The Franklin Kitchen Reset: A Simple Weekly Kitchen Reset for Real Family Life

A Simple Rhythm for Making Your Kitchen Work Better for Real Family Life

There are weeks when I open my refrigerator and realize we have plenty of food, but somehow, nothing to eat.

There might be a bag full of carrots from the farmers market, corn still in its husks, ground beef in the freezer, half a container of berries, and three different leftovers no one is going to finish.

The pantry has plenty in it, too. But when one of my boys comes into the kitchen hungry, there isn't much he can simply grab.

When Monday morning comes, I'm scrambling for school lunch ingredients. And when 5:00 rolls around, all of those beautiful ingredients still require me to turn them into dinner.

Our "before a Reset" refrigerator:

I've learned that when my kitchen gets to this point, I don't necessarily need a better meal plan.

I need a Franklin Kitchen Reset.

The Franklin Kitchen Reset is my flexible weekly kitchen reset routine and rhythm I've gradually created for getting our kitchen ready to take care of us in the week ahead.

It isn't traditional meal prep. I'm not lining up five identical lunches in containers or chopping every vegetable we'll eat between now and Friday.

Instead, I look around the kitchen and ask one question:

What can I do now that will make feeding my family easier later?

Sometimes I have most of a day to spend in the kitchen. Other weeks, the Reset happens little by little over a few days.

Both count.

The goal isn't a perfectly organized refrigerator. It's to make the food we already have more useful, prepare a few things we'll actually want to eat, and bring the kitchen back into rhythm.

Because I've noticed something very simple:

When my kitchen is working well, our family eats better.

Why Traditional Meal Prep Never Worked for Me

I've tried traditional meal-prep systems before.

They always sounded wonderful in theory: spend Sunday preparing everything for the week and sail effortlessly through Friday.

In reality, I found them exhausting.

I'd spend half of Sunday cooking and chopping, trying to squeeze it in the time between kids' soccer games, only to discover that no one wanted those sliced carrots by Friday. Leftovers started feeling old. Something inevitably changed in our schedule, and suddenly the carefully planned meal we were supposed to eat on Wednesday didn't make sense anymore.

Then I'd feel like I was somehow behind on my own system.

More importantly, cooking started to feel like an obligation.

And I don't want that.

I'm feeding three growing boys plus my husband, and food is a big part of the rhythm of our home. I love cooking. I love trying recipes, going to the farmers market, baking something homemade, and sitting down together for dinner.

I needed a way of preparing for the week that made family life easier without taking the joy out of cooking.

The Franklin Kitchen Reset gradually grew from that.

I stopped trying to prepare every meal and started preparing possibilities.

Prep Possibilities, Not Meals

This is probably the biggest difference between a Franklin Kitchen Reset and traditional meal prep.

Instead of asking, "What are we eating every day this week?" I look at the food I have and ask:

How can I move this one step closer to becoming something we can eat?

A package of frozen ground beef isn't particularly helpful at 5:30 on a busy evening.

But that ground beef with food prep can become a pot of chili or bolognese. Or I can simply form it into burger patties and leave them uncooked in the refrigerator so my husband can throw them on the grill.

Corn from the farmers market can sit in its husks for days, or I can shuck it, drizzle it with olive oil and season it, and put it into a covered roasting pan ready for the oven.

A bag of carrots can become my hot honey carrots: sliced lengthwise and tossed with olive oil, fresh thyme, salt, pepper and hot honey. They're not cooked yet. They're simply ready when I need them.

Chicken thighs can marinate in barbecue sauce. Shrimp can be prepared for the grill. An onion can be chopped. Peppers can be sliced. Eggs can be hardboiled and fruit can be washed.

None of this dictates what we have to eat on Tuesday.

It just gives Tuesday-night me a head start.

1. Reset the Refrigerator

I usually begin by seeing what's actually in the refrigerator and freezer.

And sometimes that means taking almost everything out.

