Meet Meal Planning, our newest GrovPod.
Jeff DentonLead Product Developer · 4 min read ·
Meal Planning is our newest GrovPod! It gives someone a simple place to choose meals for the week, work from a grocery list, and look back at what they cooked.
I'm excited about this one because feeding yourself involves quite a few skills we sometimes take for granted. Choosing a recipe. Figuring out what to buy. Reading the steps. Making time to cook. Then deciding whether you'd make that meal again.
For someone learning to do those things, “plan your meals” can be a pretty big assignment. Where do you start?
That's what this Pod is for. Like Simple Budget, it's a life skills teaching tool designed to help someone get from zero to something they can build on.
Start with a few meals
A first meal plan doesn't have to cover every breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Maybe someone begins with one meal they feel ready to try. Maybe they choose three for the coming week.
Meal Planner has access to more than 1,000 recipes through the MyPlate.food platform. Plenty of room to find a first meal that sounds good, then try something new as confidence grows.
Meal Planner gives them recipes to browse and search, with photos that help make the choices concrete. Open a recipe to see ingredients and cooking steps, select it for the week, or favorite it for later. Nutrition information is available from the recipe menu, too.
The sample week shown here includes 3-Can Chili, Applesauce Pancakes, and Baked Fish and Vegetables. Three different things to try, gathered into one plan they can return to.
Choosing is part of the lesson. What sounds good? What fits the time available? What ingredients or equipment will it take? Those are useful conversations for a class, a coaching session, or someone helping a friend get started.
Take the plan to the grocery list
Picking recipes is a beginning. The next question is practical: what do I need to have on hand?
The Grocery view brings the week's ingredients together in a checklist, grouped into categories. Someone can work through the list as they prepare and shop, rather than keep switching between recipes and trying to remember everything.
This is another teaching moment. Before heading to the store, look at what's already in the cupboard. Read the quantities. Talk through unfamiliar ingredients. A list gives that conversation something specific to work from.
The Pod provides structure; the person still gets to practice making decisions. A recipe might need to wait because an ingredient isn't available. Another might be a good fit for what they already have. Learning to make those adjustments belongs in meal planning, too.
Cook, then look back
The recipe keeps ingredients and steps within reach while someone cooks. Afterward, the Summary view shows meals cooked and progress across weeks, along with meal ratings.
That creates a useful reason to return. Which meals did you enjoy? What felt manageable? What would you change next time?
In the sample Summary screen, three planned meals have been cooked. That's example data, but it shows the kind of progress the Pod makes visible: a plan followed through to an actual meal.
Choose a meal. Get what you need. Cook it. Use what you learned to plan the next one.
Give the lesson somewhere to continue
If your organization teaches cooking, household skills, or everyday planning, you can connect Meal Planning to that work in your app. As with other GrovPods, a tool can sit alongside the class or resource where someone first encounters the idea.
A facilitator might help someone choose a first recipe during a session. Between sessions, that person has somewhere to find the plan and take the next step. At the next meeting, there's something concrete to discuss.
Some people will keep using a simple tool. Others may eventually want a more detailed meal planner. Either can be a useful outcome. The purpose is to help someone begin practicing a skill they can carry with them.
Start with one meal someone feels ready to make. Help them plan it, shop for it, and cook it. Then build from there.
