If you are the chief grocery shopper and cook of the house, you’ll know that feeling on shopping day of “Arg what are we going to eat next week?!”. While I love to cook and have a big stack of recipe books, I’m guilty of doing the same meals over and over and find I go through stages where I really lack inspiration for new meals.
I have to say, ideas for meals and planning for the week ahead has become easier thanks to the internet. I have found some great recipes through blogs and also more recently the website Bite.
Bite contains more than 10,000 recipes from some of NZ’s top food personalities, chefs and cooks including Al Brown, Ray McVinnie, Nadia Lim, and Dr Libby Weaver so there’s a huge amount of inspiration for meal planning. Bite is an extension of the publication that comes out in the NZ Herald each week. As well as recipes, there are also kitchen tips, wellness articles and competitions. It is more than a food website though, it’s a community you can actively be a part of, reviewing recipes and even uploading your own. My favourite thing about Bite though is the ability to to save recipes, filter by different ingredients and create shopping lists, I’ve been using it to help me plan my meals, and you can too.
Here’s my tips on meal planning.
To plan my dinner meals for the week, I like to go by the following guidelines in choosing meat:
1-2 vegetarian/meat free meals
1-2 fish or seafood meals
2-3 lean red meat meals
The rest white meat
Here’s why:
Fish, particularly oily fish is an excellent source of omega 3 fatty acids which are essential for good health. Omega 3 fats are an important part of our cell membranes, and because we’re made of cells, omega 3 fats influence many different areas of health, including heart health, mental health and controlling inflammation.
Red meat is one of the richest sources of iron and zinc. Because I tend to run low on iron, two to three small serves of red meat a week help keep my levels up.
Vegetarian meals are kind on the planet and are generally lower in saturated fats, and higher in fibre and plant based proteins.
I also include at least half a plate of non starchy vegetables (a key part to a healthy meal) and a serve of wholefood carbohydrate.
Using these as my basis, I then use Bite to plan out some of my meals for the week.
Here’s how I have planned my meals on Bite:
- To start off, I either look under the set categories, such as easy chicken dinners or fish recipes and find my inspiration. You can look for different ethnic flavours depending on what you like and feel like for the week ahead.
2. Or I’ll search by ingredient. Once you’ve picked your main ingredient, you can also go on to filter further. For example you can select special dietary needs such as gluten free or dairy free, select dinner recipes, and if you want you can also select recipes in this category from your favourite cook.
3. Adding a meal to my favourites
As soon as I see a recipe I like, I hit the favourite button (that wee heart you can see in the bottom right corner) and it saves it to your favourites. You can set up different collections for your favourites, so you can set up different meal planners, for example “Meal planning – September” or “Mexican recipes”.
4. Making a shopping list
Bite also has a function where you can add a recipe ingredients to a shopping list. You can then either email it to yourself, print it or you can copy and paste it to edit out things you already have at home. I emailed mine to myself, then used my phone at the supermarket to check this and grab what I needed.
So for the week ahead, I’ve got everything I need and my recipes sorted! Meal planning really is important for healthy eating and also saving money on food as we all know the more times you pop back, the more money you spend!
Some of the things on my meal plan are lime, chilli and ginger glazed salmon with greens, tandoori chicken thighs, sticky basil chicken and lamb flat breads. Yum!
To start your own Bite account you can join up here, it’s free and easy to use to create your own meal plans.
You can also check out Bite on Facebook, Instagram,Twitter and Pinterest for more inspiration.
This post was made possible by Bite. All opinions are my own, and Bite is a website that I truly enjoy using.
I never knew that Bite existed. What a great website. I never know what to cook for dinner and it makes sense to plan ahead. Coming home from work it’s so easy to fall into that category of ‘what shall I cook, oh I can’t be bothered.’ I end up having something that’s not fulfilling. I have found in the past when I do decide on what I’m going to cook, my groceries don’t cost as much. I will certainly be browsing Bite in the future and will mention the website to family and friends. The chance to share recipes is good too. Fresh herb and Honey chicken, yum!