I compost food that's past its prime, finally admit we're not going to eat those half-finished leftovers, consolidate containers and literally wipe down the shelves.

Resetting the refrigerator isn't glamorous, but it changes the way the entire kitchen feels.

Once the refrigerator and freezer is clear, I can see what we have, what needs to be used soon, and what's missing.

It's also one of the easiest ways I've found to waste less food. That bunch of herbs or farmers market vegetable is much more likely to become something delicious when I can actually see it.

2. Put the Everyday Food Back in Order

The pantry gets a smaller version of the same treatment.

I consolidate the bits and bobs, put dry goods back where they belong and make sure the foods we use constantly are easy to find.

I've gradually created little zones of pantry organization that reflect how our family actually eats: baking ingredients together, smoothie ingredients on one shelf, dry goods together, and grab-and-go snacks where the kids can easily find them.

I'm not trying to create a pantry that belongs in a magazine.

I'm trying to make it obvious where the pretzels are when a hungry child comes running into the kitchen.

There's a difference.

3. Prep a Few Building Blocks

Once I know what we have, I start doing the small jobs that create the biggest payoff later.

I might marinate chicken thighs for the grill, chop an onion and peppers for an easy dinner, prep vegetables for roasting or make a protein that can move between lunches and dinners.

I don't have a required list.

I look at the week ahead and choose the things that will remove the most friction.

This is also when I check the basics for my kitchen routine: Do we have what we need for school lunches? Breakfasts? Snacks? Milk? Fruit?

If not, I add them to the grocery list, or, during an especially busy week, place an Instacart order and move on.

A little something sweet: I also like keeping a batch of Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie dough portioned in the freezer. You can bake just a few at a time for after-school snacks, unexpected friends, or whenever the kitchen needs something warm and homemade.

4. Make a Refrigerator Salad

This has become one of my favorite parts of the Reset.

I like to make what I think of as a refrigerator salad: something fresh and nourishing that can be made ahead and still taste good for at least a few days. Try my creamy cucumber salad, elevated tuna salad, or herby potato salad.

The important part is that it has to hold up.

This isn't a delicate dressed green salad destined to wilt overnight. It's something I can pull from the refrigerator for lunch with some hardboiled eggs and avocado, serve alongside a protein for a light dinner, or add to another meal when we need something fresh.

Recently, that's been a creamy cucumber and red onion salad. Other weeks it might be a sturdy grain salad, pasta salad, bean salad or crunchy vegetable salad.

Because my husband and I both work from home, having something like this ready completely changes lunch.

Instead of realizing at 1:30 that we've eaten nothing, or grabbing whatever is easiest, we have the beginning of an actual nourishing meal waiting in the refrigerator.

I have a feeling you'll see many more refrigerator salads here.

5. Make One Homemade Thing

This might be my favorite rule, although “rule” is probably too strong a word.

I try to make one homemade thing.

Recently, it was a batch of homemade granola bars that I could pack in the boys' school snacks.

Another week it might be muffins, overnight oats, pesto, homemade ranch dressing, chimichurri or something baked.

I don't need to make all of those things.

One is enough.

That little bit of homemade food waiting in the refrigerator or pantry makes the kitchen feel cared for, and gives us something genuinely good to reach for during the week.

6. Give Dinner a Head Start

I don't cook a week's worth of dinners during a Reset.

I don't even want to.

I still want to cook during the week. I want to decide that tonight feels like a steak-and-chimichurri night, or grill chicken outside because the weather is beautiful.

What I don't want is for every dinner to begin from zero.

So I give a few dinners a head start.

On one recent Reset, I had chicken thighs marinating in barbecue sauce, shrimp ready for the grill, homemade chimichurri in the refrigerator, carrots sliced and seasoned for roasting, vegetables already chopped, and potatoes prepped and already in a covered roasting pan with their sauce for my scalloped potatoes.

Dinner wasn't made.

But dinner was possible.

And that's the point.

