How to Meal Plan with Cozi

Meal planning just got easier!

If you have Cozi, you can add recipes to your Recipe Box by clicking on the “Meals” tab on the left hand menu.
This will open your Recipe Box (as you can see from the tabs across the top menu)
To add a new recipe, simply click +New recipe button and begin filling in the information.
You can also add recipes directly from a website you like by installing the “Add to Cozi Meals” button to your bookmarks bar! (I do this all the time!)

edited to add tutorial on 1/8/18

As you can see below, Cozi will alphabetize your recipes.

I also like to add “tags” to my recipes so I can search for what I need easier, for example; breakfast, lunch, snack, paleo, salad, chicken, dinner, easy, fast, dessert, THM (Trim Healthy Mama)

Once you have input your recipe, click save and you are done with this step!

In the middle of the recipe (see photo above of Quinoa Greek Salad) you will notice a live link “Add ingredients to Cozi shopping list” this is a gem, right here! If you click on this, it will take you to your shopping lists:

Since I make a lot of lists, I like to date my weeks as seen the picture above. I also have lists for other stores, such as Hobby Lobby, Target, Costco, Home Depot, etc. so that if I am out, I can access my mobile app to see what I need on that list. To create a new list each week, just click the +New List button and type in the date, then create your list! Now I have added one recipe’s ingredients to my shopping list for this week! Occasionally, I will go back in and delete some of my old lists, but not always, and I’ll tell you why in a bit!

Now, I will continue to drag and drop recipes until I have filled out my menu plan. I usually just fill out the dinner part, because I wing it for breakfast and lunch, pretty much a rotation of the same 7-10 breakfasts and lunches.

If you have a lot on your schedule you can look at your calendar and your menu plan side by side, that way you will not schedule a super complicated meal on a night when you have 2 basket ball games and a ballet recital! This is what a blank week looks like side by side: (oops I just noticed my Pokemon meeting is on the wrong day… I’ll fix that in a minute) If you prefer, you can click the two little arrows beside the dividing line in the middle and ONLY view the menu portion, but I like to see what I am doing each day, so I know how involved my meal can be. Now scroll down!

As you can see I have many recipes on the right hand side of my page that I can choose from.  Those are all the recipes that I have created myself, added from my favorite books or copied from various blogs I follow. Now that I have done the drag and drop onto my meal plan part, this is what it looks like:

Each time I add a recipe to my menu plan/calendar page, I can click on it and add all the ingredients to my shopping list. (Later I can go back and delete items like salt, pepper, water, etc. that I don’t really need to shop for.)

The list will look like this: 

Each time you add a recipe’s ingredients to you list, it will give you a header (the name of the recipe) so you can see what you need for each recipe.

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I then print my menu plan by clicking the PRINT button on the Cozi screen, followed by my Grocery list. To print the grocery list, I click on the Shopping tab on the left hand side menu. Then I click on the list I just created, then print. Simple!

If you like to have your grocery list separated by section of the store, you can re-type your list, but this is too much work for me! I simply take four highlighters and mark my list. Green for produce, yellow for dairy, pink for meat, and orange for frozen/other. You can come up with a system that works for you. This is one way I do my menu plan!

If you are like me and hop back and forth between eating styles, make sure you tag your recipes as you input them. My favorites are Paleo, THM (Trim Healthy Mama), Whole 30, gluten-free, and no-sugar. I always tag my recipes because I can’t depend on my memory to think of the name of that awesomely amazing dessert I made last week!

On a side note, if you are following the THM plan, I highly suggest adding S, E, or FP to the end or beginning of the title and also to the “tags” section to make finding the type of recipe you want to use faster! Like when you forget to eat and you are starving and you need an S meal right now!!! So, take my advice, add the meal type!

The reason I don’t always delete my old lists is so that I can reuse the old menu plans. I simply save the printed menu plan and grocery list in a page protector in my kitchen binder. When I don’t feel like filling out a menu plan or writing up a grocery list, I can just go grab one of my old menu’s out of the binder and head to the store! Easy peasy!

Any questions? Feel free to ask away in the comment section below!

Create a Cozi account for the whole family today, and keep your family’s schedules and lists organized in one shared calendar. It’s FREE!