--- title: "Make something useful: a week of meals and a shopping list" url: https://aiguideson.com/courses/ai-for-beginners-start-here/make-a-meal-plan/ course: "AI for beginners: start here" lesson: "5 of 5" minutes: 10 published: 2026-10-03 updated: 2026-10-03 author: "Jack Stovell" publisher: "Adapt Progress Evolve Limited" language: "en-GB" --- # Make something useful: a week of meals and a shopping list Lesson 5 of 5 in [AI for beginners: start here](https://aiguideson.com/courses/ai-for-beginners-start-here/) · 10 minutes Now you’ll use everything from this course on a real job. You’ll tell the AI about your household, get five evening meals and one shopping list, check it against your kitchen, ask for changes, and save it to print or keep on your phone. ## You need - Your account from lesson 2 (or ChatGPT without one) - What your household eats, can’t eat, and already has in the cupboard - A document or notes app to save the plan in A narrated walkthrough of this lesson is coming. The steps below cover everything in it. ## Steps ### Step 1: Write down what it needs to know Before you open the chat, jot down who you’re cooking for, anything anyone doesn’t or can’t eat, how long you’ve got to cook, and what’s already in the cupboard. Our made-up household was two adults and two children, one adult vegetarian, 30 minutes on weekdays. (Screenshot to come.) Checkpoint: You’ve got a few lines about your household. ### Step 2: Ask for the plan and the list Paste the prompt below and change the "About us" lines to match your household. Keep the "Please" lines as they are, because they say what shape you want the answer in. The prompt (works in ChatGPT, Claude or any AI chat tool): ```text Plan five evening meals for Monday to Friday for my household, then give me one shopping list for all of them. About us: - Two adults and two children, aged 7 and 10 - One of the adults is vegetarian, so every meal must work without meat (a meat option on the side is fine) - On weekdays we have 30 minutes to cook - We already have rice, pasta, tinned tomatoes, onions, garlic, oil and basic spices Please: - Give each meal a name, a one-line description and a rough cooking time - Group the shopping list by supermarket section: fruit and veg, chilled, cupboard, frozen - Leave off anything we already have - Use everyday ingredients from a UK supermarket - Don't guess prices ``` - "About us" gives it the facts it would otherwise guess. - Listing what you already have stops it putting those on the shopping list. - "Don’t guess prices" stops it inventing numbers it can’t know. (Screenshot to come.) Checkpoint: You’ve got five meals and one shopping list. ### Step 3: Check it against your kitchen Read every meal and every line of the list, properly. Ours had three things to check. Mushrooms were on the list for Friday, but none of the meal descriptions mentioned them. Limes were on the list for Monday and Tuesday, but neither recipe used them. And the fajitas needed paprika, cumin and chilli, which it simply assumed were in our "basic spices". (Screenshot to come.) Checkpoint: You’ve found anything on the list that doesn’t match the meals or your cupboard. ### Step 4: Check anything that matters for health The AI can’t see the food in your shop. If anyone is vegetarian or has an allergy, check every label yourself. Our plan used halloumi, cheddar, mozzarella and soft cheese. The Vegetarian Society says some cheese is made with animal rennet, so it isn’t vegetarian, and to always check the label. ![The Vegetarian Society’s article on which cheeses are vegetarian, at the paragraph saying it is not always obvious which cheeses are vegetarian and to always check the label.](https://aiguideson.com/courses/ai-for-beginners-start-here/l5-vegsoc-label.png) (screenshot captured 3 October 2026) 1. Not every cheese is vegetarian: always check the label Checkpoint: You know which items you’ll check labels for in the shop. ### Step 5: Ask for a change Ask for changes in the same chat, in plain words. Our seven-year-old won’t eat mushrooms, so we asked for them to go. It found them on Friday’s pizzas, swapped them for cherry tomatoes and updated the list. The prompt (works in ChatGPT, Claude or any AI chat tool): ```text Our 7-year-old won't eat mushrooms. Swap out anything with mushrooms in it and give me the updated shopping list. ``` - Saying who won’t eat what, and asking for the updated list, gets both parts fixed at once. (Screenshot to come.) Checkpoint: The plan and list now suit your household. ### Step 6: Make it ready to print Ask for the final version as plain text, so it pastes cleanly into a document. Then paste it into a document or notes app and save it. The prompt (works in ChatGPT, Claude or any AI chat tool): ```text Now put the final meal plan and shopping list together so I can paste them into a document and print them on one page. Plain text only, no tables. ``` - "Plain text only, no tables" means it pastes neatly into any document or notes app. - "On one page" keeps it short enough to stick on the fridge. ![Our finished weekday meal plan as a plain document: five meals from Monday to Friday, each with a cooking time and a short description, then a shopping list grouped into fruit and veg, chilled, cupboard and frozen, with a tick-box before each item.](https://aiguideson.com/courses/ai-for-beginners-start-here/l5-meal-plan.png) (screenshot captured 3 October 2026) 1. Five meals, one per weekday 2. Meat options are cooked separately 3. One shopping list, by supermarket section 4. Tick-boxes to use in the shop Checkpoint: Your plan and list are saved in a document. ### Step 7: Take it with you Print it, or keep the document on your phone and tick things off in the shop. Read it once more before you shop, because you’re the one who checks it. That’s been the point of this whole course. ![The same meal plan on a phone screen, starting with the heading "WEEKDAY MEAL PLAN".](https://aiguideson.com/courses/ai-for-beginners-start-here/l5-meal-plan-390.png) (screenshot captured 3 October 2026) 1. The same plan on a phone Checkpoint: You’ve got a plan and a list you’ve checked, ready for the week. ## The finished page ![Our finished weekday meal plan: five vegetarian evening meals with meat options on the side, and one shopping list grouped by supermarket section.](https://aiguideson.com/courses/ai-for-beginners-start-here/l5-meal-plan.png) Exactly what Claude wrote for our made-up household, pasted into a plain document. Yours will be different, because your household is. ## Common problems ### The list has something no meal uses Ask: "Check the shopping list against the meals and remove anything no meal uses." Then check it yourself anyway. ### The meals take longer than the time you gave Say so in the same chat and name the meal. Cooking times from AI are estimates. ### It suggests something unsafe for someone with an allergy Never rely on the AI for allergies. Remove the meal, and check every label in the shop. Screenshots captured by tools/capture/ai-for-beginners-start-here.mjs: our finished plan is rendered from outputs/meal-plan-3.response.md as a plain local page, and the Vegetarian Society page is public. Steps 2 and 5 happen in a signed-in chat, so they have no screenshot yet. ## Sources - [Vegetarian Society: Which cheeses are suitable for vegetarians, and which aren’t?](https://vegsoc.org/news/vegetarian-cheese/) (checked 2026-10-03)