December Menu Plan

 

It’s December my friends and it’s time for the December Menu Plan! A lot of the That One Mom family’s focus is on food–especially around the holidays–and a menu plan makes it so much easier to keep track of what we are eating and what kind of food supplies we have on hand. Plus, since December is so full of social activities, it helps to know what kind of food we need to take where and whether we’re getting a night off anytime soon!

 

December Menu Planning Tips:

1. Make a calendar of every event you and your family will be attending, every day/night that you won’t be home, every food gift or potluck dish you need to prepare, and every time that someone may possibly come to your home for dinner or snacks.
2. Make a grocery list from your menu ideas and shop your fridge, freezer, and pantry before you go to the grocery store.
3. Shop sales and if you can afford it, buy a few extra ingredients to put up for next month.
4. Make simple dishes at least a couple times a week. Save the elaborate stuff for Christmas parties!

 

 

 

December Menu

 

Thursday/1: Leftovers. Thursday is almost always Leftover Night at our house. It’s nice to start the month off without having to cook!

Friday/2: Roasted Chicken, Bacon and Smoked Gouda Cauliflower Mash. Roasted chicken is an easy and versatile dish. If there is any leftover, shred it for sandwiches, tacos, or salad.

Saturday/3: Dinner Out or Pizza Night. Let the Christmas festivities begin! We are supposed to attend a high school musical (White Christmas…not the actual High School Musical) and won’t be home to cook. This will be a night to eat dinner out or grab a pizza to take home.

Sunday/4: Family Dinner. This is dinner that involves some other member of one our respective families cooking and inviting us over. Otherwise, we’ll eat leftovers.

Monday/5: Four Cheese Pesto Zoodles, Salad. I’ve been finding a lot of yummy looking recipes over at I Breathe I’m Hungry here lately. I have some zoodles in the freezer that I need to use, so this works out perfectly!

Tuesday/6: Asiago Chicken with Bacon Cream Sauce, Mexican Cauliflower Fried Rice. Since I’ve chosen yet another cream and cheese filled dish, I decided to lighten the load with some cauliflower fried rice. I haven’t tried this before, so I’ll let you know if it works out!

Wednesday/7: White Beans with Ham, Cornbread, Kraut and Wieners. This is an attempt to save money by using some of the things I have in the pantry! Plus, the white beans and ham can cook in the crock pot during the day and the rest of it can be made in less than 30 minutes. The only thing better is if someone else cooked it AND washed all the dishes!

Thursday/8: Leftover Night

Friday/9: Fried Chicken Sandwiches with Pickle Slaw, Beer Battered Onion Straws. Sometimes you just need some yummy fried food. This actually reminds me of summer and I’ll be needing a little summer before December is over!

Saturday/10: Charcuterie Platter and Caprese Flatbread. There’s a joke that says charcuterie is what you eat when you want a sandwich but you don’t have bread. So I’m having flatbread and that fixes the problem!!

Sunday/11: Family Dinner/Leftovers

Monday/12: Moroccan Chili, Roasted Cauliflower Salad. Moroccan Chili is a recipe that is in one of my church/school cookbooks that I’ve collected through the years. The cauliflower salad sounds like the perfect light complement.

Tuesday/13: Meatloaf, Mashed Potatoes, Peas. You know, like mom used to make!

Wednesday/14: Ranch Pork Chops, Baked Potato, Salad. I love crockpot recipes and I love these pork chops. So yummy and so easy!

Thursday/15: Leftovers

Friday/16: We’ve Been Invited To a Christmas Party! If we choose not to go, we keep canned soup and sandwich fixings for that very reason.

Saturday/17: Dinner Out. We’re celebrating one of my besties graduating from nursing school. Go Missy!!

Sunday/18: Leftovers/Family Dinner

Monday/19: Lemon Herb Chicken Orzo with Honey Mustard/Hot Bacon Dressing. This is an attempt at light and healthy eating. But it has bacon, so…

Tuesday/20: Breakfast for Supper — Bananas Foster Oatmeal, Bacon, and Toast. We love having breakfast foods for supper. My favorite is probably biscuits and gravy, but my family really loves waffles and pancakes. We’re compromising with sweet oatmeal! How that’s a compromise, I don’t really know. I am having bacon for the second night in a row though.

Wednesday/21: Philly Cheesesteak Sloppy Joes, Onion Tanglers, Salad. Oddly enough, even my super picky daughter will eat this sandwich. Plus, it’s super easy and that’s what I’m about right now.

Thursday/22: Potato Soup & Cornbread. This is one of my go-to recipes and basically a staple in our household. Because I’ve made it so many times, I can whip up a pot really quick and not dirty up a lot of dishes or spend a lot of time in the kitchen.

 

Friday/23: Sub Sandwich, Pasta Salad, Chips. Christmas Eve Eve is traditionally a very busy cooking day for me, so supper has to be oh so simple and quick!

Saturday/24: Christmas Eve Appetizers — Menu coming soon!

Sunday/25: Christmas Day — Menu coming soon!

Monday/26: Leftovers. While most of the family will take leftovers home with them on Christmas Day, we always have enough left for at least one dinner and a few lunches in the days following Christmas. Don’t let those leftovers go to waste!

Tuesday/27: Turkey and Noodles or Pinto Beans and Cornbread. This will depend entirely on whether we have turkey bones or ham bones to cook with and I haven’t decided which one we will be eating Christmas Day.

Wednesday/28: Chopped In the Kitchen. This is where you take leftovers and whatever ingredients you have on hand and make up something you’ve never had before. One of my favorite stir fry noodle dishes came about this way!!

 

 

Thursday/29: Chicken Fajitas, Sazon Rice, and Beans. Listen, we will all be sick of ham and turkey at this point.

Friday/30: Salmon Patties, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans. Salmon patties are another go-to dish around here. They don’t take a lot of time and everyone likes them. Unfortunately, the price of canned salmon is getting higher and higher. My grandmother used to buy a filet and cook it, then flake her own for salmon patties. I need to find some pointers for doing this!!

Saturday/31: New Year’s Eve Appetizer Night. It’s unlikely that I’ll go anywhere for New Year’s Eve. I’m old and tired! So we’ll probably just stay home and eat some appetizers and have a sparkling cider toast at midnight as per usual!

 

 

December is definitely a month when a lot of us over indulge. Try not to make things any harder on yourselves when it comes to cooking than you have to. Make sure to incorporate vegetables into your meals and cut back on sugar wherever you can, as well.

I knew someone years ago who would save her Weight Watchers points up all week in order to splurge on the weekends. We would laugh about it, but during the time of year when we are most likely to consume too much sugar and fattening foods, it honestly makes sense. Eat as healthy as possible at home so that you can have that extra piece of fudge or half a cheeseball somewhere else. And make those homecooked meals as simple as possible. There’s a lot of gift wrapping and decorating and socializing to do this month. No sense in standing over a hot stove when there’s so much else to do!!

 

For more tips, make sure to check out my previous menus and meal planning posts! To get December’s printable fill-in-the-blank Menu Plan, make sure to sign up for the email list below and get access to everything in the Subscriber Library.