Welcome back to my meal planning post. If it’s your first time over here then hello, we are a family of six and I blog about everything to do with parenting and family home life. We love to try and live a slow life as much as possible for a large family. I find being organised in the home helps us achieve this as much as we can and one of those ways to be organised for us is meal planning. Each month I share a selection of what recipes I will be slotting into our meal plan for the month. We tend to all eat the same family meals, although occasionally we have a date night with a more grown up treat meal and let the kids have a pizza or fish finger dinner. My meal planning posts mainly share my Pinterest board ideas, as well as some meals of my own, or from cookbooks. This month is all about Summer meals; enjoying those sweet strawberries, salads and lighter evening meals. We tend to eat more picnic dinners when it is hot, as I find the heat can affect the children’s appetites after school. We can often have a picnic tea and a small supper later on in the summer months. This is an easier way to feed them and for me to not be standing over a hot oven. As always I have a mixture of meat and vegetarian options as we try and have a few nights where we are meat free each week.
June Monthly Meals
Pea and Courgette Fritters with a minty yoghurt dip- Gizzi Erskine recipe
This looks AMAZING Buckwheat penne with Creamy Spinach sauce and Watermelon salad from the Little Green Kitchen Stories.
Crumbed Salmon with sweet potato fries – Donna Hay recipes
Fishcakes – Either a mix of tinned tuna or tinned/fresh salmon with sweet potato and potato mash. These are great to prepare earlier in the day and then serve warm with other salad and picnic bits.
Over on my Pinterest board
One pot Veggie Spaghetti – You can get creative with this one and add other veggies, although for my kids I find keeping it simple means they eat it!
Kebabs with salad – Picnic kebabs, chicken and pineapple kebabs or fajita style kebabs. I plan on making some of these for outdoor evening meals and use also for leftover lunches and lunch boxes. See my Pinterest board for recipe inspiration.
Orzo Pasta Salad- I find for picnic teas adding in some pasta salad is a great way to fill up tummies and take in a few extra fruit or veggies. This Pinterest red pepper and feta recipe looks delicious. Great for when you’re having a veggie meal night.
Egg and courgette muffins or loaf slice – Again a nice light tea option with salad, crisps etc. Having the addition of courgette / zucchini means there is some extra greens going in and also adding in ham and cheese appeals to the kids.
Easy Puff Pastry Pizza – I would make this one with my hidden veg pizza sauce and top the puff pastry sheet with mozzarella and any veggie bits I can get away with them eating!
Slow cooked Pork mince ragu – Looks really lovely and it’s not often we buy pork mince, so I’m hoping this may be one that we all enjoy.
Cherry tomato, red and yellow pepper and lentil lasagne. I love a good lasagne with a salad in the summer.
June Monthly deserts and treats
Frozen smoothie lollies – I whizz up smoothie and pop the mixture into my baby ice lolly moulds
Fruit kebabs – Fruit just looks so tempting when sliced and popped onto a kebab. It’s also a great one for kids to make.
Frozen bananas – covered in chocolate or yoghurt and sprinkles.
Chocolate banana ice cream
Banana Bread Cookies
Jelly and fruit
Homemade cheese biscuits my take on mini cheddars
Victoria sponge with raspberry jam – Can’t beat a good Victoria sponge in the summer or if you fancy a lovely take on Summer cake try my lemon and elderflower cake that I made last year for the Royal wedding.
Rhubarb cake – My boys love rhubarb and this Pinterest recipe looks super easy to bake.
I hope that this meal plan gives you some inspiration; if all else fails get that BBQ out, chuck on some fish/meat/chargrilled veggies/haloumi and serve it all with new potatoes and salad. The best bit about this is you quite often have salad leftovers for the next day.
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