Fuel-Efficient Cooking
As gas prices skyrocket, be fuel-efficient with your cooking, suggests Tina Fuchs, R.D., director of community health resources at St. Vincent’s Hospital in New York City. Use a slow-cooker in place of a gas oven several times a week, and set aside some time to batch-cook. “If you cook all in one night, you only heat up the kitchen once and you don’t have to crank up the A.C. every night,” she says.

Find Your Grocery Shopping Strategy

With food costs rising and non-working hours shrinking, how can you manage to put affordable, tasty meals on the table every day? “It’s all about planning,” says Bethany Thayer, a registered dietitian in private practice in Detroit. Here are three time- and money-saving approaches to buying groceries--try one, or more.

Strategy #1: Create a weekly menu.

Taking 15 minutes before you shop to jot down a meal plan for the week ahead is a huge time-saver and stress-reliever. Not only will you avoid last-minute trips to the store for needed items and what’s-for-dinner whines, “when you know what you’re buying, you avoid expensive impulse buying,” says Suzanne Farrell, R.D., a spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association. Another benefit of this strategy: You’ll cut back on buying pricey convenience items (so tempting when it’s 6 p.m. and you haven’t even thought about dinner).

The meal plan should include not just at-home dinner nights, but also take into account on-the-run days when you might otherwise stop off for fast food, says Tina Fuchs, R.D., director of community health resources at St. Vincent’s Hospital in New York City. So if Wednesday is going to be a band practice to soccer game to book club kind of night, grill extra steak and veggies on Tuesday that will become travel-friendly sandwiches to eat in the car. (Fuchs likes to combine leftover meat, veggies and cheese and create a filling, grab-and-go pressed sandwich in her frying pan.)

Strategy #2: Shop the circulars.

But what if you don’t have the time (or motivation) to sit down and figure out your menu this week? That’s OK -- but you still want to shop prepared. Before you head out to the store, quickly peruse the sales flyers in your weekly papers. “If chicken breasts are on sale this week, then plan a few meals around that,” suggests Fuchs. Save time by cooking up a big batch of chicken at once, then use in meals throughout the week (in pasta, stir-fries and tortillas) or stash in the freezer for next week.

Strategy #3: Designate theme nights.

Grandma may have been onto something with Monday chicken, Wednesday meatloaf, Friday fish nights. Having a basic weekly plan -- two chicken/meat nights, two fish nights, two bean nights and one pasta night -- takes the frenzy out of getting dinner on the table, says Farrell. You’ll cut down on cooking time -- Monday’s pot roast becomes Wednesday’s cheese steak sandwiches; the chili on Tuesday’s table is ready to go into Saturday’s burritos. Bonus: When you’re running late, family members will know to start boiling the pasta water on Thursday.