50 Menus
Well I have been doing a lot of sorting and organizing to start and finish this post! I would like first tell you about my amazing culinary professor. She was married and had a few kids in the middle of college. She never finished and quickly became a house wife. Then her sweetheart died suddenly in an air plane crash. She was left with her children and no way to support them. She went back to school and got enough education to teach culinary classes at BYU Idaho. She was an amazing wife and is an amazing mother and example to me. She introduced the idea of the 50 menus to me in my class. Here is the general idea.

She had made the ultimate recipe book. It was in a 3 ring binder with pocketed sheet protectors holding her recipes. When you would open up to the first page you would find 6 recipes for each menu. Each menu had a meat, a main dish, a veg, a fruit, a bread, a misc (dessert, drink, etc.). The ingredients required for each recipe was listed on the shopping list beside each recipe. The shopping list was divided up into the different sections in a grocery store. Here is an example of what one menu would look like.


So each menu was one meal for a day. She gave us the goal of 50 menus. We had to cook new/old recipes until we could find 50 menus that we liked. Then she challenged us to organize them in some fashion (doesn't have to be like her 3 ring binder) and then rotate them so that you don't prepare the same meals. She had succeeded in creating enough menus that she never cooked the same dinner twice a year.

Here was her system:
She would place the menus in a binder so that they were in order based on the season of the ingredients, and in a variety of taste and ethnic background. Then she would use one Menu for Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday dinners. She would collect the shopping lists next to each recipe and go shopping on Saturday for the next week's groceries. Thursday's were reserved for experimental dinners. She was always looking for a new recipe that could beat out one of the current recipes in her menu binder. Friday and Saturday were "left overs" or "out to eat days."

She gave us some of her top recipes, taught us some basic skills and then let us go in class. It was so fun. She challenged us to go outside of our comfort zones and not only push ourselves but to push our families when cooking. She stressed a few issues that are good to think about when you are creating your own menu list:
1) Understand the importance of having all 6 recipes in your menu and the responsibility that you have to feed your family a healthy and well-rounded meal every night.
2) Make your meals as colorful as possible. This will help with quality and nutrition.
3) She encouraged us to find that one spinage recipe that your husband admits he likes and will eat! Find creative and tasty ways to get your children to eat their vegetables and exotic food early on before they develope their opinions.
4) Your 50 menus will evolve over time as you- find better and better recipes, as you and your children grow older, and as your venture out of your comfort zone and challenge yourself. Don't be afraid to switch out recipes. That means that you are improving.
5) Another piece of advice that she gave us was when you are stumped make sure you have at least one dish from every ethnicity (which is basically impossible!). Spanish, French, Italian, Native American, Scottish, Ukrainian, etc. There are some very unique and delicious recipes out there that will add variety and class to your menu book.
6) She was not in favor of casseroles every night, which I loved! Try not to get stuck in a rut cooking the same things over and over. It is good to cater to your family's taste buds but make sure it is balanced and that you have enough variety that they are never afraid of a certain food and can't recall what you cooked the last few weeks.
7) Finally, one of the most important and difficult steps is arranging your menus in your binder. Put your casseroles or Chinese dishes months apart. I haven't written down a lot of my Veg's and Fruits because I am waiting to put them in order and then based on when the menu is chosen....see what is in season.
8) My point that I want to put in has to do with Breakfast and Desserts. I have started making a separate binder full of Breakfasts and Desserts. I don't want them that planned out. Let's be honest usually you have to come up with a dessert an hour a head of time. And there are not as many options for breakfasts. I have also started a list of meals like "Pig's in a Blanket" and "Homemade Corn Dogs" that I don't want as a Menu, but still want to have in a separate binder in case I want to whip it out really fast on a Friday night or something.

Anyways, I have been attempting to collect my 50 recipes for a few years now. It takes a long time and a lot of experimenting (poor Dev)! I think I have about 25 that I feel comfortable with. 10 of those, I think are amazing! I finally finished writing down my menu wish list. It is the 50 menus that I hope to master some day. I'll post this spreadsheet so you can get some ideas. There are dishes that I am familiar with, dishes that I haven't found the right recipe yet, and just plain wishful thinking! Please let me know if you would like any recipes.

I also have some cute ideas of how I want to do my recipe book/box. One cute idea is HERE . This is a link to a ribbon recipe box that is really cute.


So the reason for this Personal Project Post is to give you the same challenge that my professor gave me. That is..... to come up with your 50 menus. I will post a link to my number one favorite recipe on my 50 menus to get you started. This website is amazing and the Pioneer Women is a good place to start with your investiagion!

It's called Brisket Baby! Click HERE to jump over to her recipe. Good luck and I hope you enjoy creating your 50 menus as much as I have!

Oh and I would love to know what your top recipe is!