Customer Reviews

The Weekly Feeder : A Revolutionary Shopping, Cooking and Meal Planning System

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I gave this both 3 stars because while it is laid out well, it doesn't suit my family's style of eating. The "system" it employs is probably already used by many homemakers. Don't expect anything outstanding despite the "revolutionary" title. It is simply planning dinners ahead, taking the recipes to find the quantities needed, making your shopping list from there, and keeping copies of them, so they can be reused. A common sense approach.

The book heavily favors pasta combinations with some potato, rice and breads. Don't expect much brown rice, barley, millet, or other whole grains here. Of the meats, chicken features the most. There are no vegetarian entrees, and no nutritional information or exchanges. There is a rough proportional break down, but since they more or less follow a 30% protein, 40% carbs, 30% fat scheme, I didn't find it suitable for our eating style. We don't do high protein diets and we have vegetarians in the family. It would have been nicer in a binder style format so after you started making up your own menus you could add them to the ones already in the book so you could have them all in one place.

For those who DO follow a rough 30-40-30 scheme, there is good news: The side of the book has marks so you can quickly turn to any week's menu plans. There are tear-out grocery sheet checklists in the back of the book if you follow the menus exactly. The recipes themselves appear tasty, but since I returned my copy I can't say for sure how they'd turn out. With 8 weeks of dinner menus, it could save you some time and hassles if these menus do suit your style. There is a small dessert chapter for treats. There are charts in back for you to Xerox in making up your own menus. The homey sidebars provide tidbit info in a sort of fun way. The bottom margins are roomy enough for some notes, and there are several lined pages in back for expanded notes.

Basically, the book's usefulness will largely depend on your current eating habits more than the layout. The layout was actually one of the better ones I've seen. Those looking for more "menu oriented" cookbooks might want to look at the "Month of Meals" series by the American Diabetes Association even if you are not diabetic. The "mix and match" layout might be more useful even if it does not provide custom grocery lists like this one does. For the vegetarians, the _Month of Meals: Vegetarian Pleasures_ edition would be particularly helpful.

The premise behind this book is ease and simplification of meal preparation, planning, and grocery buying. I bought the book, excited by the prospect of help in the kitchen and help with menu planning! However, in the 3 days since purchase, I have tried two recipes, "Cashew Chicken" and "Turkey Sausage Risotto", and both times I was left hanging!

The cashew chicken mentions salt and sugar in the ingredient list, to be used in the marinade. However, in the middle of the recipe, it asks that you "sprinkle the vegetables for the stir-fry with some of the salt and sugar". ...What salt and sugar?! I already used that in the marinade! No more is mantioned in the ingredients list!

The Turkey Sausage Risotto we attempted last night, and disaster struck again... After the recipe instructed me to "process in a food processor the sun-dried tomatoes and parsley til finely chopped, then set aside", it never mentions those ingredients again! (Was it just a decoration for my kitchen counter?) I had never cooked this before, and so only guessed at when I was supposed to add those ingredients, so did the recipe turn out as intended? Who knows?!

I am not a chef, and so must place my complete trust in a cookbook! If I use this book again, it will be with great trepidation. The idea and intent behind this book is wonderful, but I wish more time had been put into testing the recipes before publication! I would only recommend it to experienced cooks.

My wife and I bought the Weekly Feeder and now healthy, well-balanced, colorful, delicious meals have replaced microwave dinners and cereal. This book has taken the effort out of being organized! With two working parents, it's hard to have dinners together. Now we do. Family dinners bring families together. Kirkpatrick writes in a conversational, non-threatening and often humorous style that opens up her house to inspire change. If she can do it with three busy kids, anyone can. Bonus: the book is filled with wonderful parenting/family tips.

In The Weekly Feeder, Cori Kirkpatrick offers an practical and effective meal-planning system specifically designed for busy people with limited time for planning, shopping for, and preparing evening meals for themselves and family. Kirkpatrick's time-saving system includes eight weeks of delicious dinner menus and recipes; pre-planned weekly grocery lists; pantry checklists for staple items and spices; easy instructions for adapting favorite personal recipes; helpful hints for organizing the home kitchen; nutritional information for good health; and enjoyable anecdotes emphasizing food, family, and fun. The Weekly Feeder is an invaluable guide from grocery story to kitchen to dining room table. If you are strapped for time, concerned about good meals for loved ones, and are missing the joy that comes from making and eating good meals in good company, then The Weekly Feeder was written just for you!

Great recipes, helpful hints and a wonderful way to organize your life in the kitchen and the grocery store.

My wife purchased the first version of this book direct from the author and liked the concept (and the recipes) so much that she bought this version too. We recommend this book for anyone who is familier with the daily mantra of making last minute decisions along the lines of "What should I buy at the store tonight?"

She has used this both for weekly planning as well as the occasional one-off recipe. The weekly planner is a neat idea; just take the whole book to the store and get your whole week's worth of groceries. She was looking for a way to simplify our life yet add variety to our menu and this fit the bill. (Note: she has taken this convenience a step further and saved even more time by simply ordering her week's groceries from HomeGrocer.com -- now WebVan.) We've found the book to be straightforward in its approach to recipes. We haven't run into some of the issues that others have reported but we're sort of flexible in our approach towards cooking anyway.

I've had this book for a few months now and have made almost everything in the book a few times. The best part is taking the list to the store putting it away and then when dinner time rolls around going to the book to see what is for dinner and knowing everything you need is already in the house. I hate deciding what to eat and this makes the choice for me. The food is great, my husband loves it, and even our 2 1/2 year old eats it.

I've given three as gifts to my other busy working mom friends!

Because I hate planning dinners, I thought this cookbook would be helpful. It offers five nights of entrees and sides and includes recipes and grocery lists. At first I thought I had hit the jackpot. However, after using it for several weeks I would recommend that you skip this one. The layout is great, but if you don't like all of the recipes, or if some of the important veggies are out of season or unavailable, then the cookbook cannot be used as intended. There are a few wonderful recipes, but they lie amid some that would be best skipped. Each page includes personal tales about the author's children, their friends, and sporting events. The narratives are a bit trite and don't add much to the book other than filler. I would have prefered kitchen organizational tips or time savers. Bottom line: keep looking. This cookbook really isn't all that revolutionary. I give it "2" stars.

My friends and I have used this cook book for over a year and we love its healthy menu's and shopping lists. It is easy to replace meals that your family doesn't like (and there are few, we don't like fish) with others (from other books).

Where was this book when I needed it? I wish it had been available when I was juggling work and cooking for a family. This is more than a cookbook. It is a system of organizing your grocery shopping and cooking that can really save you time and energy. There are enough delicious recipes for six weeks of family dinners. Complete grocery shopping lists are given for each week. What could be simpler?