One of the changes to my menu plan for our family this month (and perhaps long term) is to ensure I only plan our menu once I know what food we have for the week, based on food that is in season, on sale etc. Our diet will not change from being whole food based, natural and organic and fairtrade where possible. At the end of my month if I’m successful with feeding my family a healthy diet for $200, I will post how I did it, but for now, I’ll just share the weekly plan.

This week:
For our weekly baking day (actually there will be two this week) we’ll bake bran muffins (because I have buttermilk and bran flakes on hand) and pumpkin bread.  We’ll make three loaves of pumpkin bread, 12 pumpkin muffins and 12 bran muffins.  Two of the pumpking loaves are to give away, helping us meet our goal to give a meal (this is part of a meal) and show kindness as a regular, on-going part of our lives!

And the menu this week:

Breakfasts
Sunday tradition- Scottish porridge with cut up fruit, nuts and chocolate chips on top x 2
Cereal with milk, banana and nuts x 2
Almond butter on waffles with fruit
Toast with a topping (cheese or peanut butter), fruit 
Muffins with cheese, fruit, nuts (Saturday am breakfast before activities) 

Lunches
Spinach and lentil soup, fresh bread, cheese, fruit x 2
Moosewood broccoli soup with crackers, fruit x 2
Pearl barley casserole with cooked carrots, peas and tahini (this is a leftover)
Tuna pasta casserole with corn and green beans (this is a leftover)
Beans and rice (a weekly tradition in January to use as a sounding board for poverty discussions).

Dinners
Fish casserole with roasted asparagus and tomatoes (make a second fish casserole to give away) x 2
Nut roast, pearl barley casserole, cooked carrots, peas and tahini
Veggie stirfry with homemade hash brown potatoes
Spinach dahl with rice, asparagus and cabbage
Homemade fish and chips with peas and carrots
Veggie bolonaise with spinach salad and cabbage

Snacks
A mix of muffins, fruit, nuts & seeds

As we are not yet technically into the 31 days of “nothing” yet, I haven’t shared what my grocery total was for this week, but starting next week I will. Truth be told I have no clue this week because much of it is wrapped up in what we purchased last week and the week before, I’ll try and figure it out!

And now I’m off to make delicious bran muffins with my boy while we wait for his sister to wake up. And then we will enjoy scottish porridge! FYI It has to be said, upon hearing that is the plan for breakfast my boy says “yippee”! (Hard to believe at adoption 15 months ago he arrived only eating cheese pizza, hot dogs and chocolate shakes from a big company we boycott that begins with an M!)