January 20, 2025 • 34 mins
Dads navigating back-to-school chaos find valuable insights on meal planning and preparation in this episode. We discuss practical strategies, involve kids in cooking, and offer tips to make grocery shopping easier and more enjoyable.
• Importance of meal planning for divorced dads
• Overcoming challenges in meal preparation
• Tips for effective meal planning and organization
• Benefits of batch cooking and freezing meals
• Utilizing recipe planning tools for convenience
• Creating and adhering to a grocery list
• Managing grocery shopping solo for efficiency
• Engaging kids in meal planning and cooking
• Affordable grocery shopping tips for saving money
• Exploring grocery store loyalty programs and meal kit services
• Simple steps to get started with meal prep
• Emphasis on teaching kids valuable cooking skills
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello and welcome to the Divorced Dadvocate, where we
help dads create a healthierand a less traumatic divorce.
My name is Jude Sandvall, I amyour host and today we are going
to have another edition ofPractical Advice and we're going
(00:36):
to be talking about with thekids going back to school.
My kids are back to school thisnext week and I know that kids
across the country and the worldare going back to school this
next week and I know that kidsacross the country and the world
are going back to school.
So we're going to talk aboutmeal planning and meal prep for
divorced dads, which sometimesespecially if you are newly
(00:59):
separated or divorced that cansometimes be a little bit of a
challenge.
I know it was for me gettingused to it, but it's definitely
doable.
But before we jump into that,let me just remind you if you've
not checked out the divorcequiz on the website yet, it is
awesome.
We've been getting a ton ofpeople taking it.
(01:19):
It is a tool that will help youkind of assess where you're at
in the divorce process comparedto other people that have gone
through divorce, and it justspits out five, six different
categories that you may be goingthrough and helps you do a
little self-assessment.
(01:40):
So go to thedivorcedadvocatecomand click on divorce quiz.
It's an awesome tool.
Also, we've got some workshopsand classes coming up.
Check out the website, ordivorceddadsfreshstartcom that's
the workshop we've got everyweek now, and then
(02:00):
dadsdivorceblueprintcom August22nd.
We've got a new class startingthen, so check those out.
All right Now I don't know aboutyou, but with work and getting
kids back and forth to schooland extracurricular activities
(02:23):
and everything else that we'vegot going on, sometimes planning
meals, I really even justsimply forget.
I'll be completely honest, butfor the most part, I try to do a
really good job in planning outmy weeks for meal prep and meal
(02:43):
purchase and meal planning, andso we're going to talk today
about some tips for helping yougo through that, especially if
you're new at doing this and itused to be the traditional
family and you had somebody thatyou were working together with
and grocery shopping with, orthey did the grocery shopping
(03:03):
and you did the prep, or maybeyou didn't do any of it.
This can be just somewhatoverwhelming at the start, but,
trust me, it just takes a littlebit of planning and you can be
highly effective.
And actually I've talked tomany men, so I used to work in
restaurants.
I really love to cook and socooking is just something that's
(03:24):
fun and enjoyable to me.
Lots of men have not done itbefore and haven't liked to do
it before, but I've talked tomany who got into it and started
to do it and really started toenjoy it.
So it can be something that canbe creative and fun, depending
upon the time that you take indeveloping your cooking skills,
(03:44):
just like anything else, anddeveloping a plan to prep for
what it is that you're cookingand your meal planning.
So it can be a lot of fun.
The other challenge is somegrocery store shopping.
Right, some people hate it.
I, for whatever weird reason Iknow this is a weird quirk that
I have, because everybody tellsme that I really don't mind
(04:07):
grocery shopping and I actuallyspend several like.
I probably hit the grocerystore at least three times,
three times a week.
I try to buy everything freshand not freeze anything.
So I spend a little bit moretime and I put a little bit more
time into my schedule for fordoing that.
So it's not as big of a deal.
It's when you can start gettingrushed and you don't have time.
(04:28):
That's when it gets stressful.
So what we're going to talkabout today is ways to make this
easier, make it not stressful,because we don't want to be
working up in the morningstressing about getting
breakfast and lunches made andgetting kids off and then coming
home and having to cook.
You just start to feelsometimes like maybe a short
(04:49):
order cook or a maid, and I feelyour pain.
I know how that is.
So let's talk first about tipsfor the actual meal planning,
and what you're going to want todo is you're going to want to
really take the time to spend ahalf hour or so planning out
your week of meals, and Itypically will do this on a
(05:14):
Sunday sometime.
My Sundays are usually prettycasual, so I plan a time where
I'm going to sit and I'm goingto think about and strategize.
So you want to strategize whatit is that you're going to be
preparing for the week Now,depending upon what your
schedule might be.
Some might be on a 5-2-2-5,some might be a week on week off
(05:34):
.
You might have the kids just onthe weekend, so you might going
to maybe have to plan for thatnext weekend Friday through
Sunday.
So, depending upon what it islooking like then, you're going
to want to plan for that, andyou want to plan in terms of
recipes, in terms of dishes, orwhat you're going to cook or
what you're going to serve,instead of just thinking about
(05:58):
one-off items like, oh, I'mgoing to cook chicken, or I'm
going to cook a pizza, orwhatever it might be.
So you want to think about whatit is of the recipe and the
dish that you're going to plan,and so why that makes it easier
is then what you can do fromthere is you can prepare a list
(06:20):
of what you want, and I highlysuggest trying to do batches of
stuff.
So batches of maybe red beansand rice is a good one,
spaghetti sauce is a good one.
Soups I love soups.
Sundays, in the winters, I willcook batches of soups or
(06:41):
chilies, and you can have a lotof that and you can freeze some
of it.
You can eat some of it rightaway and you can freeze some, or
you can freeze all of it inportions and then take it out as
you go, and then you can buildup just kind of a quantity.
So sometimes, if I'm doing that, particularly during the winter
time, I can build up for thosedays that I just have.
(07:03):
Like I said, I've forgotten toplan something and I can pull
out a chili or some spaghettisauce and make some spaghetti
real quick, so you can build upin your freezer some of those
large batches that you'veportioned down to pull out in
case of an emergency.
Yeah, so the next step is youwant to create a list for when
(07:29):
you are going to the grocerystore, and we're going to talk
about strategies in going to thegrocery store too.
