How to Make a Meal Plan with Google Calendar
For months and months, Joe and I argued about what to have for dinner almost every night.
The conversation would go something like this:
Joe: What should we have for dinner?
Me: I don’t know. What do you want to have?
Joe: I asked you first! Why do I always have to make all of the decisions?!?
Me: Are you serious? You don’t make all of the decisions! I make all of the decisions, and I’m tired of it. Why can’t you choose something once in a while?
No kidding. Isn’t that absurd?
I was determined to end the madness by planning out a menu in advance. I had tried to start (and failed) many times before, but I was determined this time to figure it out and make it work.
Here’s what I came up with -
How to Make a Meal Plan with Google Calendar
1. Create a Calendar
I started small, creating a new Google calendar for our menus, calling it Meal Plan and sharing it with Joe (in the Calendar Settings page). I wanted him to be able to view and make changes to the calendar, so I told Google Calendar to give him permission to make changes to the menu and added his email address.
2. Add in Recipes
A year or two ago, Joe and I made a cookbook of our favorite recipes. I grabbed that book and flipped through it, finding a recipe for each day. I planned out only our dinners, and I skipped days when we already had dinner plans.
I typed the ingredients for each recipe (or copy/pasted if the recipe was online) into the event details.
For the recipes that are online, I also included the URL (so that whoever was making it could grab the recipe from there rather than digging through cookbooks).
For recipes that are not on my blog, I included the name of the cookbook.
When I was finished, we had a few weeks’ worth of meals, all planned out.
Changing Plans
There are some blank spots in the menu because we changed our plans. It’s really simple and easy to change a meal to another day, in the event that we decide to go out to eat or have lots of leftovers or whatever. We just click on it and drag to a new day.
Repeating Meals
Repeating meals is easy. If you want to repeat a meal on the same day, at regular intervals, you can add that in the Repeats section. (See the green photo above for the location of the Repeats info.)
If you want to repeat a meal, but not on the same day of the week, you can use the copy function. After clicking on “copy to my calendar,” the meal will pop up again on the same day.
Drag that new event to the new date you’ve chosen, click on it, and change it to your Meal Plan calendar. It is that easy.
Make Meal Planning a Family Event
Joe’s even gotten involved. When he has some extra time, he logs on to the calendar and adds recipes. That’s how corned beef and cabbage (a meal I detest) snuck in there on St. Patrick’s Day.
I can see us continuing to play our menus this way for a long time because it’s easy, and we can cooperate.
It works for us.
More Meal Planning Resources
I used these websites as I was figure out the Google calendar meal planning thing. I started with Simple Mom’s suggestions, and then I added or deleted things after reading the others.
- Simple Mom’s awesome meal planning resource
- Everything Mom’s meal planning resources
- Amy Locurto’s weekly meal plans
- Organizing Junkie’s menu planning section
Happily submitted to Mouthwatering Mondays, Homemaking Monday, Real Life, Tempt my Tummy Tuesday, Kitchen Tip Tuesday, Tuesday Toot, Tasty Tuesday, Tuesdays at the Table, Tackle It Tuesday, Toot Your Horn Tuesday, and Works for Me Wednesday
Great post! I am a big believer in meal planning and love to hear how others do it.
This is fantastic! I never knew you could do this. I am going to have to try it out since I think I can access google calendar with my itouch (?), if so that would be really handy! Thank you for sharing.
This is great! I almost (the hubs will say I totally) lost it yesterday on this very topic. I swore if one more person asked me what was for dinner I was going to scream (well, maybe I did). I have never been the domestic goddess with all the answers. I have never been able to open the cupboard and wave my arms and viola! a meal. You would think that after 8 months I would have figured this stuff out!! Everyone tells me that meal planning is the answer – this looks very helpful. Thanks!!
After 8 months?!? Oh my goodness. I've lived on my own for almost 10 years. When it was just me, I often did throw open the pantry and whip something up… but I could also spend an hour or two in the kitchen, and it was no big deal.
Now, time is premium. Grace is hungry, we only have two hours together as a family before she goes to bed. That method just doesn't work for us.
You can! I have my iPod set to sync with google calendar, so I bet you can do the same with an iTouch.
