Meal Planning in Notion • NEW template for 2024!

Summary

In this informative video, Marie shares her extensive experience using Notion for meal prepping and planning. As a vegetarian with ADHD, she tailors her approach to optimize kitchen time and ensure healthy meals. Marie discusses various meal planning methods, including freestyle, ingredient-based, and pre-made plans, highlighting the flexibility to suit individual needs. She demonstrates how to set up a Notion workspace for meal planning, including databases for recipes, groceries, and pantry management. The video also covers how to create a simple meal planner from scratch and the importance of organizing recipes by category and course for easy meal selection. Marie's enthusiasm for meal planning and Notion's capabilities make this an engaging guide for anyone looking to streamline their meal prep.

Takeaways

• 📝 Marie has been using Notion for meal planning and prepping for years and finds it the most effective tool for streamlining her process.
• 🍲 Notion allows her to create a 'Food HQ' for pantry management, meal planning, recipe collection, and more, which caters to her vegetarian diet and ADHD.
• 🛠️ Notion's continuous updates and added features have enabled Marie to continuously improve her meal planning system.
• 🥗 Marie's approach to meal planning varies, from using up ingredients in her pantry to craving-based freestyle meal plans and pre-made meal plans.
• 🔍 She emphasizes the importance of personalization in meal planning, acknowledging that everyone's needs and preferences are different.
• 📈 Marie discusses different levels of meal planning complexity, from simple pantry checks to advanced pre-made meal plans that save time and reduce decision fatigue.
• 🛒 She uses Notion to create shopping lists based on her planned meals, which helps in organizing groceries and ensuring she has all needed ingredients.
• 📚 Marie's 'Food HQ' includes various pages for different aspects of meal planning, such as a recipe database, grocery database, and meal planning page.
• 📱 She mentions using a mobile widget to filter and view only the items needed for the week's meals, making grocery shopping more efficient.
• 📝 The process of adding recipes and linking them to ingredients in Notion is time-consuming but is a one-time effort that pays off in easier planning later.
• 🌟 Marie highlights the flexibility of Notion, allowing her to switch between different meal planning methods depending on her time and energy.

Q & A

What is the main purpose of the video?

The main purpose of the video is to share how Marie uses Notion for meal prepping and planning, and to demonstrate different approaches to meal planning that can be adapted to individual needs.

How long has Marie been doing meal planning?

Marie has been doing some form of meal planning for the last 15 years.

What is unique about Notion that made Marie choose it for meal planning?

Notion is unique because it is the only tool Marie found that helped speed up her meal planning process and continued to add new features and functionality that she could iterate on and improve her system.

What does Marie call her Notion workspace for food management?

Marie calls her Notion workspace for food management 'Food HQ'.

Why is Marie's approach to meal planning different from others?

Marie's approach to meal planning is different because she is a vegetarian with ADHD, and food is her special interest, which influences her meal planning strategy.

What are some of the different meal planning methods Marie discusses?

Marie discusses methods such as freestyle meal planning, planning by ingredient, and using pre-made meal plans that are designed to work well together.

How does Marie optimize her time spent in the kitchen?

Marie optimizes her time in the kitchen by planning meals in advance, batch cooking, and sometimes freezing and portioning out components for the week.

What is the benefit of using pre-made meal plans according to the video?

The benefit of using pre-made meal plans is that they can help with money-saving by factoring in shared components between recipes and reducing decision fatigue by planning out multiple weeks in advance.

How does Marie manage her pantry and groceries in Notion?

Marie manages her pantry and groceries using databases in Notion, where she can track ingredients, their status, and create shopping lists based on the recipes she plans to make.

What is the advantage of having a recipes database in Notion according to Marie?

The advantage of having a recipes database in Notion is that it allows Marie to easily plan meals, track ingredients, and create shopping lists, making the planning part quite easy once the recipes are added and linked to ingredients.

How does Marie ensure she is not wasting food while meal planning?

Marie ensures she is not wasting food by checking her pantry and fridge for ingredients that need to be used up and focusing her meal plan on those specific ingredients and flavor profiles.

What is the significance of the 'Freestyle' method in Marie's meal planning?

The 'Freestyle' method is significant because it is a simple and flexible approach that requires minimal setup and allows Marie to quickly decide on meals for the week without worrying about ingredient sharing or complex planning.

How does Marie's culinary boot camp experience influence her meal planning?

Marie's culinary boot camp experience influenced her meal planning by teaching her new skills in the kitchen, which helped her level up her flavor creation and gave her new perspectives on how to approach making food.

What does Marie mean by 'ingredient first' approach in meal planning?

The 'ingredient first' approach means that Marie starts her meal planning by considering which ingredients she has on hand or needs to use up, and then builds her meal plan around those specific ingredients.

How does Marie's Food HQ help in reducing decision fatigue?

Food HQ helps in reducing decision fatigue by providing a structured system where Marie can pre-select meal plans, decide on ingredients first, or choose from a freestyle selection, thus minimizing the daily decision-making process.