428 Nutrition & Wellness for Life Copyright Goodheart-Willcox Co., Inc. As time goes on, you will collect more and more recipes that you like. Use your recipe collection along with the list of foods that you already have to write your menu. Consider planning leftovers into the menu. Rather than throwing away leftovers, plan ahead for their use in the menu. If roast chicken is on the menu for Sunday, plan chicken casserole for later in the week. Make the casserole with leftover chicken and any leftover vegetables from the week. Consult resources for planning healthy meals discussed earlier to ensure that your menu meets the nutritional and health needs of those you are feeding. Managing Time for Meal Preparation Meal planning saves time and effort. Efficient use of time is important to people with busy schedules. Some people skip meals if they cannot prepare foods quickly and easily. For them, fast and simple meal preparations are essential to good nutrition. A number of strategies can help you make the best use of your time in the kitchen. Organizing your work area, using a work schedule, and performing advance preparation help ensure meals are ready on time. Time-saving devices can streamline (simplify) cooking tasks. You can also use recipes and food prod- ucts designed to speed your food preparation tasks. THE MOVEMENT CONNECTION Walking Meeting Why Healthy meals require planning, but healthy meals don’t have to be boring. Use your creativity to make meals both healthy and enjoyable. In addition to physical health benefits, studies have shown that the act of walking boosts creative thinking. Working with a partner, locate the MyPlate Plan feature on ChooseMyPlate.gov. (If you have not already done so, create a meal plan for each partner.) Enter each partner’s meals and snacks for a typical day into the MyPlate Plan tracking report. Deter- mine how the food choices compare with each partner’s Daily Food Group Targets. Apply Take five minutes to hold a walking meeting in your classroom. During the meeting, discuss your findings. Use your creativity to propose ways the meals could be changed to make them healthier. Julien Tromeur/Shutterstock.com