Free ALDI Meal Plan week of 9/17/23

Welcome to your free ALDI meal plan for the week of 9/17/23: This week we’re cooking up everything from cracker-y, crumble-y, Parmesan-y pork chops to an easy cheesy beautiful pasta skillet — and, so much more.

Happy mid-September! How on earth did this happen already, right? Anyway: Just a quick reminder that our ALDI meal plans are no longer posted every week. This IS a meal planning week over here, though, so I hope that you all enjoy. Read on for all of your:

Easy family recipes for the week of 9/17/23
An editable, printable shopping list to take to the store
An easy add-to-Instacart list for pickup or delivery, and
Six nights of sitting down to easy & affordable family dinners.

Our easy ALDI meal plans feature six complete dinners for four, $70 out the door. Bring your family together around the table for six straight nights, and save time & money in the process.

Don’t miss anything! Be sure to sign up for email alerts.

Use any meal plan as an easy starting point, modifying your own family’s weekly dinner menu around what’s in stock (or on sale) in your area, what’s on hand in your pantry, and/or any dietary needs and preferences.

Free ALDI meal plan week of 9/17/23 – 9/23/23

Come and cook along with us for the answer to the never-ending question: What’s for dinner?

*** Subscribe to new ALDI meal plans & updates here ***

Before jumping straight into our menu, though, let’s talk briefly about this week’s new ALDI Finds.

Organic ground beef and super soft leggings

My fave ALDI Finds for the week of 9/13/23 include organic grass fed ground beef, frozen potato circles, fall decor, and more!

*** Five Fave ALDI Finds of the week, here ***

Check out this week’s picks (and more pix!), and let me know what you want to Find. Then extend your savings just a little further on Amazon, with this huge list of HUNDREDS of subscribe & save filler items.

gray and white cat admiring self in mirror

What else? How about a little news about what The Notorious Bad Kitty Lucy and her bad kitty friends have been up to, all in our latest Caturday update.

And now, with no further ado, here’s your easy ALDI meal plan for the week of 9/17/23. *** Be sure to sign up for our emails, so that you never miss a new meal plan post or Mashup Mom update! ***

ALDI Meal Planning week of 9/17/23 – 9/23/23

Pick up everything on the shopping list below, then start cooking on Sunday. As always: Six complete dinners for four, $70 out the door.

*** Print your meal plan summary + grocery shopping list below this week’s detailed plan, in Word, .rtf, or PDF format. ***
I’m assuming that you have on hand some pantry basics like cooking oil, condiments, and spices. Read through the recipes before you shop, to make sure that you have the necessary pantry staples on hand for this week’s ALDI menu plan. *** The printable shopping list includes a separate section of needed basics for the week.

Six easy dinners from ALDI for $70

ALDI Meal Plan — start cooking 9/17/23

Sunday

Taco style tater tot casserole (use 1 lb beef), topped with a little leftover salsa
Simple sheet pan green beans (cook at 400 degrees along with the casserole instead of at 425, giving an extra couple minutes in the oven if necessary), and

Monday

Ground beef & broccoli stir fry
Garden salad, topped with a little shredded Parmesan

Tuesday

Keema inspired ground beef quesadillas
On the side: Use a hand or stand mixer to mix 12 oz of softened cream cheese with about 12 oz of salsa to make a dip, then scoop it up with crackers. (Reserve some crackers for Friday’s recipe.)

Wednesday

Easy cheesy beautiful pasta skillet (use 12 oz of the rotini, unless your store has the prettier farfalle to sub — mine has been out forever!)
Heat up the baguette

Thursday

Broiled Parmesan pork chops & broccoli
Spinach salad topped with thinly sliced onion, shredded mozzarella, & Italian dressing

Friday

Cracker-y, crumbly, Parmesan-y pork chops
Take the 1.5 bags of peas you have left, and saute them in a pan with butter, a little minced garlic, sea salt, & pepper to taste, until heated through nicely (about 5-6 minutes)

Saturday

Leftovers, family pizza night (ALDI sells nice big take-and-bake deli pizzas), carryout, mix it up!

