Meal Planning and Cooking: Dinners for One or Two People

When you live alone or as half of a couple, it's often easier to choose foods that are convenient rather than good for you. Planning and cooking small meals might not feel like it's worth your time, and besides, most recipes are designed for four or more people.

The problem with choosing the more convenient take-out foods or highly processed meals is all the calories, fat and sugar that usually come with them. Plus they're typically not rich in vitamins, minerals, fiber and antioxidants your body needs to stay healthy. Cooking your own meals gives you better control of ingredients.

Here are a few tips on planning meals for one or two people:

Take an hour or so to prepare a meal plan for a few days or a week. Make a shopping list based on the ingredients you'll need - it helps to choose two or more meals that use some of the same fresh ingredients so you don't end up wasting them. Or in some cases, you can freeze leftover ingredients for another week.

Try out some recipes specifically designed for one or two people. You can also look for larger recipes and cut them down by half or make two or three meals at one time and freeze the leftovers for healthier frozen dinners later, similar to once-a-month cooking. Look for recipes that call for ingredients that are low in calories, sugar and saturated fat, but rich in nutrients like dishes that feature lots of colorful vegetables.

More Cooking and Meal Planning Help

• Cooking for One or Two
• Meal Planning for Two
• Know When a Recipe is Healthy
• Reduce a Recipe

I've also got a few grocery shopping tips. Some foods can be purchased in bulk because they store well for a long time. You can keep dry beans, pasta, flour, and other dry goods in covered containers and use as much as you'd like whenever you want them. You can also stock up on canned goods; just think about the amounts you'll use after the containers are open. A large family-sized can of soup might seem like a great bargain, but not if you end up throwing half of it away. Stay with smaller single and double serving sizes of canned goods. Grocery shopping is always easier when you have a shopping list. This way you'll buy the foods you need, and you'll be less tempted to fill your cart with highly processed meals.

Shopping for Groceries

• Shopping for Groceries
• Shopping for Two
• Choosing the Right Size Bakeware
• Nutrition Facts Labels

What about leftovers? Some of your favorite recipes might be difficult to scale down in size, but you can save the leftovers for another meal. You might bake a whole chicken for dinner one night and use the leftover meat to make a stir-fry or stew. Or you could use some of the chicken on a sandwich to take to work or school the next day. Be sure to practice good food safety when you store leftovers. They should be stored in the right size containers, usually sealed, in put into the refrigerator or freezer within one hour after serving. Frozen foods can last for several months, but refrigerated cooked foods will keep for less than a week, so you'll want to make good use of them quickly.

When it's time for eat your leftovers, be sure to reheat them thoroughly before serving, to avoid cold spots in your food. Frozen foods should be thawed in the refrigerator or in the microwave (in microwave-safe dishes only) and not left on the counter to thaw at room temperature.

Food Storage Tips

• Tips for Using Your Freezer
• Food Safety Basics
• The Food Temperature Danger Zone

You can reduce the size of most recipes to serve one or two people, however here are some recipes that are made to serve two people. You'll find many more at About.com Cooking for Two.

Healthy Recipes

• Chicken Piccata
• Shrimp Fra Diavolo
• Spanish Sauteed Lamb
• Sauteed Chard
• Glazed Carrots with Mint and Lemon
• Chipotle Grilled Peaches
• Roasted Cauliflower

(Note: if your recipe is in metric and you need to convert the measurements, use this Kitchen Measures Converter.)