Here are some pro tips to help you customize the perfect meal plan. Click on what you want to do.
Plan for leftovers and cook less often |
Schedule slow cooker or pressure cooker recipes |
Plan for a quick make ahead breakfast and/or lunch |
Schedule a few hours for batch cooking |
Plan for leftovers and cook less often
To do this, you will need to customize your Schedule:
- Click the gear icon in the upper right corner of the website (this is where you access your Settings)
- Select My Meal Plan or Whole30 Meal Plan
- This opens the Diet and Schedule page where you can specify dietary restrictions as well as make adjustments to your schedule
- Select how many dinners you will cook each week
- Use the slider to select the number of recipes that will be cooked for dinner during the week
- Check the box next to Do you want enough for leftovers? if you would like the meal plan to use leftovers for some of the meals
- Note: Leftovers will be scheduled during lunches and/or dinners based on the number of dinner recipes selected
- Select the appropriate number for How many extra leftover portions would you like to make?
- This is the number of extra portions of each dinner recipe that you want to make
- Select the appropriate number for Over how many meals do you want to spread these leftovers
- This is how many meals each dinner recipe will be used for a leftover
- Click Save if you are done making changes
Schedule slow cooker or pressure cooker recipes
To do this, you will need to customize your Schedule:
- Click the gear icon in the upper right corner of the website (this is where you access your Settings)
- Select My Meal Plan or Whole30 Meal Plan
- This opens the Diet and Schedule page where you can specify dietary restrictions as well as make adjustments to your schedule
- Click Customized Scheduling
- Click on Filter next to the meal for which you want to customize
- Click on Tags in the window that pops up
- Select the Slow Cooker/Crock Pot or Pressure Cooker tag
- Click Add
- Once you are done making changes to your filters, click Save
Pro tip: Other options in the Tags filter that may be helpful include:
- Simple, which includes recipes that use fewer ingredients and take less time to make
- Make-Ahead Breakfast for grab and go breakfasts
- Freezable to help with batch cooking
- Kids, which might have more familiar ingredients
- You can also create your own tags to use for scheduling in the Filters
Plan for a quick make ahead breakfast and/or lunch
To do this, you will need to customize your Schedule:
- Click the gear icon in the upper right corner of the website (this is where you access your Settings)
- Select My Meal Plan or Whole30 Meal Plan
- This opens the Diet and Schedule page where you can specify dietary restrictions as well as make adjustments to your schedule
- Click Customized Scheduling
- Click on Filter next to the breakfast you want to customize
- Click on Tags in the window that pops up
- Some suggested options to consider:
- Select the Active Time filter
- Select the appropriate timeframe
- Usually <= 15 min works for fast options
- Select the Make Ahead Breakfast tag
- A good option for heat and eat breakfasts
- Schedule a specific recipe
- Begin typing the name of the recipe in the Enter Recipe box
- When the recipe you want pops up, select it
- Click the +
- Select the Active Time filter
- Click on the Filter next to the lunch you want to customize
- Schedule a specific recipe
- Begin typing the name of the recipe in the Enter Recipe box
- When the recipe you want pops up, select it
- Click the +
- Create your own packable lunch tag to apply to recipes
- Schedule those recipes by adding the tag you created in the filter for that meal
- Schedule a specific recipe
- Click Add
- Once you are done making changes to your filters, click Save
Schedule a few hours for batch cooking
You may find that our simple meal planning format works well for batch cooking. It frees you from the constraints of a calendar so you can schedule as many (or as few) recipes as you would like in each meal plan. You can then prepare the recipes at the time that fits your schedule. To learn how to change to simple meal planning, click here.
However, if you are using calendar meal planning, the most common way to set up batch cooking:
- Open the Planner
- Manually drag all of the recipes that you want to cook on your big cooking day to that day
- Add a note on the day that you plan to eat each recipe
- Click the ... in the meal time for which you want the note to be scheduled
- Select Add note from the drop down box
- Type in your note
- Click Add
An alternative way to set up batch cooking is to use one main recipe that you can eat for several meals during the week:
- Click the gear icon in the upper right corner of the website (this is where you access your Settings)
- Select My Meal Plan or Whole30 Meal Plan
- Click Customized Scheduling
- Click on Filter next to the meal you want to customize
- Schedule a specific recipe
- Begin typing the name of the recipe in the Enter Recipe box
- When the recipe you want pops up, select it
- Click the +
Pro tip: Some options in the Tags filter that may also be helpful include:
- Simple, which includes recipes that use fewer ingredients and take less time to make
- Make-Ahead Breakfast for grab and go breakfasts
- Freezable to help with batch cooking
- Kids, which might have more familiar ingredients
- You can also create your own tags to use for scheduling in the Filters
Here is an example of how a bulk cooking plan could be set up:
That might translate into something like this in your Meal Planner:
If you need assistance, please send us an email at support(at)realplans.com.