ALDI Shopping List — Shop through 9/16/23

*** Check below this grocery list for Easy One-Stop Instacart Shopping, as well as an editable & printable list. *** Note: If you have wiggle room in your budget this week, I’d also grab avocados & sour cream to go with Sunday’s recipe, cook up some rice for Monday’s recipe, and add in some fruit. 🙂

Dairy & refrigerated

2 blocks Happy Farms cream cheese, $2.58
Emporium Selection whole milk ricotta, $2.49
8 oz block Happy Farms cheddar, $2.09
16 oz bag Happy Farms shredded mozzarella, $3.89
5 oz Emporium Selection shredded Parmesan, $2.49

Frozen

30 oz bag Season’s Choice crispy potato circles, $2.79
2 bags Season’s Choice steamable sweet peas, $1.90

Grocery

Specially Selected French baguette, $1.69
24 oz jar Casa Mamita medium salsa, $2.29
Box of Savoritz golden round crackers, $2.29
Bottle of Tuscan Garden restaurant style Italian dressing, $2.19
16 oz box Reggano rotini, $.99
24 oz Reggano marinara, $1.49
El Milagro flour tortillas, $1.16
Packet Casa Mamita taco seasoning mix, $.39
Can Dakota’s Pride black beans, $.79
Can Happy Harvest whole kernel corn, $.64
8 oz can Happy Harvest tomato sauce, $.49

Meat & seafood

4 lb family pack organic grass-fed ground beef, $17.96
2.75 lbs family pack boneless thin-sliced pork chops, $8.23

Produce

1.75 lb broccoli crowns, $2.96
8 oz bag of spinach, $1.49
Garden salad, $1.79
16 oz green beans, $1.79
3 lbs yellow onions, $2.49
3 heads garlic, $1.49

That comes to: $70.84

Or, maybe less…! These meals can run even less, if you supplement this week’s ALDI purchases with: Clearance meat you already have in your freezer, pantry staples you picked up on sale, produce you have on hand, and/or sale produce from a local fruit market.

Shop this week’s meal plan with Instacart

Easy-peasy: *** Add this week’s grocery list to your Instacart. ***

IMPORTANT! READ BEFORE CHECKING OUT:

You’ll need to check your pantry for staples not included in this Instacart list. *** See needed pantry staples, below.
The list feature doesn’t allow me to add multiples of a single item or to change the weight of items, and the meat special buys often don’t show up. So: Before adding the list to your cart, change these quantities and make the following notes.
1. Quantities:
  - Change the cream cheese quantity to two
  - Change the frozen peas quantity to two
2. Notes for your shopper:
  - Make a note to add the 4 lb family pack of organic ground beef on special buy in this week’s ad
  - Make a note that you want about a 2.75 lb pack of the thin-sliced family pack pork chops on special buy in this week’s ad
  - Make a note that you want a bag of the frozen crispy potato circles, also a special buy that’s not showing up
  - Make a note that you want a 1.75 lb pack of the broccoli crowns

When using the add your list to Instacart feature, always double check your cart against the grocery list above, and see the notes and quantity changes above.

** Pantry staples to check for before shopping: Olive oil, butter, sesame oil, soy sauce, brown sugar, corn starch, garlic powder, Italian seasoning, seasoned salt, smoked paprika, oregano, thyme, sea salt, salt, crushed red pepper, chili powder, cumin, turmeric, cinnamon, paprika, powdered ginger, cayenne

Instacart prices are higher than in store, so your total will be higher than shown in the above grocery list.

Printable ALDI meal plan & grocery list

Print this week’s meal plan:

*** Download this week’s printable ALDI shopping list and meal plan in Word format, or:
- Download in .rtf format
- Download in PDF format
If you don’t have Word, open the shopping list in Google Docs or Wordpad.

Edit and add in your own meal ideas, remove items you have on hand, and/or change regional pricing to match your store. *** Day(s) next to each item in the printable shopping list show which nights use each ingredient, so that you can easily see what to delete if you’re skipping a night or modifying.

A couple of notes

I try not to repeat main dish recipes more often than once a month, but you will see favorite easy recipes again in these weekly ALDI meal plans as the same meats and produce items come up again on sale. Part of the fun of meal planning lies in mixing old stand-bys with something new each week.
If one or more of these recipes isn’t to your taste, or if you have other ingredients to use up, adapt the recipes in this ALDI meal plan to your family’s preferences. Or, just use the ideas here to supplement your own meal planning! See: Pantry staples to stock up on and how to modify a meal plan for your family.

** ad markets & dates

This week’s ALDI meal plan reflects prices from the current week’s ad (running 9/10-9/16 in Sunday ad markets, and 9/13-9/19 in Wednesday ad markets). Non-advertised prices are from my local store in the Chicago suburbs. Prices and produce deals *can vary* by location & region. In either ad market, shop any time through Saturday and start cooking on Sunday 9/17/23.

Stay in the meal planning loop

More ways to stay connected:

*** Subscribe here to receive email about new ALDI meal plans.
Browse through every ALDI meal plan here *** Note: prices may have changed since originally posted.
Come over and join us on Facebook in the Almost All ALDI group.

Happy ALDI shopping & cooking this week! If you find this meal plan useful, why not share it with your friends on Facebook so they can save money with ALDI meal planning as well?