A Question I had for myself while eating tonight.

[Richard Chrz]

I often try to make at least one large cut of meat, like a chuck roast, knowing that it can be used in any number of ways through out the week, tacos, ramen, with a red sauce and pasta. i am likely going to make burgers every week, just never sure of day.. I am generally only un planned for 2-3 meals a week. I worry more about having a pantry full of ingredients that can be made into any number of meals. The only real planning that happens for me, is do I have sourdough made, i generally like to have my dough fermented for 60 hours, and my starter ready to be strong in 24 hours.

I’d be curious what others make sure they try to always keep in their pantry. For me, I need Cento DOP san marzanos, green onions, sweet potatoes, russet potatoes, pasta of various shapes, rice noodles. Romaine lettuce, eggs, yes, hot dogs, burger buns, hot dog buns, mushrooms, tomato paste, heavy cream or buttermilk, chicken.and ground chuck., various blocks of cheese for pizza, or other, garlic.. tortilla she;s for when I am not in the mood to make them. Purple onions, white onions

[Richard Chrz]

I would add various soup stocks, but i make those myself.

[Troutman]

With all this mention of "talking to one's self" I'm thinking you all need some sort of psychiatric help !!!

[Steve R.]

It's only when you answer yourself that you need to seek help.

[Troutman]

We plan on the weekends. Usually cook some sort of protein that lasts for at least 2-3 days. Like several have mentioned, you can then serve it several different ways. Heck if it's grilled chicken I might just eat it cold with a salad. I also cook batches of marinara sauce, freeze it in containers and pull it out for a quick pasta dinner. Same with meatballs, will cook maybe 50 of them and freeze them 4 at a time. Back to weekends, that's when I get my creative juices on, but on weekdays all of us are running a hundred miles per hour to think about doing serious cooking. Maybe if I ever fully retire ....

[Dan Deter]

We plan out our menus, anywhere from 3-5 days, to avoid multiple trips to the grocery store/farmers market, and to not have to think about it every night. Just look at the plan and start cooking. Certain nights are planned easy meals due to our schedules and others I spend time enjoying the process of making something a bit more complex. Obviously things get bumped/moved as the actual days come up. This also helps keep track of when leftovers (which I eat for lunches usually) got put into the fridge, and when they need to be discarded if they haven't been eaten. It also helps keep us from eating the same 3 things over and over...

[WillTravelForFood]

Weekends are for Big Cooking Experiments and fun. If we don't use every piece of cooking apparatus somewhere along the line, we've failed. These are usually planned a few days (or a week or two) ahead, in order to ensure we have all the right ingredients and any advance prep handled. We'll blame any number of cooking TV shows or magazines for the weekend inspirations.

Weeknights depend mostly on a combination of available time vs weather, and we have a fairly good idea of what's going to happen each evening. We tend to keep it generically healthy M-Th, with lots of salmon or other assorted fish, or chicken. Rarely pasta due to carb minimization, but sometimes it's the best option available. Weeknight menus tend to be relatively boring to an outsider, but we know we can knock out a dinner pretty quickly if needed.

If the meal is going to take an hour+ to make, we'll save that option for a weekend.