Frugal ADHD meal planning is perfect for ANYONE with a frazzled or sluggish brain. Read on for 9 tips for creating simple and tasty budget-friendly meals.
The story.
The aromas of onion and garlic drifted up from the sizzling cast iron skillet. As they tickled my nostrils, my stomach growled. I could hardly wait to partake of what had become one of my new favorite meals.
I dumped the cut-up, cooked chicken in with the stir-fried vegetables, then slowly poured in the sauce. Mixing them altogether, I felt a surge of pride. Cooking for my parents and three siblings was no small task. Cutting up enough veggies and meat to serve everyone was tedious.
But it was worth it not to eat my mom’s cooking.
Besides, a really tasty meal required a lot of time and work, right? And, yeah, maybe more money than my coupon-queen mother was willing to spend.
I was sixteen years old at the time, and had a lot to learn.
I need to say this first…
Some of the “ADHD meal planning” tips in this article aren’t going to sound very frugal. But in my very strong opinion, saving health care costs down the line by choosing to reduce stress and eat healthy is one of the most frugal actions you can take.
And I’m talking to people who, like me, deal with memory, distractibility, fatigue, and/or boredom issues. For us, making life a little easier by spending a little extra money right now is essential for better health long-term.
Okay, on with the good stuff…
Forget T.V. chefs. There’s a much easier – and more frugal – way.
Eating out is eating into your budget. Fast food is slowly killing you. You know this, yet your brain is too tired or frazzled to prepare interesting and tasty meals that are also inexpensive. What to eat when overwhelmed, but you want to stay true to your inner Frugal Homemaker?
What you need are a few basic tips that will enable you to whip up delicious, yet budget-friendly, meals with little effort.
Whether you have a neurodivergent brain lacking in executive function or menopause brain fog, ADHD meal planning is the way to go. You want meal prep to be simple and easy, and result in something tasty as well as healthy.
Being slightly older than sixteen now, an individual with AuDHD, and having been married for twenty years, I’ve learned a thing or two about making meal prep easier. What follow are my nine best tips for how to feed yourself when you have no executive function. The tips will both support your body’s nutritional needs as well as please your palate.
Tip #1: Use frozen vegetables.
Whenever you want to include veggies like broccoli, cauliflower, green beans, corn, peas, or brussel sprouts in a meal, use frozen vegetables. Most of the time, they’re frozen in a much fresher state than the “fresh” produce that grocery stores carry, making them tastier and more nutritious.
Nowadays, you can even find packages of mixed vegetables specifically made for stir frys, as well as blends that include sliced zucchini. Some stores have pre-cooked and frozen cut-up butternut squash, as well as a bell pepper-onion mix.
Let’s go back to the old stir-fry: Making this kind of meal is a lot easier if the only ingredients you need to chop are the garlic, onion, and ginger.
If you don’t mind eating room temperature food, you can simply pour out the amount of vegetables you want for a particular meal about ninety minutes ahead of time and save yourself the work of heating the veggies in a pan.
Tip #2 for ADHD meal planning: Use dried herbs and spices.
I mentioned above chopping onions, garlic, and ginger for stir-fry meals. But unless you have a particular taste for freshly cooked herbs, it’s a heckuva lot easier to spoon in some powder. Use a teaspoon dried for every tablespoon of fresh.
Also, if you can stomach them (some of my sensitive readers can’t), spices are an awesome way to jazz up any meal.
Tip #3: Purchase prepared fresh produce.
It’s a measurable fact that produce that has been pre-cut and sat in the store for hours has less nutrition than when you cut it up at home and eat it shortly after.
And it’s easy for us autistic women to get all guilty about the plastic going into the landfill when we buy bags of pre-shredded lettuce or baby spring greens.
But your mental well-being is as important as your physical health and the health of the planet. And as for the latter, how much of the earth’s energy and resources is expended into running a restaurant? How much trash do you end up with when you buy take-out or fast food?
Right. So, chill. 🙂
If cutting up fruit or vegetables, or washing and tearing up lettuce, is a barrier you to eating healthier, then buy them pre-prepared. It’s a perfect solution for low executive function meals.
Of course, it’s not the best money-saver in the world. If you’re on a tight food budget, I recommend that you purchase fruit that you can eat without cutting up (buy melons and pineapple as an occasional treat), and eat raw only those vegetables that don’t require much cutting apart (carrots, lettuce, etc.).
Tip #4 for ADHD meal planning: stock your favorite sauces and salad dressings.
Sauces already have all the delicious herbs, spices, tomato sauce, and/or oil you would otherwise have to add to a meal. Purchase the kinds you like, making sure never to have less than one unopened jar or bottle available in the pantry so you never run out.
Then, use them creatively to add special pizzazz to a meal. For a few examples:
- Dress a salad with barbecue sauce.
- Mix pasta sauce into a dish of quinoa and chickpeas.
- Bake chicken breasts or salmon in ranch dressing.
- Flavor steamed vegetables with soy sauce or Worcestershire sauce.
