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Welcome to my annual roundup of Project Meal Plan’s best and Most Popular Recipes of 2024! Here’s where I reflect on the year, chat highlights, share trends, and countdown our Top 10 Most Popular Recipes of 2024!
Once again, it’s time to put together this end-of-year post. I’m currently trekking through a rough December, which makes it difficult to look past the last four weeks and reflect on the year as a whole, but I’m gonna do my best.
Reminding myself: It’s always nice to step back, take a look at the year, and see what the vibe was. The recipes I think will be popular, rarely ever are. There are always surprises when I look at things from a different angle.
This year, the surprise was… not much changed? You’ll see what I mean, especially if you compare this list to last year’s. Honestly, I’m thankful for that. I’m thankful to be able to slow down when I need to (or travel, or volunteer, or just go outside), and still have a steady job I can come back to. So much in this industry changes all the time – it’s really nice my website views are less of a rollercoaster than they used to be.
The hugest of shoutouts to YOU, literally anyone reading these words, for being here and supporting a small business. You’d be surprised how much it actually matters where you get your recipes!!
I put together this list by looking at the top most viewed recipes on Project Meal Plan, not including recipe round-ups or non-recipe article posts (those will be listed separately after!). This includes all recipes, not just ones published this year.
Stick around for some mini lists below – such as top meal prep lunches, top NEW 2024 recipes, etc! Even if you don’t care about the numbers, this is the perfect place to pick out the next PMP recipe to cook in your own kitchen.
If you’re looking for the best of Project Meal Plan according to YOU, (the readers!), then you simply must browse this list of our Most Popular Recipes of 2024!
Most Popular Recipes of 2024
1.34% of 2024 Pageviews
Published April 13th, 2018
This is the oldest PMP recipe on this list, and she just keeps hanging on every single year. I will forever and always be obsessed with deli counter premade pinwheels. And this is my best recreation! I first shared this simple make-ahead lunch back in 2018, and I love that it's still popular 6 years later.
1.37% of 2024 Pageviews
Published November 4th, 2021
French toast is delicious, but all the drippy egg mess and flipping is not! This recipe solves all of that by mixing everything together and then air frying to perfection. Perfect little dippers for kids or adults! It's the second year this recipe has made the Top 10!
1.90% of 2024 Pageviews
Published July 21st, 2021
This recipe remains one of my go-to meals when I want a hot sandwich. So easy and so delicious, it uses my Lazy No-Chop Tuna Salad as a base, meaning no chopping required. Then it takes just 8 minutes to cook in the air fryer.
1.95% of 2024 pageviews
Published January 26th, 2022
This year, I made this recipe for others, talked about it with others, and made several batches for myself. So I was pleased (but not surprised!) when it showed up in the Top 10 for the first time. Breakfast burritos are a staple meal prep option in my household! Lately, I've been putting crispy cooked tater tots in there as well. You have to try it!
2.24% of 2024 Pageviews
Published March 21, 2019
Another recipe sticking strong - despite never actually hitting the number one spot, this one has been all over the Top 10 for years. This is probably my favorite casserole on Project Meal Plan - chicken, bacon, ranch, roasted potatoes. I could go on. I make this casserole at least once a year, and I think you should too!
2.29% of 2024 Pageviews
Published August 4th, 2022
My absolute favorite pasta salad on Project Meal Plan, and yours too! This recipe is bright, flavorful, zesty and perfect for picnics or packing up to go. I even took a giant bowl of this pasta salad camping, where we were able to pull it out of the cooler and enjoy it instantly.
2.95% of 2024 Pageviews
Published July 19th, 2018
Whipped Greek Yogurt has hovered around the most popular list since it was published in 2018. This easy recipe makes a delicious breakfast or dessert, depending on how you dress it up. I've got some variations of the recipe on the blog too - the Peppermint Chocolate version is also a favorite of mine!
3.69% of 2024 Pageviews
Published June 5th, 2018
This casserole has been a Top 3 contender since it was first published all the way back in 2016, and then republished in 2018. Despite not being my personal favorite (like, at all), this recipe gained traction in the 'rotisserie chicken dinner' space several years ago, and hasn't let up since. Pinterest readers are very into this recipe too, for some reason! Super family friendly, with tons of five star reviews. Let me know if you give it a try!
8.76% of 2024 Pageviews
Published September 14th, 2021
If I had to pick one meal prep hot lunch I think everyone should try, it's this! Honestly, this is one of the recipes on Project Meal Plan I'm most proud of publishing. It makes a perfect go-to cold weather lunch - full of flavor, packed with veggies, and super easy to put together. This recipe has been battling it out with the number one recipe, and it was so close!!
8.88% of 2024 Pageviews
Published March 11, 2021
And she's back to the top spot! These chicken tenders are some of my best work, and I'm so glad the internet recognizes that 😅 According to the reviews, even people who don't like chicken are a fan of this recipe! It's shocking to me that these top two recipes made up over 17% of the total traffic to Project Meal Plan this year. Talk about popular!