But let me just also add ifyou're not good at planning
recipes, there are options outthere for you to get online in
their recipe builders.
There's a site called theDinner Daily, and so they'll
(07:53):
help you plan meals around yourgrocery store and their weekly
flyers, which is really coolbecause you can find those
discounts on food items.
There's also another one calledthe $5mealplancom.
It's $5mealplancom, and they'llalso give you recipes as well,
(08:22):
and it's recipes, unlike recipesthat you find when you just
Google a recipe for somethingand they come up with all of
these exotic things that youneed to be hunting all over at
different grocery stores forwhich, like you know, you can't
be doing that.
It's just a giant pain.
So it's with normal, everydayingredients that will that
you'll be able to easily find inthe grocery stores.
You're going up and down theaisles or you're in the produce
(08:44):
section, so it makes it a loteasier.
So if you're really really newto this, maybe look and
subscribe to one of those andthey'll help you spit out some
different recipes and then fromthat recipe you can take and you
can make your list.
And you can make a list.
Always, always make a list andtry to stick to that list.
(09:07):
Then this is going to help inthe finance department.
Stick to that list when you goto the grocery store and we'll
talk about tips on saving moneywhen you go to the grocery store
in just a bit too.
But those recipe sites willhelp you to formulate that list
and then when you get to thegrocery store you have your list
.
Now, if you're really superduper prepared which I am never
(09:31):
that super duper prepared everyweek you can formulate that list
based on the aisles.
If you know your grocery storewell enough or after many years,
like it is now that I've beendoing this on my own, you kind
of get to know your grocerystore and you know the aisles,
you can base your list and youcan section off your list and
sort it by aisle so that you canjust be effective when you're
(09:53):
going into the store and you canget in and out.
Now I can't do that.
I always end up going oh man, Iforgot I needed this.
It was on my list, but I didn'tlook at my list and I went past
that aisle and I got to go backdown to produce and I got to go
back down to the freezersection or to the dairy section
or to whatever section.
So I end up just like goingback and forth to in the grocery
(10:16):
store.
But that's okay with me.
Like I said, I don't mind beingthere as much.
But here's a good tip too whenyou are going to the grocery
store, especially in thebeginning, if you're just
getting used to doing thisgrocery shopping prepping thing
and it's a little overwhelmingtry to do it when you're alone
and not with the kids,especially if you have little
(10:38):
kiddos.
So when I got divorced, my kidswere six, four and two.
So, as you can imagine, threelittle ones in the grocery store
can be incredibly, incrediblychallenging.
So if you can schedule thisaround times where they are
maybe at you know with theirmother, that would be good.
(10:59):
Or maybe during school if youhave time when they're at school
, depending on what year hoursare or if they're a little bit
older, they have after schoolactivities Oftentimes.
So if I'm not little bit older,they have after school
activities Oftentimes.
So if I'm not doing it on theweekend and I'm doing it during
the week, if I've got a timewhere it's just an hour, maybe
(11:19):
they're at an activity I'mdropping them off at one of
their activities.
I've got an hour that I wouldotherwise be having to kill or
just drive back home, and thenby the time I get home I got to
drive back and pick them upagain.
I will try to schedule my timeto go to the grocery store in
that maybe 45 minutes or an hour, which is about the perfect
time that it takes me to getthrough the grocery store about
(11:41):
45 minutes to an hour max,especially if I have my list and
I know my stores now, or I knowmy one particular store that I
like to go to.
So that's about the max that ittakes me to get through.
So go alone if you can,especially in the beginning, and
then that also avoids all thenasty little secrets tactics
(12:03):
that the grocery storesimplement on you and the kids,
which is putting all thecolorful cereals and stuff at
the bottom and all thatmerchandising in order to get
you and the kids to be lookingat this and that, and it avoids
all the can we get this, can weget that, et cetera.
So if you can do that,especially at the start, that's
(12:24):
great.
If not, I highly suggest and Idid this because it wasn't
possible for me to, I didn'treally have time when they were
younger so I always took them tothe grocery store and so I got
them involved in helping dostuff, because they all really
liked to pick out the differentthings that we were going to eat
(12:47):
.
And I even got them involved inthe meal planning, the recipe
planning, early and we wouldpick and this happened probably
when they were about six, eightand 10, each one of them would
pick one dinner a night thatthey were going to be
responsible for planning andthey came up with the recipe and
(13:09):
we even bought a recipe, akid's recipe book.
So they came up with reallycool and fun different recipes,
like mac and cheese with a hotdog for the protein in it, and
the hot dog was cut up a specialway, like an octopus with
mustard as the eyes.
It was really cool.
They had a lot of fun preppingthat and it was easy stuff like
(13:31):
a Mac and cheese and hot dogs.
They could help prepare that.
But then they even got to get alittle more creative.
They started making stuff likelasagna, because they love to
make the lasagna, boil thenoodles and then put it all
together and build it.
It's almost like a littlescience project for them
building that and then cookingit and then eating it.
(13:52):
And lasagna is one of those bigbatch things.
Then you can portion out andyou can freeze and have for
later.
So getting them involved wasreally a good thing for me.
I really enjoyed it and theyreally enjoyed it.
The other thing it assisted indoing was teaching them how to
look and buy things.
So I'd explain to them howthings were priced and how to
(14:15):
look at the different prices onthings, how some things were
generic labeled with the grocerystores and how some of them
were retail labeled just withthe regular ones and some of
them they'd recognize fromseeing on advertisements and I'd
explain well, there's this alsothe generic version.
Maybe it's good, maybe it's not.
(14:37):
Sometimes you got to try it.
And then we started talkingabout as we ate, healthier and
more organic stuff there'sorganic options and what that
meant.
So it was really an educationalprocess for them.
So now my daughter's being older, they can go into the grocery
store and they can look and theycan find the best deal on
something.
And we've even taken it now tothe next level, which is the
(15:02):
grocery shopping challenge.
I don't know if any of you haveseen that TV show where people
will go in and they're shoppingand the challenge is to find all
of the stuff as quickly aspossible through the grocery
store.
So we've even done some fundays where we will split up the
grocery list in teams andthere's four of us, so it'll be
(15:23):
two and two.
We'll each get a cart and thenwe take off and then we're going
and seeing who can find theitems the quickest and then meet
at the front Now and actuallyafter that I review that we got
everything and make sure that wegot everything and it's the
appropriate stuff, et cetera.
