I love reading this thread and what others have posted! Thanks all!
I keep a master OneNote file with everything I make and then what I actually make. I do different categories for things that we especially love to jot my memory later.
Also keep a very stocked pantry and freezer with different staples - rices, 2 types of pasta, flour, sugar, beans from scratch in the freezer, homemade chicken broth in the freezer, vegetables that have a long shelf life (carrots, onions, potatoes, butternut squash, sweet potatoes, garlic), lettuce, different cheeses, etc. It does not cost us much per month to replace anything that run out since we tend to use a little of everything each month. I generally make everything from scratch to keep things new, so there are few prepared items in my pantry/freezer/fridge that box us into a corner. For example, if I had a bottle of teriyaki sauce then I would feel obligated (read: creativity hampered/dull/every dinner the same) to make a teriyaki dish....however, having the rice vinegar, sesame seed oil, some brown sugar, soy sauce....allows me to bounce around from a peanut sauce to teriyaki to a sesame dressing depending on my mood. Does that make sense? Same thing could be applied to salad dressings....having a couple vinegars (red wine, balsamic, apple cider) and a good Dijon mustard allows me to make an orange vinaigrette dressing, a warm cider vinaigrette reduction dressing, homemade BBQ sauce.....versus eating the same damn balsamic dressing every night from a bottle (which gets boring and is less healthy).
My meal plan is to have a general idea of what I'd like to make....I rarely make it on that day though. I probably change it 90% of the time due to our schedules, no longer interested, etc. Instead, if I am in the mood to use something up, like goat cheese or pine nuts, I will just enter that into google. Nearly every time, there is a recipe that sounds tasty that comes up and more times than not, I already have 9 out of 10 ingredients on that recipe. Anything I don't have, I just improvise with something else or do without. If I am missing a key ingredient, then I move on to the next recipe. The comments from the recipe reviewers are GOLD MINE since lots of times they also mention how they improvised the recipe. Don't be literal with the recipes you read.
I DO NOT go to the store for "just 1 item" as I usually end up buying more crap that I didn't need to begin with. Today, I am making split pea soup and have no onions...instead of going to store, I will either skip the onions altogether or throw in some pearl onions that I have in the freezer. I guess I don't have that kind of willpower to just buy 1 thing in the store. LOL. Knowing my DH's tastes, the star of the meal tonight will be the bacon, and he will never even miss the onion. As others mentioned, only going to the store once every 10-14 days really works for us.
Each week though, I generally make an Asian dish, Italian dish, and a Mexican/Southwestern dish. Those dishes also generate either a lunch for the next day or leftovers for the following night. Keeping in mind this principle alone....that's already 3-4 out of 7 meals for the week. I might do a big salad night, crockpot of soup or casserole, and then whatever I can throw together for the following night. That's it....7 measly meals for the week. I am lucky that DH does not mind eating leftovers and is ok if I repeat the same thing (which I rarely do) twice in two weeks. He is just happy that dinner is made for him!
Using the example cited above re: one Asian dish, one Italian dish, and a Mexican/Southwestern dish.....In the fall, I bought 10 roasted organic chickens from a local farm. It's my goal to make 2 roasted chickens per month - from the roasted chickens (as others have said), I might have roasted chicken with mashed potatoes one night, then next night might be a chicken teriyaki dish (Asian), shredded BBQ chicken sandwiches (American?), chicken enchiladas (Mexican/Southwestern), chicken noodle soup (crockpot), chicken taco salad (salad), and then finally homemade broth with the leftover carcass.
I don't think my system is perfect, but my goal has been to keep our grocery/toiletries/dining out budget to average $400 per month )(family of 3 and we eat almost entirely organic produce and free range/cage free meats/eggs) and have been successful the last 3 months by utilizing what I explained above. After realizing that I spent close to double that amount in 2012 and 2013 (mainly eating out, CSA membership which I've since cut, and some infant formula), I realized that the amount of time that I invest in planning my meals better would practically fund an IRA for one of us for the year, so it makes it well worth my time to spend a few minutes planning out our meal for the day so I have something to look forward to.
Finally, there is a gauntlet challenge on the "Throw Down the Gauntlet" section of this MMM forum. An ongoing challenge/thread of eating whatever is in your pantry and lots of people post (including me) and what they are making from their pantry. I use it as motivation to stay out of the grocery store and be creative with whatever I have.