Something quick and (hopefully) helpful for you today! In honor of Friday, my grocery shopping day, here are six of our family’s favorite soup recipes. Best Taco Soup | I was looking back through my recipes archives as I wrote this post, and it’s fascinating how many recipes were in our regular rotation until they… weren’t. But this recipe! This recipe I have been making it since CoJ published it in 2013, and it’s still a family favorite today. (I make it without hominy and add frozen corn.) I serve it with a pan of honey cornbread, which both our 7 and 5 year olds can make with just a little oversight. Lemony Chicken and Potato Soup | Made in the Instant Pot, this soup has a lovely zing from the lemon. We pair with a salad for the grown-ups. Sweet Potato Beef Stew | This is one of my favorite recipes of all time. It’s from the Skinny Taste cookbook, and I first had it at my sister-in-law’s house. It’s incredibly flavorful and it makes the house smell amazing. I serve it the way she did, always with cheddar herb biscuits. Leftover Roast Chicken Soup with Roasted Vegetables | My friend Meredith made a triple batch of this soup to feed our whole small group, and every single person wanted seconds. I went home and made it for our family the next week, and it’s been a favorite since. Butternut Squash Soup with Apples | I love a butternut squash soup (it’s hard for me to resist if I ever see it on a menu!) and this is my favorite version to make at home. The tablespoon of cumin gives it a kick, so you might consider backing off the spice just a bit if you’re feeding kids. Do

I wrote about how we meal plan back in 2013, and though many things in our life have changed since then (two new babies, new house, now COVID), the bones of our meal planning process remain the same. There are a few tweaks and changes that have fine-tuned this weekly rhythm over the years, though, so I thought it was time for an update! If you’re new to the idea of meal planning, it might feel really intimidating or complicated. Maybe you’re worried it will take your whole Saturday. I get it! Even though I’ve been meal planning for years, there’s still a part of me that resists sitting down and doing it each week. But, this simple process saves me SO much time, energy, and money that it is completely worth it!! In contrast, on the weeks where we fly by the seat of our pants (maybe if we’ve been traveling the weekend before), I’m basically pulling my hair out by Tuesday. If that’s you every week, I think you’ll love this post! Let’s go! When I meal plan: Though I’m not perfect at it, I try to sit down and plan our meals for the week on Friday evening, after the kids are in bed. With COVID, I aim to go to the grocery store pretty much first thing Saturday morning, so making our grocery list the night before ensures I’m not scrambling in the morning. For me, planning our meals on the weekend, and as early in the weekend as possible, is crucial. As mentioned above, once the week starts churning it’s hard for me to find time to do it AND go shopping, which really throws off our whole rhythm. And if for some reason I wait until Sunday to do it, it adds to the

It appears the world actually IS ending, because yesterday I forwarded to 20 friends a “chain email” for the first time since approximately 1999. Yes. I was sucked in by the promise of 36 recipes*, but also by the innocently throw-back vibe of a chain email showing up in my inbox in 2020. *Let’s pause on that math for a sec. If I sent the email on to 20 friends (which I did), and they each sent it on to 20 friends (doubtful), and those friends each sent me a recipe (extremely doubtful), then I would hypothetically receive… 400 recipes????? Though that math is a little more intimidating than exciting, this whole chain email situation did inspire me. I’m always looking for fresh recipes (plus, one of my yearly goals is to streamline meal planning!). While my in-person meal planning potluck is on hold, I thought we could have a virtual recipe exchange right here, right now! If I was able to invite you all to this potluck (that would be fun!!), what dish would you bring? Just like my future potluck, let’s consider this a chance to come together and share our blue-ribbon, sure-fire, 100%-guaranteed, all-star dinner recipes with each other – the ones we make when friends come over, the ones that never let us down on a busy weeknight or slow Sunday. If you had to pick just one dinner favorite, what would it be? Drop a link in the comments (or type out the whole recipe, if not online!) and tell us why you love it! I’ll go first: the obvious pick is our sausage, kale, and chickpea pasta. But since y’all already know that one, I’ll add this one. It’s a yummy, easy beef ragu that also includes a boatload of zucchini, so you can

As we build our menu each week, there are four basic factors we keep in mind: we want a mix of meals that are inexpensive, quick and simple to prepare, meatless, and that make leftovers. Of course, we also want meals that are healthy and delicious! Not every meal falls into every one of those categories, so we do our best to piece together a menu of seven dinners that feels balanced. I thought I’d do a mini series covering each of those four attributes, so you can pick and choose which ones matter most to you! Today, I’m starting with ten of our favorite cheap meals! From Cookie + Kate 1. Spaghetti and meatballs. Nothing fancy here, friends! Pasta from a box, frozen meatballs, sauce from a jar, and some sort of vegetable on the side. I LOVE this sauce which is super easy to make, but it does take a bit longer. 2. Taco soup. Mostly canned ingredients keep the cost low on this one. Adding a pan of cornbread doesn’t add much to the price but is delicious :) 3. Baked risotto with sausage and peas. If you think risotto is hard to make, you have to try this recipe! It’s one of our favorites from The Newlywed Cookbook. The roasted vegetables variation is yummy, but we more often make it with crumbled Italian sausage and frozen peas. 4. Chana masala. There is an upfront cost if you don’t already have the spices this recipe calls for, but once you’ve purchased them, you can make this delicious dish many times over! Chick peas as the protein keeps the cost low. I like to top mine with a little plain yogurt, and we do naan on the side. 5. Burrito bowls. Royal blend rice, black beans and pinto