But it makes it kind of fun andit it just mixes stuff up a
(15:46):
little bit.
So those are a few differentfun ways that you can get the
job done at the grocery store,even if you have the kids there,
and it keeps them occupied andmaybe having a little fun too.
So let's talk about some tipsfor more affordable grocery
(16:08):
shopping.
Okay, um, the first one wouldbe um, join your grocery stores
reward program.
So this, uh, this used to benot as economical or not as
helpful, but now, with all ofthe electronic awards apps that
they have out there like mygrocery store has one, and I can
literally you don't have tocoupon clip, you don't have to
(16:30):
do anything.
Um, that used to be a big thing, the coupon clipping, and I
don't know about you, but that'sa ginormous pain in the butt.
But the app is, and the onethat I have for my grocery store
chain is you just go in and youcan click it electronically on
your app and then, once you typein your number in the store, it
applies it automatically.
(16:51):
So if I see something on theapp that I need for that that I
put on my list for that week, itjust automatically takes the
discount off of it, which isincredibly, incredibly helpful.
Another one, and this is areally fantastic one, and I got
to admit I have not done this,but thinking about the thought
(17:12):
process behind it makes perfectsense and that is bring cash to
pay for your groceries.
And that is because if youbring a 100, like, for instance,
you bring a $100 bill and youknow that that is what you have
budgeted for groceries that week, then you will not go over and
(17:32):
you will not.
You know, you will stay true tothat budget and not be just
tossing things into the cartthat you see as you walk down
that aisle and fall into thattrap I was talking about with
the merchandising and like, oh,look at this end cap, I like
that, let's try this.
Or what is this.
Or look at this display.
It will keep you on your budgetmuch better because you have
(17:57):
that dollar amount set and youhave that with you and you
cannot exceed that.
So I think that's a great one.
Another one is shop for's a.
That's a.
That's a great one.
(18:17):
And my daughter, my, uh, myyoungest, just asked this this
week about zucchini and I havetotally space and apparently she
loves zucchini now and we liketo saute zucchini.
So if you shop for it in season, then it's going to be less
expensive and then that alsohelps you keep a variety of
different recipes going like, uh, the zucchinis and squashes and
stuff, and then that also helpsyou keep a variety of different
recipes going like thezucchinis and squashes and stuff
(18:38):
, and you can do the sauteedstuff like that, you can grill
them as well.
Then that gives you theopportunity to just mix it up a
little bit, because we're goingto talk about strategies for
mixing up a little bit here too.
I kind of get into my same oldroutine of the same stuff A lot
(19:01):
of meats, a lot of vegetables,all kind of a rotation, and
that's also why I engaged mydaughters in picking up their
stuff.
So you started to hear acomplaint oh, chicken again, dad
.
I said, okay, well, great, youdon't want to have chicken.
So why don't you come up with asolution to something different
?
You'd like on that day that youare going to be preparing the
(19:23):
dinner, and so not only to helpthem think about something
different than it was chicken inour case, apparently I like
chicken a lot.
I do like chicken, and you know.
But then it's also helped themto see that it's not.
It's not that easy to figurethis stuff out.
So you know, we can make itlook like we're super dads a lot
(19:44):
of the time because we'reprepping this stuff and we're,
you know, we're pulling offbreakfast, lunch and dinner
every single day.
But when they need to justthink about one meal a week and
they need need to prep that andthey need to look for it at the
grocery store and then come homeand they need to prepare it
that night together and thenserve it, it really gives them
(20:05):
an appreciation of this wholeprocess.
Little to no complaininganymore, because they did have
an appreciation for being ableto do that whole process and
only having to do it once andnot having to do it seven days a
week or however many weekdays.
Well, seven days a week, theyare eating seven days a week, so
(20:27):
, whether they're with me orwith their mom.
So another tip is stock up onbasic ingredients like flour or
sugar or anything else that'speanut butter, some of those
staples that you might have whenthey go on sale.
If there's a good sale, maybebuy two or three of them, if
(20:48):
it's within your budget, andstock them up.
Either freeze them or, you know, at my old house I built
shelves and shelving.
Now, with the advent of Costco,sam's Club, some of the big
stores where you can buy inmassive bulk.
You can do that and that helpsout as well in buying bulk.
Sometimes I don't have as muchspace at my place and I also try
(21:13):
to buy fresh as much aspossible and not freeze,
especially any meats anymore.
So that's why I'm doing moregrocery stores.
There's nothing wrong with it.
You just got to have the spaceand the place to store it,
freezers as well as shelving Allright.
So if you absolutely loathegoing into the grocery store and
(21:36):
I've got a friend whoabsolutely loathes going to the
grocery store and he's notprepared enough and organized
enough so he actually hiressomebody to go into the grocery
store but not all of us havethat disposable income and
ability to hire somebody to godo our grocery store shopping
for us.
But there are a lot of us thatdo loathe going to the grocery
(21:57):
store.
So there are two options nowwith the advent of and
especially after all this COVIDstuff, and that is doing
curbside pickup or having thegroceries delivered directly to
your door.
Now I was an early adopter ofthe delivery stuff and when they
started it it was justabsolutely atrocious and it was
a train wreck and they got stuffwrong and they forgot stuff and
(22:20):
it never came on time and thenit was all seemed warm and nasty
and so it was not good.
So I didn't do it for a longtime and I've gone back since to
trying it and a lot of themhave a really good services now
for doing that.
Now, my only challenge in whatI don't like is two things is
(22:40):
that if they don't havesomething, they're just going to
replace it with something else,and I don't necessarily like
that, because I'm a littleparticular about what I'm buying
and what I want and ingredients.
And the other thing is I reallylike to find deals and find
sales.
So that's why I go to the storeand that's why I don't use this
.
So I like to find what's goodand I like to look at the
(23:02):
product too before I'm buying it.
So if you're as picky as I am,that might be a little bit more
challenging.
But you can still do that withthe curbside if you're going to
check the groceries before youtake them home and see if that's
that's going to work.
But those are two options.
If you absolutely do not wantto, uh, to step foot into, uh,
(23:25):
the grocery store and so, um,let's see here.
Um, now, meal delivery services.
Okay, so let's talk about now.
