Meal Planning

October Monthly Meal Plan (Slow Cooker Heavy)

It’s that time again, monthly meal plan time!

How did September go for you? For our family, September was all about getting back into a normal routine, and the meal plan really did help the transition.

I am sharing our Monthly meal plan again below, and I have also pinned all the recipes to my October Meal Plan Pinterest Board.

I use Plan to Eat to quickly organize my family favorite recipes and organize them into meal plans and generate shopping lists! If you have a Plan to Eat Account send me a friend request (my username is HomeinFLX), I’d love to exchange recipes!

I plan for the month but shop for the week. Since I have already set aside the time to meal plan, I find it easier to plan for the whole month, kind of a once and done thing. The other nice thing, after each month, is planned for the year, you are done. You can repeat weeks or whole months if you would like. I also purchase some things for the whole month, especially if they are on sale, but the majority of the grocery shopping is done weekly.

Things to know about the October Meal Plan

I leaned heavily on my slow cooker this month! My daughter has swim meets, and my son has fall baseball & football. We will be pretty busy and I love coming home to a hot meal fully cooked meal on a chilly fall day.
There are 4 pork dinners on this meal plan, all 4 meals can be made from 1 whole pork loin! Whole Boneless Center Cut Pork Loin Roasts are great budget cuts of meat (Wegmans sells them for around $1.69/lb. and they average 8-10 lbs.) If you have never cut down a whole loin, have no fear it is incredibly easy and there are plenty of tutorials, or you could have your meat cutter at the grocery store do it! Be sure to package your cut pork loin and refrigerate or freeze as soon as you can. Check out: How to Turn a Whole Prok Loin into 9 meals and save a ton of Money
My family is not bothered by chicken a couple of nights in a row, but we generally don’t eat red meat multiple days in a row, just personal preference!
My meal plan is pretty flexible, and I consider it a “guideline” not a rule, and one you can ignore at will. Craving tacos on Monday and have all the ingredients of hand? Go for it! I’ve never had the meal planning police knock at my door for observing Taco Tuesday on another day of the week ? Have fun with it, meal planning is supposed to make your life easier, not cause stress. Really the only time I strictly follow my meal plan is when fresh perishable food is involved, like seafood.

I hope you find our meal plan helpful or maybe inspirational, (I know all families are different and have different preferences or dietary restrictions). I am looking forward to sharing meal plans for the upcoming months.

October Monthly Meal Plan

Monday, Oct 1: Slow Cooker Meatball Sandwiches with a tossed salad
Tuesday, Oct 2: Easy Ginger Pork Stir-Fry *use a portion of the pork loin
Wednesday, Oct 3: Baked Potato Soup with Garlic Cheesy Pull Apart Bread
Thursday, Oct 4: Leftovers
Friday, Oct 5: Garlic Shrimp Stir Fry
Saturday, Oct 6: Saucy Chicken Thighs with Baked Potatoes and Steamed Spinach.
Sunday, Oct 7: Roast Chicken & Perfect Rice Pilaf *I bake 2 chickens and shred & freeze 1 for use in other meals (ex: chicken stew or chicken quesadillas)
Monday, Oct 8: Slow Cooker Salisbury Steak with Freezer Mashed Potatoes and corn
Tuesday, Oct 9: Chicken Stew with Dumplings
Wednesday, Oct 10: Broccoli Cheese Soup
Thursday, Oct 11: Leftovers
Friday, Oct 12: Linguine with Clam Sauce with a tossed salad
Saturday, Oct 13: Beef Nacho Pie with Mixed Vegetables
Sunday, Oct 14: Slow-Cooker Pulled Pork Fajitas *use a portion of the pork loin
Monday, Oct 15: Western Omelette with Fruit
Tuesday, Oct 16: S low-Cooker Apricot-Glazed Pork Roast and Stuffing *use a portion of the pork loin
Wednesday, Oct 17: Slow Cooker Chili with Corn Bread
Thursday, Oct 18: Leftovers
Friday, Oct 19: Chicken Quesadillas & Easy Spanish Rice
Saturday, Oct 20: Cabbage Sausage Supper
Sunday, Oct 21: Asparagus ‘n’ Shrimp with Angel Hair
Monday, Oct 22: Homemade Sloppy Joes with French fries and Roasted Cauliflower
Tuesday, Oct 23: Slow-Cooker Mexican Pork *use a portion of the pork loin
Wednesday, Oct 24: Broccoli Chicken Divan with a tossed salad
Thursday, Oct 25: Leftovers
Friday, Oct 26: Macaroni and Cheese with green beans
Saturday, Oct 27: Dad’s Meatloaf with Tomato Relish with baked potatoes and corn
Sunday, Oct 28: Cube Steak and Gravy Recipe with Freezer Mashed Potatoes and Oven Roasted Frozen Broccoli
Monday, Oct 29: Classic BLT Sandwich with cut fruit
Tuesday, Oct 30: Cheesy Gnocchi and Sausage Skillet with Easy Garlic Bread
Wednesday, Oct 31: Fast English Muffin Pizzas

Some great easy Fall desserts for October:

Looking for More Dinner Inspiration?

Check out the September Monthly Meal Plan

September Monthly Meal Plan

After a crazy summer I am ALL about simplification, so I sat down and created a monthly meal plan. All the links to recipes are listed below, and I also created a Pinterest board where you can find images of the dishes and links to the recipes.

I plan for the month but shop for the week. Since I have already set aside the time to meal plan, I find it easier to plan for the whole month, kind of a once and done thing. The other nice thing, after each month is planned for the year, you are done. You can repeat weeks or whole months if you would like. I also purchase some things for the whole month, especially if they are on sale, but the majority of the grocery shopping is done weekly.