After many years of providing meals for my family, I was pretty tired of trying to appeal to everyone else and having "enough variety", whatever that vague criteria was in my mind.
I'm down to one other mouth to feed nowadays, and that person doesn't care much about variety. So I made a conscious shift to just cook fewer things--I made a short list of about 15 dinners I know we both like and boom! a lot of annoyance was gone.
I am enjoying cooking much more now that I know positive results are guaranteed.
Boy I can relate. I started a new rule last night! My husband first thought it was because he texted me asking for advice for dinner while I was in my big meeting. But I told him that no, I'd decided earlier during the day on a walk.
So. I pretty much eat the same thing for lunch every day. Salad.
My experience is probably different than many/most. I eat a lot of produce AND I get it delivered by 2 services. We have one service that shops at the farmer's market and delivers a box every Saturday. We can swap things out within reason (there are usually 11 items and 6-8 "swaps"). There's a Weds box by a different company that delivers to our elementary school. Thus, most of my meals have to be planned around produce. And I get a lot of salad greens, so I've basically been eating salad every day for lunch for 4-5 years.
Breakfast rotates. Eggs. Oatmeal. Yogurt.
For dinner, I would pick 2 big meals to make on Sat/Sun, and then we'd eat them Mon/Tues, then have to wing it mid-week.
New plan, the kids have to help (they are 12 and 6) and pick a night because I'm tired of thinking about it.
Saturday: 12 yo picks and has to help cook.
Sunday: 6 yo, same deal
Monday: Leftovers
Tuesday: (only day I get home first): Me
Weds: favorite chicken (aka, chicken tenders for kids, veggie burgers or leftovers for parents)
Thurs: husband
Friday: frozen pizza
On Friday night, we will look at what we are getting in the 2 veggie boxes and everyone has to decide not only the main dish, but also choose a veg and recipe.
To be honest, I pretty much always eat veggies raw, or roasted, or microwaved, or stir-fried. Doesn't matter the veg, it's not hard to prep.
(For example, this week we are getting the following veg:
Sat: broccoli, beets, leeks, carrot, lettuce, radish, kale, baby greens, dill, apples, mandarin
Weds: cauliflower, spinach, leeks, potatoes, onion, avocado
And we still have carrots and sweet potatoes and onions from this week's box.
In the past, I've done things like:
Sat, meal 1. Sun meal 2. Monday Meal 1 leftovers. Tues Meal 2 leftovers. Weds crockpot, Thurs crockpot leftovers, Friday wing it.
Or Monday: chicken, Tues tacos, Weds stir fry, Thurs pasta, Friday pizza.