We talked about the grocerydelivery from the grocery store
Chef.
Some of those ones are mealdelivery services.
(23:48):
Now, these are really cool forseveral reasons.
One is they will prep theportions for you and create meal
(24:13):
kits specifically for you.
So if you have a family of four, you say I have a family of
four and I need meals, I needdinners for four days this week,
and they will prep stuff ineasy to prepare this.
So they'll have it prepped andready for an easy for you to
(24:36):
prepare for dinner in a veryshort period of time.
So instead of having to pullout the meats and the vegetables
and maybe a starch and startcooking that and boiling the
rice or the potatoes or bakingthem and then cutting up the
vegetables and steaming them andthen having planned to marinate
(24:57):
the meat and then grill that,it all comes in a prepared,
pre-prepared kit and you'regoing to pull that out.
It's got specific step-by-stepinstructions makes it incredibly
easy for you to pull out.
This is really helpful ifyou're not very skilled or very
organized very skilled or veryorganized and it can help you
(25:23):
kind of bridge that gap for thetime being, if you want to learn
some more skills and do that soyou can get these prepared meal
kit delivery services.
And it is also really easy toinclude the kids in doing that
too, because it's so easy and sostep by step.
And the other thing that reallyhelps with this, or this helps
with, is that it will mix thingsup a little bit.
(25:46):
Like I said, I kind of getstagnant.
So they have all thesedifferent options out there and
if you order the different stuff, you know it gives you a lot of
options and a lot of you knowyou can just you're probably
never, ever going to be at aloss and you're probably never
going to hear that complaint,like the chicken complaint, that
there's not.
You know that it's the samestuff over and over because they
(26:08):
have so many myriad of options.
Now, the only drawback is theyare much more expensive.
So you're paying for the time.
You know time is money, right,so you're paying for them to put
that menu together, that recipetogether, pre-prepare it, get
(26:29):
it all ready for you and have itall set there.
Now here's one thing, thoughthat is a tip If you don't want
to have that delivered and youwant to save a little bit of
money and you still want to havethat meal kit service.
Some of the grocery stores noware selling some of those in
store.
(26:49):
So if you go and you look and Ifind them at the kind of around
the deli sections and the deliaisles they'll have some.
They're not huge, hugeselections, but they do have
some of those and these are goodones too.
If you want to buy, you want tofreeze and you want to stock up
on those, and you can.
This is as simple as if youwant to go and you want to
(27:11):
prepare that and create acalendar, you can have them all
in your freezer.
If you have a standup freezerand you can have them dated and
you can just pull them out andyou'll know exactly what those
are.
Or, like I said before, if youforget, you've got something
right there, it's already set.
You just pull it out and youcan get it all ready.
(27:32):
Now you probably have to thawit out, so you probably have a
little foresight to thaw it outand put it in the fridge, but
you can have those thawed outand ready to go for when you um,
when you want them, or ifyou're like me and you just
forget right.
So this is going to save you aton of time.
This is going to save you a tonof money If you, uh, if you,
(27:54):
put into place some of these, um, some of these options and and
all of them whether it's themeal kit services, whether it's
the grocery store apps or themeal kits in the stores they all
have some promotions so you cantry these and it's pretty
economical even just to try andstart out doing some of this
(28:17):
stuff and seeing what works foryou and what doesn't.
So, nine years down the road,for me, I kind of know what I
want.
I kind of know what I do.
I've got Sundays and Wednesdayson my schedule for grocery
shopping at the very minimum.
So I know I'm doing that.
I know I'm prepping on Sundaywith my recipes and my list and
I'm setting that in place.
(28:37):
And then I know, you know, I'mgoing on Wednesday for the meals
for the rest of the week.
So I've kind of got this set upand I like my schedule is
flexible, I make my own scheduleso I can do, I spend the time
and my daughters know that we'regoing to be.
You know, mealtime is going tobe meal prep at a certain time
of the afternoon or evening andthen we'll be cooking.
We're going to be sitting downtogether.
(28:58):
Not everybody can do that, andso I recognize that, and that's
why being prepared like thiswill help you immensely.
And if this is also overwhelming, try starting with just
breakfast.
Start with breakfast, somethingsmall, and prep for breakfasts
for that week.
And maybe do something likebreakfast sandwiches.
(29:18):
Prep on Sunday some breakfastsandwiches with an English
muffin, eggs and a uh and a beefyou know, just a beef breakfast
patty.
Make those up, put them inZiplocs, put them in the freezer
, make a bunch of them, havethem ready to go, pop them in
the microwave in the morning.
It's going to make your lifemuch easier.
It's going to be much healthierthan just feeding them that
(29:41):
sugary cereal with milk.
That's just not going tosustain them through the morning
and even get them to theafternoon.
And maybe then do the samething after that.
Work on preparing those lunchesas well and getting those ready
and where you can just pull outduring the week and put them in
(30:01):
the kids' lunch boxes to go forthe day.
And then, next thing, work yourway up to having the dinner
meals as well, and again, engagethe kiddos in all this so that
they can see and they can alsotake some, you know, take some
ownership of doing this as well.
Our ultimate goal is to teachour kids how to go off and live
(30:23):
their lives as adults andhealthy, functioning adults, and
eventually they're going tohave to learn this stuff, and so
the sooner we engage them inthis and the sooner that we help
them to learn some of theselife skills, the better off
they're going to be.
I know that I wasn't preparedwhen I went off and some of this
stuff was learning, you know,searching around in the dark.
So you're actually doing them aservice by engaging them and
(30:47):
helping them in it.
And sometimes they're going tocomplain, they're going to whine
right, they'd rather be playingvideo games than prepping food.
But after a while some of themget really engaged in it.
You can have a lot of fun.
It's all about the mentalitythat you take in it, reframing
it, making it fun, enjoying thetime together.
So those are some tips.
(31:07):
I hope this episode of practicaladvice on meal planning and
meal prep was helpful to you,especially if you're new to this
and just going through thedivorce you're newly divorced it
will be absolutely gratifyinggoing through this and learning.
I'm Italian, all of our livesrevolve around food and it's a
(31:29):
lot of fun to do that as afamily, so hope you enjoyed.
If you did and you found somevalue.
Please subscribe like ourchannel.
Share this with somebody else.
We keep getting some more andmore men to the Divorce Dads
community or the DivorceDadvocate community.