When you have pre-made sauces and dressings on hand, all you have to do is cook the basic meat, beans, grains, and/or vegetables, then add the sumptuous flavor with a quick pour or sprinkle!
To make the healthiest choices possible, buy products without trans fats, high fructose corn syrup, or GMO ingredients.
And try to buy them with coupons/on sale.
Tip #5: Prepare frozen meals for your busy/exhausted brain.
You may have come to this post because you know you’re eating way too many store-bought frozen meals. Preparing your own is one of the top frugal meal planning hacks.
It’s also a great zero-waste cooking strategy, because after batch cooking, you freeze them in individual or family portions. That way, you thaw out approximately the amount of food you and your family is going to eat for one meal.
Granted, this tip might require too much executive function for some of my readers. But if you can hack it, there are a lot of casseroles (a-hem, that’s the old-fashioned word for “one pot meals) that can be made ahead of time and stored in the freezer.
If nothing else, if you’re not a Vegan you can cook several days of meat ahead of time and put it in the freezer. Put what you need for dinner in the refrigerator in the morning. Add a pre-made salad or thawed out frozen vegetables and steamed potatoes, and you have a meal that only takes ten minutes to put together.
You can also bake a large batch of healthy-ish muffins or scones to eat for breakfast throughout the next few weeks.
Speaking of breakfast…
Tip #6: Have a super-simple breakfast.
ADHD meal planning (along with meal planning for menopause brain fog) means as simple as possible. Fruit is about the simplest breakfast you can eat, and most people don’t eat nearly enough of it. Eat three pieces of your favorite, in-season fruit along with nut butter and/or whole nuts and seeds, and you get a nice dose of vitamin C and various minerals.
Or, you can eat some freshly-cooked grain (oatmeal, quinoa, millet) topped with sunflower seeds and banana slices. Avocado or nut butter toast is another easy, frugal alternative.
Tip #7 for frugal ADHD meal planning: Learn to use a slow cooker.
Whether you eat a 100% plant-based diet (this book can get you started), or include some meat in your diet, a slow cooker can be the best friend for someone with executive dysfunction. I don’t recommend the one-pot cookers because the coating used on the inside is toxic.
Any brand of slow cooker worth its proverbial salt will come with a little booklet of basic recipes to get you started.
Tip #8: Find 5 meals you like and rotate them into a schedule.
This a frugal ADHD meal planning hack that works great for any busy woman. You can apply the principle for all three main meals, for just the noonday and evening meal, or the evening meal only.
What you need to do is experiment with a variety of simple dishes. Once you’ve hit on five that you enjoy for any given mealtime, rotate them in on Monday through Friday. Saturday and Sunday can be leftover day, or one of the days can be a fasting day or splurge day, depending on your philosophy of healthy eating. 😉
When you cook what you highly enjoy, you get that much closer to zero-waste meal prep.
I give several examples of simple meals in my post about how to reduce stress with simple and healthy meals.
My most important tip for frugal, healthy eating with executive dysfunction: Plan, plan, plan.
I know I’ve mentioned this before, but it’s the most important tip of all. If you don’t plan your meals, you’ll end up getting take-out or at the McDonald’s drive-thru (hey, it’s their spelling, not mine).
Make a recurring appointment with yourself one day a week to sit down and plan your meals for the next seven days. To be as frugal as possible, plan your meals around weekly sales and whatever coupons you have/can print out. Based on that plan, go through your refrigerator and pantry and write out a grocery list. Use your Home Command Center to set up reminders for your meal planning and list-making.
If possible, try to go grocery shopping on the same day or two every week. My neurodivergent readers want to avoid being in a grocery store anytime on a Saturday and Sundays after ten in the morning. Talk about sensory overwhelm!
Bonus tips: how to save even more money with food.
- Buy grains, nuts, seeds, and beans in bulk. Then learn how to store/how soon to eat them so they don’t go rancid or get attacked by insects.
- Buy organic produce from conventional grocery stores.
- Stop being afraid of non-organic produce. It’s not nearly as toxic as we greenwashed autistic women have been led to believe (preaching to myself here). And it’s significantly less expensive.
- Look for online coupons and sales flyers for the grocery stores you shop at.
- Eat the evening’s leftovers for breakfast or lunch the next day.
- Buy store brands (unless you know the popular brand is much more to your taste).
- Never grocery shop when you’re hungry.
- Include more starches in a meal with meat, because starchy foods are cheaper.
- Try to grocery shop only once a week. If you have to shop more often for specific ingredients you need very fresh, only get those one or two items during your additional run to the market. If you have ADHD, reward yourself by listening to your favorite song or watching a funny video when you manage to stick to your frugal goal.
- Avoid the processed food aisles unless you’ve judiciously included a product or two as part of your overall frugal meal plan for the week. Or you need to buy treats for some sort of get-together.
Question: “Why is frugal meal planning so hard with ADHD/brain fog/autism?”
Answer: it doesn’t have to be.
I encourage you to try several of the above ideas to try to prove me wrong. 😉
And please, share your own simple eating hacks in the comments!
