Planning out the menu

(Pic: That would be my oldest son's opinion of broccoli)

I try to stick to a month to month menu plan. I have a stack of menus from previous months, a total of 6 now. Of course life likes to get in the way at times and I have lost track of my menu plan. That's alright, I'll be getting back on track in February.

As part of planning the menu for the month, I ask my children to get involved. I admit, my youngest is only 3 and not much help in planning the menu. Her idea of a healthy dinner is a hot dog (minus the bun), a BIG bowl of ketchup, a cookie (or 4 cookies), and a piece of chocolate cake (hold the cake, just leave the frosting). But she is still welcome around the dining room table for our menu planning session.

I start out by sitting down at the dining room table with a pencil (for easy changes), a blank monthly calendar, a single subject notebook (where I have a list of meals and ideas for meals), and my 3 children. The calendar is to fill in, the notebook is to jot down the ideas from the kids as well as flip back to the lists of recipes that I have compiled over the years (not the full recipes, just the titles, sorted into categories... I'm too organized sometimes). I then open the floor for suggestions. Before anyone else can open their mouths my oldest is usually the first to shout out "LASAGNA!"

I can always count on my kids to come up with the staple meals of lasagna, spaghetti, beans and rice, and breakfast for dinner. After they have given their standard ideas we plan out which days we are going to have those items and what else we are going to have with it (if anything).

We then fill in the rest of the days from my lists of meals in the notebook.

When it comes to deciding on side dishes is where we usually run into problems. My oldest doesn't like green vegetables. He'll eat salad and he likes spinach but broccoli, peas, green beans are at the bottom of his personal list. So we have come to a compromise. I get salad as often as I can but other days, he has to help pick the vegetable and he does need to eat the vegetables that are on his plate.

No, I am not sitting there and forcing him to eat the veggies, but if he helps to choose the vegetable, he is more inclined to eat it. But then I have my secret weapon... my food processor. Wonderful invention for mothers of picky-eaters everywhere.

On the nights when we do not have a green vegetable on the plate, I will try to find some way to hide a green vegetable in our main dish. Broccoli is chopped up and added to my meatloaf and meatballs. Zucchini and broccoli gets chopped and added to spaghetti sauce. Even though my oldest likes spinach, I still hide it in Salisbury steak.

If I can hide a veggie in dinner, I do. It causes less aggravation at the dinner table, which, for us, is a time of family and conversation. It is not a time to be fighting about eating the broccoli.

But tonight we are having chili, salad and cornbread. A favorite all around (as long as I don't make the chili too spicy for the kids). It is also a favorite of my husband's and he requested it for tonight. Besides, what can be better on a chilly winter's day than a bowl of hot chili topped with chopped onions, and shredded cheese over a slice of fresh-baked cornbread.

Now that I have made myself hungry... I better scat. Recipes and picture of our chili dinner coming tonight!