almonds, and a splash of homemade vanilla almond milk? Yep, sounds delish to me!  

5. Do try to include the same key food or ingredient in more than one meal.

For example, if you like black beans, look for both a dinner recipe and a different breakfast or dessert recipe where you can use black beans.

So, you might plan for my 30-Minute Black Bean Sloppy Joes one night for dinner. Then some of these spicy chocolate truffles for dessert on another night. This is one of my favourite tips. And in fact, my Double Duty Dinners cooking workshops are based on this exact principle!  

6. Do keep it simple.

Whether you love to cook or simply consider it an endless chore, you’re better off sticking to easy, fresh and simple recipes. This means no complicated ingredient lists and no complex cooking techniques.

Here’s a tip: most of the recipes on my website meet these criteria!

If you want to challenge yourself, that’s a totally different ballgame. But for most weekly healthy meal planning, recipes with 10 ingredients or fewer, that can be made in an hour or less, are your best bets.  

Now, there are also some key “don’ts” to keep in mind when planning out your healthy meals and here they are.  

Your info is safe with me. I will guard it with my life and promise no spam, ever. I genuinely hate it as much as you do!

7. Don’t try to multitask or do 2, 3, 4 or more things at the same time.

You’re never as effective or efficient when you multitask. Research shows it takes 10 minutes to refocus on a task whenever you switch to something new. So, it will take less time to plan your meals during a quiet time. You’ll be less likely to be distracted by TVs blaring, phones ringing, kids crying, etc.  

8. Don’t wait until the last minute to start your meal planning.

Waiting until the last minute to start your meal planning is not the best time to meal plan. For me, this is Sunday evenings before a busy week. Set aside a time when you have a more spacious schedule to give this task some time and attention.

You’ll be in a rush. You won’t enjoy the process of discovering new recipes. And you may even forget an ingredient or two when writing up your shopping list.

As long as I have a few trustworthy sources on hand, I find 1-2 hours is usually enough time. I can plan all or most of my meals for the coming week.  

9. Don’t ignore the season.

Let me say that I’m committed to eating locally and in season as much as I possibly can.

You will rarely catch me doing otherwise because as much as I occasionally like to chow down on asparagus in the dead of winter, I also know that this isn’t when these foods are at their peak flavour or freshness.

So what’s the point, right?

The foods may be shipped from far away or chemically manipulated. Why doesn’t a so-called ‘ripe’ tomato taste as good in January as it does in the middle of August? These foods will lack flavour, nutrition and cost more.

The costs of these foods are guaranteed to be much, much higher than when these foods are locally in season. It’s the simple reality of supply, demand and availability. So, as much as possible, try to focus on the seasonal foods and ingredients where you live. As an extra tip, current magazines can be a great source of information for this.  

10. Don’t be afraid to try new foods or ingredients.

Never tried turmeric before? It’s a tasty and equally powerful anti-inflammatory spice that deserves a prime spot in your kitchen spice cabinet.

Never tried teff before? It’s a gluten-free grain, perhaps the tiniest in the world! It is awesome in breakfast porridge or the popular Ethiopian bread, injera.

Stepping out of your comfort zone can be a great way to enjoy favourite recipes but in a new way.  

11. Don’t give up.

Just do your best. If you only want to plan your dinner meals because you like having more freedom when it comes to breakfasts and lunches, it’s perfectly fine.

Make a plan and find a routine that works for you and your life.

But do schedule time for it–that one is a non-negotiable! 🙂  

Do you have any favourite healthy meal planning tips?

Please share it with me in the comments!

Life is a plate… Eat up!

Ashleigh