Our meetings are full everysingle week.
(31:51):
Workshops are building up,classes are coming up, so please
share this, pay it forward andlet somebody else know about
what we're doing here.
We're building, going throughthis together.
Let's just help each other.
(32:20):
You can get through this.
Hopefully this practical advicetoday will help you do so.
Thanks so much.
You have a phenomenal week,thank you.
Hello and welcome to the Divorced Dadvocate, where we
help dads create a healthierand a less traumatic divorce.
My name is Jude Sandvall, I amyour host and today we are going
to have another edition ofPractical Advice and we're going
(00:36):
to be talking about with thekids going back to school.
My kids are back to school thisnext week and I know that kids
across the country and the worldare going back to school this
next week and I know that kidsacross the country and the world
are going back to school.
So we're going to talk aboutmeal planning and meal prep for
divorced dads, which sometimesespecially if you are newly
(00:59):
separated or divorced that cansometimes be a little bit of a
challenge.
I know it was for me gettingused to it, but it's definitely
doable.
But before we jump into that,let me just remind you if you've
not checked out the divorcequiz on the website yet, it is
awesome.
We've been getting a ton ofpeople taking it.
(01:19):
It is a tool that will help youkind of assess where you're at
in the divorce process comparedto other people that have gone
through divorce, and it justspits out five, six different
categories that you may be goingthrough and helps you do a
little self-assessment.
(01:40):
So go to thedivorcedadvocatecomand click on divorce quiz.
It's an awesome tool.
Also, we've got some workshopsand classes coming up.
Check out the website, ordivorceddadsfreshstartcom that's
the workshop we've got everyweek now, and then
(02:00):
dadsdivorceblueprintcom August22nd.
We've got a new class startingthen, so check those out.
All right Now I don't know aboutyou, but with work and getting
kids back and forth to schooland extracurricular activities
(02:23):
and everything else that we'vegot going on, sometimes planning
meals, I really even justsimply forget.
I'll be completely honest, butfor the most part, I try to do a
really good job in planning outmy weeks for meal prep and meal
(02:43):
purchase and meal planning, andso we're going to talk today
about some tips for helping yougo through that, especially if
you're new at doing this and itused to be the traditional
family and you had somebody thatyou were working together with
and grocery shopping with, orthey did the grocery shopping
(03:03):
and you did the prep, or maybeyou didn't do any of it.
This can be just somewhatoverwhelming at the start, but,
trust me, it just takes a littlebit of planning and you can be
highly effective.
And actually I've talked tomany men, so I used to work in
restaurants.
I really love to cook and socooking is just something that's
(03:24):
fun and enjoyable to me.
Lots of men have not done itbefore and haven't liked to do
it before, but I've talked tomany who got into it and started
to do it and really started toenjoy it.
So it can be something that canbe creative and fun, depending
upon the time that you take indeveloping your cooking skills,
(03:44):
just like anything else, anddeveloping a plan to prep for
what it is that you're cookingand your meal planning.
So it can be a lot of fun.
The other challenge is somegrocery store shopping.
Right, some people hate it.
I, for whatever weird reason Iknow this is a weird quirk that
I have, because everybody tellsme that I really don't mind
(04:07):
grocery shopping and I actuallyspend several like.
I probably hit the grocerystore at least three times,
three times a week.
I try to buy everything freshand not freeze anything.
So I spend a little bit moretime and I put a little bit more
time into my schedule for fordoing that.
So it's not as big of a deal.
It's when you can start gettingrushed and you don't have time.
(04:28):
That's when it gets stressful.
So what we're going to talkabout today is ways to make this
easier, make it not stressful,because we don't want to be
working up in the morningstressing about getting
breakfast and lunches made andgetting kids off and then coming
home and having to cook.
You just start to feelsometimes like maybe a short
(04:49):
order cook or a maid, and I feelyour pain.
I know how that is.
So let's talk first about tipsfor the actual meal planning,
and what you're going to want todo is you're going to want to
really take the time to spend ahalf hour or so planning out
your week of meals, and Itypically will do this on a
(05:14):
Sunday sometime.
My Sundays are usually prettycasual, so I plan a time where
I'm going to sit and I'm goingto think about and strategize.
So you want to strategize whatit is that you're going to be
preparing for the week Now,depending upon what your
schedule might be.
Some might be on a 5-2-2-5,some might be a week on week off
(05:34):
.
You might have the kids just onthe weekend, so you might going
to maybe have to plan for thatnext weekend Friday through
Sunday.
So, depending upon what it islooking like then, you're going
to want to plan for that, andyou want to plan in terms of
recipes, in terms of dishes, orwhat you're going to cook or
what you're going to serve,instead of just thinking about
(05:58):
one-off items like, oh, I'mgoing to cook chicken, or I'm
going to cook a pizza, orwhatever it might be.
So you want to think about whatit is of the recipe and the
dish that you're going to plan,and so why that makes it easier
is then what you can do fromthere is you can prepare a list
(06:20):
of what you want, and I highlysuggest trying to do batches of
stuff.
So batches of maybe red beansand rice is a good one,
spaghetti sauce is a good one.
Soups I love soups.
Sundays, in the winters, I willcook batches of soups or
(06:41):
chilies, and you can have a lotof that and you can freeze some
of it.
You can eat some of it rightaway and you can freeze some, or
you can freeze all of it inportions and then take it out as
you go, and then you can buildup just kind of a quantity.
So sometimes, if I'm doing that, particularly during the winter
time, I can build up for thosedays that I just have.
(07:03):
Like I said, I've forgotten toplan something and I can pull
out a chili or some spaghettisauce and make some spaghetti
real quick, so you can build upin your freezer some of those
large batches that you'veportioned down to pull out in
case of an emergency.
Yeah, so the next step is youwant to create a list for when
(07:29):
you are going to the grocerystore, and we're going to talk
about strategies in going to thegrocery store too.
But let me just also add ifyou're not good at planning
recipes, there are options outthere for you to get online in
their recipe builders.
There's a site called theDinner Daily, and so they'll
(07:53):
help you plan meals around yourgrocery store and their weekly
flyers, which is really coolbecause you can find those
discounts on food items.
There's also another one calledthe $5mealplancom.
