A List for the Week

Every Sunday, Bradley and I look at the week ahead. We open our calendars, talk through what is coming, and begin to shift our minds toward Monday. Somewhere in that conversation comes a practical question: what are we going to eat?

The produce we brought home from the market on Saturday is usually where I start. I look through the refrigerator and pantry, see what needs to be used, and consider what we might make with it. Then I turn to a few favorite cookbooks or recipe apps for inspiration. Something seasonal, something familiar, and usually something we have not tried before.

We like variety. There are recipes we return to often, but I enjoy adding a new one to the week—a different way to prepare a vegetable, an unfamiliar combination, or a dish that makes dinner feel worth looking forward to after a day at Dixon Rye.

The calendar helps keep those ambitions realistic. An evening at home leaves room to cook. A late day in the studio calls for something simpler. And if we are going out, there is little reason to buy ingredients for a dinner neither of us will be there to make.

Gradually, it all becomes a list.

We keep ours on our phones, shared between us, so either of us can add something when we notice it is running low. At the grocery store, we can work our way through different aisles and check things off as they go into the cart. Marriage has many forms of teamwork. Ours occasionally involves locating the chickpeas.

Having a list makes shopping easier, but it also makes me more thoughtful about what we bring home. A promotion is less tempting when I know we have no use for it. There are fewer duplicates in the pantry and fewer vegetables waiting in the refrigerator for a meal that never happens.

In Europe, I enjoy shopping more frequently, picking up what I need for the meal I am about to prepare. Our rhythm here is different. With a larger refrigerator and room to store more, it is easy to buy ahead—and easy to buy too much. Planning for the week helps me keep that sense of purpose, even when I am shopping for several days at once.

By Sunday evening, we have a few meals in mind and the ingredients to make them. There is comfort in knowing that, somewhere between appointments, decisions, and long days, we have already made room to feed ourselves well.