The Reset Doesn't Have to Happen in a Day

Despite the way weekly resets are often portrayed, I don't think you need to spend an entire Sunday doing food prep.

Sometimes I do.

If I have the time and energy, I genuinely enjoy putting on music and spending much of the day in the kitchen, cleaning, cooking and getting things ready.

Other weeks, absolutely not.

I might clean the refrigerator one day, make granola bars the next morning and marinate chicken while I'm already making dinner.

By the end of a few days, the kitchen has still been reset.

I think this flexibility is part of why this rhythm has finally worked for me.

The Reset should serve your life. Your life shouldn't serve the Reset.

Reset for the Season You're In

What our kitchen needs changes constantly.

During back-to-school season, I'm thinking about lunchboxes, breakfasts, after-school hunger and dinners that can happen quickly between activities.

In summer, the refrigerator might be overflowing with farmers market corn, tomatoes, peaches and herbs that I want to make sure we actually use.

Fall might mean a pot of soup, muffins for breakfast and vegetables ready for roasting.

The holidays will bring an entirely different rhythm.

That's why there isn't one perfect Franklin Kitchen Reset checklist.

The question stays the same:

What would make feeding the people in this house easier this week?

Start there.

Your First Weekly Kitchen Reset

If you're not sure where to begin, don't try to do everything. Start here:

1. Clear the refrigerator. Toss or compost what's old, consolidate leftovers, wipe down the shelves.

2. Take stock. What needs to be eaten? What are you missing for breakfasts, lunches, snacks and a few dinners?

3. Choose one refrigerator salad. Make something that will hold for several days and give you an easy lunch or dinner side.

4. Prep one or two dinner building blocks. Marinate a protein, chop vegetables, make burger patties, prep a roasting pan, whatever will help most.

5. Make one homemade thing. Granola bars, muffins, pesto, dressing, overnight oats, choose one.

6. Create a grab-and-go zone. Put fruit, snacks and other easy foods somewhere your family can actually find them.

7. Stop when you've done enough. The goal is a kitchen that works better, not an exhausted person standing in a perfectly organized kitchen at 8 p.m.

Love this idea? Save it for your next kitchen reset.

Save The Franklin Kitchen Reset to Pinterest so it's easy to come back to whenever your refrigerator, pantry, or week, could use a fresh start.

Shop My Franklin Kitchen Reset Collection

You absolutely don't need a kitchen full of matching containers to make a Reset work. But there are a handful of things I use over and over again, from big glass bowls for refrigerator salads to jars for homemade dressings and simple bins that keep the boys' snacks easy to find.

• Large Pyrex glass bowl + lid — refrigerator salads

• Pyrex/glass rectangular food-storage containers — marinating chicken, shrimp, chopped vegetables, leftovers

• Wide-mouth mason jars + lids — pesto, ranch, chimichurri, vinaigrettes

• Airtight pantry containers — oats, cereal, pretzels, dry goods

• Open-front/clear pantry bins — kids' packaged snacks

• Baskets — grouping snack categories and making all the plastic packaging visually calmer

A Kitchen Ready for Real Life

There's a particular feeling I have after I've done a Reset.

The refrigerator is clean. Food isn't quietly going to waste in the back. I know what I'm packing in school lunches Monday morning. My husband and I have something nourishing to eat for lunch. There are snacks the boys can grab themselves. A couple of proteins might be marinating, and at least one dinner already feels easier.

My nervous system feels calmer.

Not because I've planned every meal or controlled everything that's going to happen in the coming week.

Quite the opposite.

I've created enough structure that there's room for life to happen.

And maybe that's what I've been trying to create all along.

Not a perfectly organized kitchen.

Not a refrigerator full of matching meal-prep containers.

Just a kitchen stocked with good food, a few things made with care, and enough preparation that feeding my family doesn't feel like an emergency every time someone says,

“Mom, I'm hungry.”

That's The Franklin Kitchen Reset.

Here's to a kitchen that works for the season you're in.

— Alexis