It's $5mealplancom, and they'llalso give you recipes as well,
(08:22):
and it's recipes, unlike recipesthat you find when you just
Google a recipe for somethingand they come up with all of
these exotic things that youneed to be hunting all over at
different grocery stores forwhich, like you know, you can't
be doing that.
It's just a giant pain.
So it's with normal, everydayingredients that will that
you'll be able to easily find inthe grocery stores.
You're going up and down theaisles or you're in the produce
(08:44):
section, so it makes it a loteasier.
So if you're really really newto this, maybe look and
subscribe to one of those andthey'll help you spit out some
different recipes and then fromthat recipe you can take and you
can make your list.
And you can make a list.
Always, always make a list andtry to stick to that list.
(09:07):
Then this is going to help inthe finance department.
Stick to that list when you goto the grocery store and we'll
talk about tips on saving moneywhen you go to the grocery store
in just a bit too.
But those recipe sites willhelp you to formulate that list
and then when you get to thegrocery store you have your list
.
Now, if you're really superduper prepared which I am never
(09:31):
that super duper prepared everyweek you can formulate that list
based on the aisles.
If you know your grocery storewell enough or after many years,
like it is now that I've beendoing this on my own, you kind
of get to know your grocerystore and you know the aisles,
you can base your list and youcan section off your list and
sort it by aisle so that you canjust be effective when you're
(09:53):
going into the store and you canget in and out.
Now I can't do that.
I always end up going oh man, Iforgot I needed this.
It was on my list, but I didn'tlook at my list and I went past
that aisle and I got to go backdown to produce and I got to go
back down to the freezersection or to the dairy section
or to whatever section.
So I end up just like goingback and forth to in the grocery
(10:16):
store.
But that's okay with me.
Like I said, I don't mind beingthere as much.
But here's a good tip too whenyou are going to the grocery
store, especially in thebeginning, if you're just
getting used to doing thisgrocery shopping prepping thing
and it's a little overwhelmingtry to do it when you're alone
and not with the kids,especially if you have little
(10:38):
kiddos.
So when I got divorced, my kidswere six, four and two.
So, as you can imagine, threelittle ones in the grocery store
can be incredibly, incrediblychallenging.
So if you can schedule thisaround times where they are
maybe at you know with theirmother, that would be good.
(10:59):
Or maybe during school if youhave time when they're at school
, depending on what year hoursare or if they're a little bit
older, they have after schoolactivities Oftentimes.
So if I'm not little bit older,they have after school
activities Oftentimes.
So if I'm not doing it on theweekend and I'm doing it during
the week, if I've got a timewhere it's just an hour, maybe
(11:19):
they're at an activity I'mdropping them off at one of
their activities.
I've got an hour that I wouldotherwise be having to kill or
just drive back home, and thenby the time I get home I got to
drive back and pick them upagain.
I will try to schedule my timeto go to the grocery store in
that maybe 45 minutes or an hour, which is about the perfect
time that it takes me to getthrough the grocery store about
(11:41):
45 minutes to an hour max,especially if I have my list and
I know my stores now, or I knowmy one particular store that I
like to go to.
So that's about the max that ittakes me to get through.
So go alone if you can,especially in the beginning, and
then that also avoids all thenasty little secrets tactics
(12:03):
that the grocery storesimplement on you and the kids,
which is putting all thecolorful cereals and stuff at
the bottom and all thatmerchandising in order to get
you and the kids to be lookingat this and that, and it avoids
all the can we get this, can weget that, et cetera.
So if you can do that,especially at the start, that's
(12:24):
great.
If not, I highly suggest and Idid this because it wasn't
possible for me to, I didn'treally have time when they were
younger so I always took them tothe grocery store and so I got
them involved in helping dostuff, because they all really
liked to pick out the differentthings that we were going to eat
(12:47):
.
And I even got them involved inthe meal planning, the recipe
planning, early and we wouldpick and this happened probably
when they were about six, eightand 10, each one of them would
pick one dinner a night thatthey were going to be
responsible for planning andthey came up with the recipe and
(13:09):
we even bought a recipe, akid's recipe book.
So they came up with reallycool and fun different recipes,
like mac and cheese with a hotdog for the protein in it, and
the hot dog was cut up a specialway, like an octopus with
mustard as the eyes.
It was really cool.
They had a lot of fun preppingthat and it was easy stuff like
(13:31):
a Mac and cheese and hot dogs.
They could help prepare that.
But then they even got to get alittle more creative.
They started making stuff likelasagna, because they love to
make the lasagna, boil thenoodles and then put it all
together and build it.
It's almost like a littlescience project for them
building that and then cookingit and then eating it.
(13:52):
And lasagna is one of those bigbatch things.
Then you can portion out andyou can freeze and have for
later.
So getting them involved wasreally a good thing for me.
I really enjoyed it and theyreally enjoyed it.
The other thing it assisted indoing was teaching them how to
look and buy things.
So I'd explain to them howthings were priced and how to
(14:15):
look at the different prices onthings, how some things were
generic labeled with the grocerystores and how some of them
were retail labeled just withthe regular ones and some of
them they'd recognize fromseeing on advertisements and I'd
explain well, there's this alsothe generic version.
Maybe it's good, maybe it's not.
(14:37):
Sometimes you got to try it.
And then we started talkingabout as we ate, healthier and
more organic stuff there'sorganic options and what that
meant.
So it was really an educationalprocess for them.
So now my daughter's being older, they can go into the grocery
store and they can look and theycan find the best deal on
something.
And we've even taken it now tothe next level, which is the
(15:02):
grocery shopping challenge.
I don't know if any of you haveseen that TV show where people
will go in and they're shoppingand the challenge is to find all
of the stuff as quickly aspossible through the grocery
store.
So we've even done some fundays where we will split up the
grocery list in teams andthere's four of us, so it'll be
(15:23):
two and two.
We'll each get a cart and thenwe take off and then we're going
and seeing who can find theitems the quickest and then meet
at the front Now and actuallyafter that I review that we got
everything and make sure that wegot everything and it's the
appropriate stuff, et cetera.
But it makes it kind of fun andit it just mixes stuff up a
(15:46):
little bit.
So those are a few differentfun ways that you can get the
job done at the grocery store,even if you have the kids there,
and it keeps them occupied andmaybe having a little fun too.
So let's talk about some tipsfor more affordable grocery
(16:08):
shopping.
