Freezer Meal Prep Planner — 30 Meals

A freezer prep session fails in the shopping, not the cooking: six recipes, six separate ingredient lists, and the same onion bought three times in three quantities — or not bought at all. This planner runs the whole session end to end: recipes and portions first, then ONE shopping list with shared ingredients summed, then the prep-day sequence, then the freezer inventory that tells you what you actually have.

The sample session: 6 recipes x 5 meals = 30 meals, 70 portions (lasagne and egg muffins make 3 portions a meal, the rest 2). Under the recipes sit the ingredient lines — 28 rows, one per recipe-ingredient in that recipe’s own quantities. The shopping list aggregates them: chopped tomatoes appear in three recipes and land on the list once, at 2,800g; onions in three, at 14 pieces; rice in three, at 2,000g. Eight of the sixteen list ingredients are combined from more than one recipe line — that aggregation is the product. The list totals $85.37 of example shopping, which the cost block reads back as $2.85 per meal and $1.22 per portion.

Prep day gets a clock: nine tasks in your order with your time estimates and a running total — the sample runs 205 minutes, 3h 25m from washing vegetables to loading the freezer. Then the inventory: meal, portions, date frozen, and a use-by date computed from YOUR OWN window in days (the sample’s is 90, set on Start Here — your window, your call; this sheet tracks dates, it is not a food-safety authority). Check it against a date you type and anything past your window is flagged in the log’s own words: the sample’s older soup batch, frozen July 25, reads EXPIRED? — with the question mark, because the window is your setting and the call is yours. The other five batches sit at 79 days left, and the freezer holds all 70 portions, counted.

What it does for you:
– Plans the full session: recipes x meals x portions, 30 meals in the sample, totals automatic
– Aggregates the shopping list from per-recipe ingredient lines — shared ingredients summed once
– Sequences prep day with your task order and time estimates, running total included
– Logs the freezer: portions, date frozen, use-by from your own window, days left, status flags
– Reads the session back as cost per meal and cost per portion from the real shopping total
– Plus expense log, zero-based monthly budget, dashboard and monthly summary

What’s inside (.xlsx, works in Excel AND Google Sheets):
– Start Here — setup steps, your use-by window (YOUR example setting) and the check date
– Recipes & Shopping — 6 sample recipes, 28 ingredient lines, the aggregated 16-item shopping list
– Prep Day & Inventory — a 9-step sample session (3h 25m) and the freezer log with one batch flagged EXPIRED?
– Expense Log, Monthly Budget, Dashboard, Monthly Summary

Instant download. Type only in the yellow cells — formula cells are locked (password: sheetdaily, disclosed on the Start Here tab so you can unlock if you ever need to). Sample session is pre-filled so you can see exactly how it works; clear the yellow cells and type your own. Prices are your own example entries, and use-by windows are your own settings — the sheet plans, aggregates and tracks; it does not set food-safety rules.