As the mom of four boys, two dogs, and a budding anxiety disorder, I know how hard it can be to provide your family with nutritious dinners that are also tasty, eco-conscious, cookbook-cover-worthy, and affordable. But because of misogyny built into the very fabric of our society, I’m somehow expected to! That’s why I like to meal-plan—to set myself up for success each week. Disclaimer: Success varies greatly. Typically manifests as failure.
Before we dive in, I know you’re wondering, Are we supposed to just go about our everyday lives and pretend that the collective trauma of a seemingly endless pandemic, the near-overthrow of our democracy, and irreversible damage to our climate isn’t real? Also, do you have vegan options? Yes and yes!
Grocery List: First things first—is it safe to shop in person, or should I still get groceries delivered? What a great, unanswerable question! Luckily, all these meals can be made with basics from your pantry, unless, of course, your definition of “basics” is boxed wine and a pallet of family-sized hand sanitizer. Quick veggie-drawer hack! Wrap your greens in a tea towel to keep them crisp longer. Death and decay are inevitable, but wasting arugula doesn’t have to be.
Monday: Start the week off strong with an easy, vegetarian three-bean chili. All you’ll need is one pot, eight ingredients, thirty minutes, and a health-insurance plan that at least partially covers cognitive-behavioral therapy. Eco-tip! Use reusable bowls, utensils, and straws, but somehow never wash them because that wastes water. It’s a real Catch-22, which is a book you know well since you had to teach it to your kids in remote school last year.
Tuesday: Normally, Tuesday would be burger night, but there was an alt-right, anti-mask, pro-horse-dewormer rally outside the grocery store today, so you couldn’t pick up buns. Then, on the way home, you listened to a podcast about how the industrial meat industry is destroying the Amazon rain forest. All of this might sound like a setback, but it’s actually a set-back-to-the-drawing-board. Serve veggie burgers wrapped in lettuce, call the French fries “pommes frites,” and boom! You’ve got yourself a healthy, classy dinner. Fruit for dessert.
Wednesday: O.K., the kids are still pretty mad about the whole fruit-for-dessert thing. No better way to rebound than with a tuna noodle casserole. I recommend a couple of tweaks: sub ground turkey for tuna because tuna is high in mercury, and you can’t afford to damage your kids’ brains any more than constant exposure to screens already has. Sub zoodles for noodles, sub yogurt for mayo, and then sub the whole thing for pizza because, what the hell, you’re pretty sure the kids love their dad more anyway.
Thursday: You know those videos in which perfectly manicured moms use multicolored batter to make fun cartoon-character pancakes for their delighted children? You don’t know how to do that. Sandwiches.
Friday: T.G.I.F.! Which in this house stands for “Thank God I (bought) Frozen dinners!” Did you know that you can eat frozen dinners for breakfast and lunch, too? It’s true! Plus, your kids will get a decade’s supply of sodium. For dessert, hand each kid a hatchet, shove them all outside, and lock the doors. Foraging for dessert has a fun make-your-own-sundae vibe and will be a necessary skill in the afterscape. Bonus: this also counts as family game night!
Saturday: Pull out some cereal and sniff the milk. Since time is meaningless, it’s breakfast-for-dinner night! This one requires almost zero prep, which gives you a few minutes to reflect on how the labor of creating a meal plan and doing all the budgeting, shopping, and cooking takes away from your ability to do other things, like staring at a wall. Hmm, that wall looks pretty dirty! Better clean it while remembering the birthdays of every member of your immediate and extended family.
Sunday: Time to start planning for next week! Because the weeks never end! They just roll on, oblivious of our attempts at stackable food-storage solutions or our efforts to eat the whole rainbow every day. Yet we continue the strange performance of “planning,” as if playing a sonata on the deck of the Titanic. A futile attempt at control as we slip through chaos into darkness and maybe, finally, into peace. Taco night! ♦