Okay, um, the first one wouldbe um, join your grocery stores
reward program.
So this, uh, this used to benot as economical or not as
helpful, but now, with all ofthe electronic awards apps that
they have out there like mygrocery store has one, and I can
literally you don't have tocoupon clip, you don't have to
(16:30):
do anything.
Um, that used to be a big thing, the coupon clipping, and I
don't know about you, but that'sa ginormous pain in the butt.
But the app is, and the onethat I have for my grocery store
chain is you just go in and youcan click it electronically on
your app and then, once you typein your number in the store, it
applies it automatically.
(16:51):
So if I see something on theapp that I need for that that I
put on my list for that week, itjust automatically takes the
discount off of it, which isincredibly, incredibly helpful.
Another one, and this is areally fantastic one, and I got
to admit I have not done this,but thinking about the thought
(17:12):
process behind it makes perfectsense and that is bring cash to
pay for your groceries.
And that is because if youbring a 100, like, for instance,
you bring a $100 bill and youknow that that is what you have
budgeted for groceries that week, then you will not go over and
(17:32):
you will not.
You know, you will stay true tothat budget and not be just
tossing things into the cartthat you see as you walk down
that aisle and fall into thattrap I was talking about with
the merchandising and like, oh,look at this end cap, I like
that, let's try this.
Or what is this.
Or look at this display.
It will keep you on your budgetmuch better because you have
(17:57):
that dollar amount set and youhave that with you and you
cannot exceed that.
So I think that's a great one.
Another one is shop for's a.
That's a.
That's a great one.
(18:17):
And my daughter, my, uh, myyoungest, just asked this this
week about zucchini and I havetotally space and apparently she
loves zucchini now and we liketo saute zucchini.
So if you shop for it in season, then it's going to be less
expensive and then that alsohelps you keep a variety of
different recipes going like, uh, the zucchinis and squashes and
stuff, and then that also helpsyou keep a variety of different
recipes going like thezucchinis and squashes and stuff
(18:38):
, and you can do the sauteedstuff like that, you can grill
them as well.
Then that gives you theopportunity to just mix it up a
little bit, because we're goingto talk about strategies for
mixing up a little bit here too.
I kind of get into my same oldroutine of the same stuff A lot
(19:01):
of meats, a lot of vegetables,all kind of a rotation, and
that's also why I engaged mydaughters in picking up their
stuff.
So you started to hear acomplaint oh, chicken again, dad
.
I said, okay, well, great, youdon't want to have chicken.
So why don't you come up with asolution to something different
?
You'd like on that day that youare going to be preparing the
(19:23):
dinner, and so not only to helpthem think about something
different than it was chicken inour case, apparently I like
chicken a lot.
I do like chicken, and you know.
But then it's also helped themto see that it's not.
It's not that easy to figurethis stuff out.
So you know, we can make itlook like we're super dads a lot
(19:44):
of the time because we'reprepping this stuff and we're,
you know, we're pulling offbreakfast, lunch and dinner
every single day.
But when they need to justthink about one meal a week and
they need need to prep that andthey need to look for it at the
grocery store and then come homeand they need to prepare it
that night together and thenserve it, it really gives them
(20:05):
an appreciation of this wholeprocess.
Little to no complaininganymore, because they did have
an appreciation for being ableto do that whole process and
only having to do it once andnot having to do it seven days a
week or however many weekdays.
Well, seven days a week, theyare eating seven days a week, so
(20:27):
, whether they're with me orwith their mom.
So another tip is stock up onbasic ingredients like flour or
sugar or anything else that'speanut butter, some of those
staples that you might have whenthey go on sale.
If there's a good sale, maybebuy two or three of them, if
(20:48):
it's within your budget, andstock them up.
Either freeze them or, you know, at my old house I built
shelves and shelving.
Now, with the advent of Costco,sam's Club, some of the big
stores where you can buy inmassive bulk.
You can do that and that helpsout as well in buying bulk.
Sometimes I don't have as muchspace at my place and I also try
(21:13):
to buy fresh as much aspossible and not freeze,
especially any meats anymore.
So that's why I'm doing moregrocery stores.
There's nothing wrong with it.
You just got to have the spaceand the place to store it,
freezers as well as shelving Allright.
So if you absolutely loathegoing into the grocery store and
(21:36):
I've got a friend whoabsolutely loathes going to the
grocery store and he's notprepared enough and organized
enough so he actually hiressomebody to go into the grocery
store but not all of us havethat disposable income and
ability to hire somebody to godo our grocery store shopping
for us.
But there are a lot of us thatdo loathe going to the grocery
(21:57):
store.
So there are two options nowwith the advent of and
especially after all this COVIDstuff, and that is doing
curbside pickup or having thegroceries delivered directly to
your door.
Now I was an early adopter ofthe delivery stuff and when they
started it it was justabsolutely atrocious and it was
a train wreck and they got stuffwrong and they forgot stuff and
(22:20):
it never came on time and thenit was all seemed warm and nasty
and so it was not good.
So I didn't do it for a longtime and I've gone back since to
trying it and a lot of themhave a really good services now
for doing that.
Now, my only challenge in whatI don't like is two things is
(22:40):
that if they don't havesomething, they're just going to
replace it with something else,and I don't necessarily like
that, because I'm a littleparticular about what I'm buying
and what I want and ingredients.
And the other thing is I reallylike to find deals and find
sales.
So that's why I go to the storeand that's why I don't use this
.
So I like to find what's goodand I like to look at the
(23:02):
product too before I'm buying it.
So if you're as picky as I am,that might be a little bit more
challenging.
But you can still do that withthe curbside if you're going to
check the groceries before youtake them home and see if that's
that's going to work.
But those are two options.
If you absolutely do not wantto, uh, to step foot into, uh,
(23:25):
the grocery store and so, um,let's see here.
Um, now, meal delivery services.
Okay, so let's talk about now.
We talked about the grocerydelivery from the grocery store
Chef.
Some of those ones are mealdelivery services.
(23:48):
Now, these are really cool forseveral reasons.
One is they will prep theportions for you and create meal
(24:13):
kits specifically for you.
So if you have a family of four, you say I have a family of
four and I need meals, I needdinners for four days this week,
and they will prep stuff ineasy to prepare this.