Hi Carolyn, it is a great website! So many yummy looking recipes, and it’s great being able to save them and rate them too
Great to have a variety of meals to choose from much more interesting than boring meat and three vege…
Tom yum Gai
Lamb flatbreads
Would love to try the Duck, Noodle and Asian Herb salad!
The Chicken & Leek pie looks gorgeous I could hide all sorts of goodness in there for the vegggie refusers in my house.
The Quick Apricot Chicken Casserole gives me a chance to work some Nadia Lim magic! Delicious.
The Smoked paprika roast vegetable soup sounds divine – I love soup even in summer and want to include more vegetables in my meal plans
That sticky basil chicken and the roast veg and miso dressing both look amaaaaaaazing!!!! I’m hungry for them now and it’s 9am!
The Duck, Noodle and Asian Herb salad sounds amazing!
Wow what a great idea! I have just started trying to meal plan and this makes it so much easier thanks very much!
First off I’m going to try the lamb flatbreads I think yummy thanks bite
apricot chicken casserole for my partner and friend Ed
Oh wow there are so many recipes to choose from! This is definitely my new favourite meal planning website 🙂 The Coriander & Lime Grilled Chicken looks incredible! I will definitely be trying this for dinner sometime soon
Lamb flatbreads would be divine! A great weeknight meal to make dinners a bit more exciting!
Oh my god where has this website been all my life! I always buy groceries every two weeks so really have to plan ahead! This will make it so much easier and am guilty of the same thing. Every weeks seems to be the same as the last!
Though tonight I will be stopping on the way home to get everything for lamb flat breads! Can it please be dinner tike already?!
Wow, what delicious choices, and such a great site! Would really love to whip up the lime, chilli and ginger glazed salmon. Good choice for your meal planner 🙂
I would love to try the pumpkin and leafy green frittata! Sounds so delicious
I have to admit I’m quite addicted to this website!! I have created “my bite” full of all the recipes I want to try. I have saved a heap of the feijoa recipes all ready for next season! So many seasonal recipes I am excited to make the chicken mustard bake along with winter roast veges and miso dressing! Since discovering I have told a lot of my clients and one of them told me about the pumpkin seed, cranberry and dark chocolate cookies! I ????bite!
The Chicken and Leek Pie looks and sounds divine
Bite is fantastic and has such a good selection of vegetarian meals! I don’t eat meat but do eat seafood (pescetarian) so it’s great to have some inspiration as we do fall into a bit of a ‘same meal rut’ some weeks! The lime, chili and ginger salmon sounds amazing! I didn’t know about the shopping list and saving favs functions though – thanks for sharing!
Lime, chilli, ginger glazed salmon sounds fabulous.
Miso fresh bowl @AbigailGeddes
Chicken & leek pie I’d like to share with my lil sister 🙂
I really need to try any of these recipes, but I’d look for a slow cooker one first as we don’t have a lot of time in the evening after work, bootcamp and our own training!
The sticky basil chicken and lamb flatbreads sound devine! Meal planning and prepping is key for healthy eating and reducing stress! Makes your week much, much easier!
The lamb flatbreads sound delicious!
Looking forward to trying winter roast veges with miso dressing yum! Make it for my partner John
I already plan my weekly meals but this will be an awesome tool to use! I think that the lamb flatbreads and sticky basil chicken look delicious!
lamb flat bread sounds delicious! ????
I need that pumpkin and leafy greens frittata by Nadia Lim in my life! Looks so yummy and easy to make.
Pumpkin and leafy green frittata!
This is so helpful, thanks so much! I start to get into a good routine but then I get a lazy day or tiredness sets in and we revert to takeaways. Having a meal plan would make things so much easier and give me some focus for cooking and shopping. I would love to try the Lamb Flatbreads – I think they would be a winner even for my preschoolers! 🙂
warm roasted vegetables with miso dressing! YUMO
Wow what a fantastic way to plan meals!
I love the look of Venison roast with kumara mash, roasted kale and black garlic, and will definitely be making it!
Oh Eat Well and Bite
I’m dreaming of these meals
So delicious and nutritious
and full of appeal
My picks would be endless
But tonight for my tea
Will be your sublime
Pumpkin Frittata and warm roasted veges 🙂
Tom yum Gai looks delish #nomnomnom