Feeding Hungry Boys

I live with three of them.

If you have been following this blog you would know how much feeding my family good, home cooked meals means to me - I would risk harmonious relationship for it. However, fortunately, I have matured (kind of) and realized that nutritious meals aren't worth breaking relationships for. But that's for another day. 

Given the above, I am more than happy to pack Kimi bekal when he started school early last year. Fancy tools are a pre-requisite - I bought, of course, fancy lunch boxes with fancy sandwich cutters and fancy food picks. Pancakes, check. Sandwiches, check. Roti jala, check. Roti nutella, check. Sausages, check. Sometimes Kimi makan habis, sometimes tak. One time I asked him why didn't he finish his bekal, he said, "Tak sedap". That got me a laugh from the husband, "Would you rather him lie about it?". Yergh, boys.  

One month later I had run out of ideas what to pack him for bekal. 

Thennn it occurred to me that I should be planning our weekly meal. Patutnya buat dari awal tahun tapi tak terfikir pun! There are a lot of menu planner available online, but I made my own in an excel sheet. I even added the aChieaJanie monogram (yes we have a monogram!) to it. Awwwwwwww. 

My menu planner allows me to plan breakfast, bekal and dinner, with a to-buy list on the same page. Armed with my planner, I would sit down with Kimi every Saturday to "brainstorm" his bekal wish list. Worked like a charm.  Most of the times the list is made up of the same menu recycled weekly, but he finished his food most days - until I became a bit malas to pack him bekal towards the end of the year.

This year I resolve to pack him and the husband bekal at least 3 days a week. This week I have mee goreng, sandwiches and burger (!) in my list. Burger kau! We'll see if I can stick to my resolution this month. 

I have made the planner available for download. Feel free to download it if you want. Alang-alang tu, you can also check my grocery list out. Both files are in excel and fully editable. 

Have fun and happy feeding!

Download here

*Both files are in the same workbook.