New Mama Lifesaver: Meal Planning
Becoming a new mama is lifechanging, one thing that can help create a smooth postpartum is meal planning! I think when starting to think about meal planning it can be overwhelming. What type of meal planning do you want to execute? Is there time? How will you manage a baby and cooking? I’m here to help you choose the best option for your family and take the stress out of food. Make sure you read until the end where I share the meal planning I’ve started that’s a variation of a couple different ideas and share my daily meal planner.
Let’s take a look at the different types of meal planning. Then I will outline how you can support yourself before the baby arrives and the easiest way to meal prep after the baby comes.
MEAL PLANNING OPTIONS
Weekly
This is the classic approach! Choose one day during the week, usually it’s a Sunday, to sit down and plan meals for the week, During this time you can create a menu and make a shopping list or order groceries online (that’s my vote!). Once you have all your ingredients you can prep in advance.
Batch
Cook large portions of meals or snacks to have for the week and freeze the extras into individual servings. Then you have meals ready to go when you are too tired to cook but also meals ready for the week and you don’t have to worry about cooking.
Freezer
Create a meal plan then spend a day preparing multiple meals and snacks to store in the freezer. This is great for early postpartum and also something you can ask family and friends to help with.
Meal Kit
These are delivery services that provide ingredients and recipes that are already portioned. Usually all you have to do is a little chopping and cook the recipe. For me personally I find they take around 30 minutes or so to cook which is usually more manageable.
Slow Cooker or Instant Pot
An easy way to get the meal prep done in the morning and by dinner you have a delicious meal. These recipes are usually simple but have a lot of flavour.
Recipe Exchange
As a new mama finding recipes can be exhausting, you usually want something easy and quick. Here’s an idea, a recipe exchange! Find a group online or reach out to all your mama friends to start a recipe exchange. It’s a simple way to get meal inspiration.
Cook and Freeze
This is my own meal planning tip! This started this in pregnancy and early postpartum. I was baking banana muffins and instead of making 12 I tripled the recipe to make 36 muffins. When baking I have all the ingredients out and usually enough to make more. It’s so easy. As the muffins cook you can clean up and be finished when they’re ready. Then I’d have muffins for the week and the next month or more! Same with dinner, I recently made an instant pot chicken soup and realized I had enough to make two big pots. When the first was finished cooking I started the second and it was finished before dinner was over, This created two meals for the week and TWO MORE for the next month. If you do this enough, and have the freezer space, before you know it you have 1 or 2 freezer meals a week to pull out and this reduces how much you have to cook.
Meal planning can help out during postpartum in a big way. Mama, don’t do it alone, ask your friends and family to help with freezer meals and snacks. Once the babies are here, freeze extra meals to make it easier for the next week or month! When you don’t have the time or energy to cook order a meal kit or prepared meal. This is a tool you can use to make life easier in postpartum! So you have more time to enjoy with your baby and be nourished with great food.
What’s your favorite way to meal plan? Did I miss anything? Tell me in the comments, I would love to hear from you!
