How to manage the kitchen can be a daily quandary. The kitchen is the busiest place in the house. We all eat and that requires the effort to make the food, which makes a mess, which means cleaning, and then our people are hungry again. Taking into consideration everyone’s health, food becomes a very important factor in life. The kitchen is also a gathering place, it’s where all the action happens! Let’s simplify things.
Get Organized
Set aside an hour and think how the contents of your cupboards can be reorganized so that like is with like. Create “centers” in your kitchen for the things you do there I.e. salad center, baking center, beverage center.
Set aside a couple of hours to declutter your cupboards. Put rarely used items in the backs of cupboards or in high cupboards. If you have children who help cook, set the table, or unload the dishwasher, put the frequently used items at their height.
Meal Time Routines
Create a system around your meal times. Delegate tasks to the other people in your home. Start with the regular occurrences: load and unload the dishwasher, wash dishes, wipe tables and counters, sweep the floor set the table, take out the trash. Think about other regular tasks such as making the salad and loading the coffee pot. Make all of these things part of the meal time routines and assign the jobs to your people.
Menu Planning
Make a list of your family meal favorites and put the meals on a blank calendar page. On your Town Day, get the grocery items you need for the coming week. It can be that simple.
Perhaps you want to work towards improving your family’s health? May I suggest that you start with one new healthy meal a week. It takes time for children to accept a new food. After they’ve adjusted to one healthy meal, add another. This makes it easier for you too because you are probably accustomed to making the same meals over and over. Those are your “automatic” meals. You can add healthy meals to your life and they will become automatic too. Baby steps.
Learn more about meal planning
