Archives for June 2019

It’s farmers market season, which is one of my favorite times of the year (or at least it was when I lived in mild-temperature Colorado, ha!).  The abundance of delicious produce and long summer evenings always inspire me to cook more bright, fresh meals, and I have a few resources to share that might make your summer meal planning just a little easier.  To start, here’s a little video that Jamie and I put together a couple years back of our favorite farmers markets in Denver proper:

If you’re looking for a farmers market in your area, check out this local food directory.

Second, my favorite meal planning app is Paprika 3.  I absolutely love it, and this is going to sound crazy, but it actually makes me enjoy grocery shopping because I’m so thrilled with how easy and organized it is.  With Paprika, you can add recipes using either their built-in browser, which automatically transfers the recipes into their format and includes photos, or you can add them manually, which is great if you have a lot of family recipes scribbled on index cards like we do.  You can categorize the recipes any way you like (and in multiple categories if desired), and then you can use their meal planning features to plan breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks for each day.  Because I try to eat seasonal, I have my recipes categorized not only by Breakfast, Dinner, etc., but also by season.  For each recipe, you can automatically have all ingredients added to your grocery list, or you can pick and choose which ones you need and don’t need.  The app automatically groups the ingredients in the grocery list out by type of item so that you don’t have to run all over the store as you come across each item, and it also lists what recipe each ingredient is for, in case you need to reference that.  There is also a pantry section of the app, which keeps track of what groceries you’ve already bought and what you have on hand, although I haven’t used this portion of the app yet.  I would highly recommend Paprika to anyone who regularly grocery shops and cooks because it will simplify your life!  Below are some screenshots if you’d like to see what it looks like:

Finally, after watching the documentary on food waste, Wasted!, I became intrigued with all the different ways that I can waste less food in my own life.  I stumbled across this cool interactive website, Save the Food, which really has some neat features for those of us who like to cook, such as a dinner party calculator and a meal prep calculator that estimate exactly how much food you’ll need, and recipes for all kinds of different foods that are past their prime.  After working in quality assurance and food safety of fresh produce, I was convinced that I knew how to properly store all kinds of fruits and vegetables, but I was completely impressed with the storage instructions that this site gives for just about every kind of food.  They are very detailed and geared towards people who cook at home, rather than commercial establishments that have a lot more options for storage.  And of course, I love the idea of using every part of a fruit or vegetable or other food item, so the site’s recipe ideas for scraps are right up my alley.

I hope this inspires you to eat local, make some great meals, and waste less this summer.  I’d love to hear if you have any other ideas or helpful resources too – please feel free to share in the comments.  Happy (almost) summer!