Animated Lessons
Kitchen management and meal planning
Busy homemakers can find managing the kitchen and meal planning and preparations a large challenge. The trend towards fast foods and convenience foods is common today as a solution to deal with this challenge. I walk into a nearby grocery store and find the deli loaded with "old-fashioned" goodies like roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, apple pies and any other item one could want for making meal time a breeze. This could seem like an answer to prayer!
I am not so convinced that these types of helps for the homemaker
are answers to prayers. The food is loaded with bad fats, MSG,
sugar and poor quality ingredients in general. They add
preservatives and coloring so it is shelf stable and looks
appealing. Perhaps the answer lies more in improving the skills
of managing the kitchen so as to give us the extra time we need
in our days and to be able to feed our family better quality
food.
When you are looking at where to start in managing your kitchen
remember that every homemaker must have a plan. As managers of
our homes we can't be tossed about and pulled by our daily lives
as though we were victims of whatever may come our way. We need
to work on a plan to be prepared to handle the feeding of our
families.
Food and eating are major issues of both finances and health, and
worth the time and effort that is necessary to be organized in
this area. I have found that having a weekly menu has been the
main key to good kitchen management. Making menus, grocery lists
from those menus and keeping my pantry stocked with needed items
makes meal time much easier to deal with.
The first step is to make a menu. [Note from THSM: TheHomeSchoolMom Menu Planner is available at http://www.thehomeschoolmom.com/planner.html#menu ]
Make a grocery list from your recipes making sure to check your pantry for any of the needed items. There's nothing like running out of baking powder when you are trying to quickly make a batch of cornbread. Or finding that your recipe called for a can of tomato sauce that you thought you had.
Having a well stocked pantry is helpful for good kitchen management. Begin by creating a pantry list for yourself. Find lists on the internet to help you get started (I have one on my site, http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/pantrylist.html ). Add to this and remove items to suit your cooking style and needs. Watch for when these commonly used items to go on sale and then stock up on them.
If you feel you just don't have the time to spend to organize this area let me encourage you that as we look at our roles as wives and mothers and put the things of our lives into priority we realize the care and feeding of our family is pretty high on the list. How wonderful it is to be able to feed them better quality home cooked meals and not over do the budget in the process. We will spend time at the grocery store and in the kitchen anyway, so we might as well spend a little extra time organizing this area of our life and receive the benefits of being an organized homemaker!
Crystal Miller, 2004
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