Homestead Revival: Sizzling Summer Round Up: Plan To Eat!

Summer is moving along and so is our Sizzling Summer Round Up! Have you thought about this fall though? It will be here before you know it and with it, school starts and various other clubs and activities and scheduling suddenly becomes a necessity.

Planning meals can be so much easier with the right tool. I've been using Plan To Eat for quite a while now and it's pretty much revolutionized how I meal plan.

Here's the basics of what it's all about...

• a menu planner for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks with an easy drop and drag function from recipes you input into your recipe box, but you can also just type in your own items/notes.

• a recipe book where you can store your recipes from home and from the internet and invite friends to join you and share recipes.

• a shopping list that will also store your pantry inventory and allow you to cook based on what's in your pantry at the moment (just click the "Cook from My Pantry" button and recipes matching your ingredients will pop up)

• the ability to create an iPhone mobile ready "app" so you can quickly access information at the grocery store or on the run (I'm forever needing to have my actual menu with me when I'm away from home. This has also helped me to coordinate with my daughter who helps me shop and cook. I just tell her to check the app since we both keep it on our phones.)

Now that you know the basics, let me expand on one of my favorite things about this site. If I find a recipe on a blog or website that I like and want to try, I can easily upload it into the Plan To Eat recipe planner. There's a little link you add to your tool bar which you click when you find the page with the recipe you want - much like the "pin it" link for Pinterest. When you click the button on the toolbar, it opens a window up on the right side (see photo below) and will either automatically upload the recipe or if it can't do that, it will make it easy for you to copy the information and paste it in each section. Trust me... it works quickly and easily! Another way to upload recipes is just to copy the URL and paste it in on the Plan To Eat site in your recipes.

After the recipe is uploaded into your Recipe Book, you can then add a photo if it doesn't import one from the site.

I looked at several other menu apps for iPhone, but I didn't find one that also had a computer version. And really, I wanted the iPhone app just as a back up for when I'm at the store and shopping. Most of my menu planning happens at home on the big screen. Plan To Eat had both.

Interested yet? What if I told you they give you a 30 day free trial? Sweet.

And, the winner of this give-away will receive a one year subscription for FREE!

How To Enter This Give-Away
This give-away is open to all Homestead Revival readers who have access to internet during their 12 month subscription should they win.

• Visit Plan To Eat and come back here to tell me how you struggle with menu planning and how this plan would help you. You MUST have a blog OR leave me a way to contact you!

• For an extra entry, LIKE Plan To Eat's facebook page and leave a separate comment telling me you've done so.

• For another extra entry... blog, Facebook, or tweet about this giveaway and leave me a comment telling me you've done so.

This give-away ends at 11:59 p.m. PST TONIGHT!! The winner will be announced on the Homestead Revival Facebook page ONLY. Be sure to like my page so you get all the winners from the Sizzling Summer Round Up as well as updates that I don't put on my blog!