So they'll have it prepped andready for an easy for you to
(24:36):
prepare for dinner in a veryshort period of time.
So instead of having to pullout the meats and the vegetables
and maybe a starch and startcooking that and boiling the
rice or the potatoes or bakingthem and then cutting up the
vegetables and steaming them andthen having planned to marinate
(24:57):
the meat and then grill that,it all comes in a prepared,
pre-prepared kit and you'regoing to pull that out.
It's got specific step-by-stepinstructions makes it incredibly
easy for you to pull out.
This is really helpful ifyou're not very skilled or very
organized very skilled or veryorganized and it can help you
(25:23):
kind of bridge that gap for thetime being, if you want to learn
some more skills and do that soyou can get these prepared meal
kit delivery services.
And it is also really easy toinclude the kids in doing that
too, because it's so easy and sostep by step.
And the other thing that reallyhelps with this, or this helps
with, is that it will mix thingsup a little bit.
(25:46):
Like I said, I kind of getstagnant.
So they have all thesedifferent options out there and
if you order the different stuff, you know it gives you a lot of
options and a lot of you knowyou can just you're probably
never, ever going to be at aloss and you're probably never
going to hear that complaint,like the chicken complaint, that
there's not.
You know that it's the samestuff over and over because they
(26:08):
have so many myriad of options.
Now, the only drawback is theyare much more expensive.
So you're paying for the time.
You know time is money, right,so you're paying for them to put
that menu together, that recipetogether, pre-prepare it, get
(26:29):
it all ready for you and have itall set there.
Now here's one thing, thoughthat is a tip If you don't want
to have that delivered and youwant to save a little bit of
money and you still want to havethat meal kit service.
Some of the grocery stores noware selling some of those in
store.
(26:49):
So if you go and you look and Ifind them at the kind of around
the deli sections and the deliaisles they'll have some.
They're not huge, hugeselections, but they do have
some of those and these are goodones too.
If you want to buy, you want tofreeze and you want to stock up
on those, and you can.
This is as simple as if youwant to go and you want to
(27:11):
prepare that and create acalendar, you can have them all
in your freezer.
If you have a standup freezerand you can have them dated and
you can just pull them out andyou'll know exactly what those
are.
Or, like I said before, if youforget, you've got something
right there, it's already set.
You just pull it out and youcan get it all ready.
(27:32):
Now you probably have to thawit out, so you probably have a
little foresight to thaw it outand put it in the fridge, but
you can have those thawed outand ready to go for when you um,
when you want them, or ifyou're like me and you just
forget right.
So this is going to save you aton of time.
This is going to save you a tonof money If you, uh, if you,
(27:54):
put into place some of these, um, some of these options and and
all of them whether it's themeal kit services, whether it's
the grocery store apps or themeal kits in the stores they all
have some promotions so you cantry these and it's pretty
economical even just to try andstart out doing some of this
(28:17):
stuff and seeing what works foryou and what doesn't.
So, nine years down the road,for me, I kind of know what I
want.
I kind of know what I do.
I've got Sundays and Wednesdayson my schedule for grocery
shopping at the very minimum.
So I know I'm doing that.
I know I'm prepping on Sundaywith my recipes and my list and
I'm setting that in place.
(28:37):
And then I know, you know, I'mgoing on Wednesday for the meals
for the rest of the week.
So I've kind of got this set upand I like my schedule is
flexible, I make my own scheduleso I can do, I spend the time
and my daughters know that we'regoing to be.
You know, mealtime is going tobe meal prep at a certain time
of the afternoon or evening andthen we'll be cooking.
We're going to be sitting downtogether.
(28:58):
Not everybody can do that, andso I recognize that, and that's
why being prepared like thiswill help you immensely.
And if this is also overwhelming, try starting with just
breakfast.
Start with breakfast, somethingsmall, and prep for breakfasts
for that week.
And maybe do something likebreakfast sandwiches.
(29:18):
Prep on Sunday some breakfastsandwiches with an English
muffin, eggs and a uh and a beefyou know, just a beef breakfast
patty.
Make those up, put them inZiplocs, put them in the freezer
, make a bunch of them, havethem ready to go, pop them in
the microwave in the morning.
It's going to make your lifemuch easier.
It's going to be much healthierthan just feeding them that
(29:41):
sugary cereal with milk.
That's just not going tosustain them through the morning
and even get them to theafternoon.
And maybe then do the samething after that.
Work on preparing those lunchesas well and getting those ready
and where you can just pull outduring the week and put them in
(30:01):
the kids' lunch boxes to go forthe day.
And then, next thing, work yourway up to having the dinner
meals as well, and again, engagethe kiddos in all this so that
they can see and they can alsotake some, you know, take some
ownership of doing this as well.
Our ultimate goal is to teachour kids how to go off and live
(30:23):
their lives as adults andhealthy, functioning adults, and
eventually they're going tohave to learn this stuff, and so
the sooner we engage them inthis and the sooner that we help
them to learn some of theselife skills, the better off
they're going to be.
I know that I wasn't preparedwhen I went off and some of this
stuff was learning, you know,searching around in the dark.
So you're actually doing them aservice by engaging them and
(30:47):
helping them in it.
And sometimes they're going tocomplain, they're going to whine
right, they'd rather be playingvideo games than prepping food.
But after a while some of themget really engaged in it.
You can have a lot of fun.
It's all about the mentalitythat you take in it, reframing
it, making it fun, enjoying thetime together.
So those are some tips.
(31:07):
I hope this episode of practicaladvice on meal planning and
meal prep was helpful to you,especially if you're new to this
and just going through thedivorce you're newly divorced it
will be absolutely gratifyinggoing through this and learning.
I'm Italian, all of our livesrevolve around food and it's a
(31:29):
lot of fun to do that as afamily, so hope you enjoyed.
If you did and you found somevalue.
Please subscribe like ourchannel.
Share this with somebody else.
We keep getting some more andmore men to the Divorce Dads
community or the DivorceDadvocate community.
Our meetings are full everysingle week.
(31:51):
Workshops are building up,classes are coming up, so please
share this, pay it forward andlet somebody else know about
what we're doing here.
We're building, going throughthis together.
Let's just help each other.
(32:20):
You can get through this.
Hopefully this practical advicetoday will help you do so.
Thanks so much.
You have a phenomenal week,thank you.
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