And then I'd have to make it my home page so I wouldn't forget to look at it. LOL! That is a fabulous idea!
Blessings,
Kim
I LOVE Google Calendar! I use it for everything!!
I LOVE this idea!!! I use google calendar and never thought of doing it this way!
Honestly, this is the best way to save money! We have been following a meal plan for the past year and I have cut our grocery costs in half! We now spend $50 a week on groceries in most cases.
That is great! We do this but on paper with a pencil. Otherwise we never have the food in the house for the things we want/need. Menu planning and cooking are my biggest tackles on a weekly basis. I hate it!
What a great idea!
Making it your homepage is a great idea! Or you could print it out by week or by month and hang it on the fridge.
Really?!? That's awesome! How has it helped you to cut expenses? Do you plan your meals around what's on sale?
It is a lot of work. I think using the Google calendar will make it a little easier since I can copy and paste meals we've already made. The ingredients for those things are already typed in.
Oooh! I love this! I've been doing something similar for about a year, but I've used a spreadsheet. There's no room on it to include recipes – I'd already been linking to the ones online – without making it too unwieldy. I'm going to try it this way. Thanks, Tara!
Awesome post on using Google Calendar for Meal Plans!!!
My pleasure
Tara,
It just helps me organize… so I plan my meals around what I have on hand.
For instance, if I have an over abundance of carrots then I will make sure
to find a few recipes that will help me make the most of them. I just go to
the store with a plan and stick to it. I found that before I was planning I
would make a random list of things and come home and find that I already had
a few of the items and that we may have bought things that really made no
sense. I definitely try to buy all organic meat and then fill in with non
organic items here and there. I stick to the dirty dozen list when it comes
to organic.
I love google calendar, I have like 14 different calendars to organize my life, I am so adding the Meal Plan!!
Me, too
I love my google calendar meal plan! It works for me too! Great tutorial!
Thank you for this fantastic idea. I'm so going to do this!
beyond awesome.
thank you. i LOVE it. i just set it up.
Thanks Rachel
You are very welcome.
This TOTALLY sounds like me and my husband! I'm going to set it up NOW! Thank you for sharing!
WOW! I love GCal and why didn't I ever think of this?!? I always get SMS/Text Messages from GCal for bill paying etc etc, but the endless possibilities of having this with the meal plan? Have reminders pop up on my iphone? Just wow. This is the best tip I've ever read. Thanks so much for sharing!! Off to creating a Menu Plan on GCal!!
WOW! I love GCal and why didn't I ever think of this?!? I always get SMS/Text Messages from GCal for bill paying etc etc, but the endless possibilities of having this with the meal plan? Have reminders pop up on my iphone? Just wow. This is the best tip I've ever read. Thanks so much for sharing!! Off to creating a Menu Plan on GCal!!
[...] Make a menu plan with Google Calendar @ Feels Like Home [...]
This is GREAT! We've been doing meal planning using good ol pencil and paper for months. This is a wonderful idea. I have 2 weeks worth done, entered, and the grocery list entered into my task list like Ben mentioned. My only question… How can I make it PRINTER friendly so I can have my menu and my recipes available both ONLINE and in my Meal Planning Binder for easy use while cooking in the kitchen?? Any thoughts???
Thanks Kristin
It is simple to print a calendar on Google Calendar. Next to the
Day/Week/Month tabs, to the left of those, is a Print icon. When you click
it, a new window will open with printer options. If you choose to show only
your menu planning calendar, that's all that will print.
Does that make sense?
Yeah makes total sense…I can get the actual calendar to print…and my “task list” grocery list… but Is there anyway to print my day details so I can see the recipes I've added in event details? (I like to have mine printed and put in order of my meal plan for easy access!
) Or do you just bring up your online recipe each time you make a meal and use your computer? 
Thanks again!
Just saw this now – thanks so much for linking up EM!
[...] How to Make a Meal Plan with Google Calendar [...]
I use Google calendar for my meal plan but hadn’t thought to add the actual recipe to it! I divide mine into the following categories: breakfast, lunch, supper, treats, & prep. Treats is for our regular Friday night dessert, special occasion desserts, or “company’s coming” desserts. Prep is to remind me to thaw a whole chicken a few days before I need it or start something that needs to be done overnight.
That’s a great idea!
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