2024 in Review
Project Meal Plan 2023 vs. 2024 Statistics
Pageviews: Decreased 1.18% from ~2,874,000 (2023) to ~2,840,000 (2024)
Pageviews are the number of pages viewed by a User, including repeat pageviews, during any number of sessions. Higher is better!
Users: Decreased 11.25% from ~1,858,000 (2023) to ~1,649,000 (2024)
A User is someone who has initiated at least one session on the website. Higher is better!
Views per user: Increased from 1.53 views per user (2023) to 1.72 views per user (2024)
The average number of screens or web pages viewed per user. Higher is better!
Average Engagement Time: Increased from 30 seconds (2023) to 32 seconds (2024)
This is the average length of time that the app was in the foreground, or the web site had focus in the browser. More time is better!
Session RPM (revenue per mille, or revenue per thousand sessions): Increased from $33.83 in 2023 to $48.99 in 2024 😮
Higher is better! The higher this number is, but more money I make from each session of someone browsing Project Meal Plan.
Notes on these numbers:
- The fact that Pageviews are less than 2% off from 2023 to 2024 is wild to me, especially because those numbers are decently high. I was actually feeling like PMP took a bigger hit this year, but a decrease of only 1.2% isn’t bad at all. At least it’s consistent!
- The number of Users slightly decreased unfortunately. But since pageviews were nearly the same, that means the remaining Users looked at more pages and spent more time on the site.
- Yes, that’s a huuuuuge jump for RPM. I double checked it. Is this my years of random post updating and SEO optimization paying off? Or just a recovering economy? I’ll never be completely certain, but I do think it’s a lot of hard work paying off.
Project Meal Plan’s 2024 Top 5 Lists
Top 5 NEW Recipes Published in 2024
When I post a new recipe, it takes some time to be seen by the people, gain traction, and get feedback. That’s why you usually don’t see these new recipes show up in the Top 10 list in the same year they were published (in my experience anyway).
So they get their own list! It’s interesting to see what gets an immediate response versus what people aren’t really into as much. Here’s the list of top 5 recipes newly published in 2024:
- Air Fryer Stuffed Chicken Breast
- Thin Sliced Stovetop Chicken Breasts
- No-Bake Pecan Pie Date Balls
- Simple Red Potato Chicken Soup
- Air Fryer Chicken Cordon Bleu
Top 5 Non Recipe Posts of 2024
I share mostly recipes on Project Meal Plan, but I occasionally share helpful articles and recipe round-ups as well. Here’s a list of the top 5 most popular posts on Project Meal Plan that are not recipes:
- Make-Ahead Cold Lunches to Prep For Work This Week
- First 15 Recipes I Made With My Air Fryer
- 10 Trader Joe’s Foods That Are Perfect For Your Air Fryer
- 30 Weeknight Dinner Menu Theme Ideas
- 25 Bulk Meal Prep Ideas For Large Families
Top 5 Meal Prep Lunches of 2024
We have a wide array of meal prep lunch recipes here at Project Meal Plan. Since many of them don’t make it all the way up to the top (because air fryer recipes are always taking up the spots), I like to share some in a separate list so you can see which are most popular. Here are the top 5 meal prep lunches of 2023:
- Meal Prep Unstuffed Pepper Bowls
- Easy Turkey Pinwheels Meal Prep
- Caesar Chicken Salad Lunch Wraps
- Lazy No-Chop Tuna Salad
- Easy Chicken Salad With Grapes
Top 5 Traffic Referral Sources (+ percentage of all traffic)
Traffic referral source refers to the place the traffic came from, or how they got to the Project Meal Plan website. Here are the top 5 traffic sources to Project Meal Plan:
- Pinterest – 33.35% (decrease)
- Google – 44.87% (increase)
- Direct/None – 17.06% (slight decrease)
- Bing – 0.69% (slight increase)
- DuckDuckGo – 0.22% (slight increase)
Danielle’s Favorites of 2024:
Notes & Comments on the Year
- During 2024, I published 28 new recipes on Project Meal Plan, as well as republished/updated 7 old recipes and 2 old articles. I also shared one new recipe roundup: 15 Lunch Recipes With Hard-Boiled Eggs.
- This year, I put together 4 different eBooks with the Best of Project Meal Plan’s recipes. These are used as freebies for email subscribers and are available throughout the site (hint: visit an air fryer recipe to find the air fryer ebook, and so on!). Freebie page with all of them coming in 2025!
- Changes to the “What’s For Dinner?” Printables: New permanent price for the bundle: $6. We also set The Dinner Dice free from the bundle and made them available to anyone – find them here!
- In March, I attended the 2024 Tastemaker Conference in Chicago where I made some behind the scenes changes; and the biggest: NerdPress is now my website maintenance team and I couldn’t be happier with their work!
2024 Wins & Accomplishments
- This July, I officially joined the Mediavine Pro club, an invite only-service for earning over $100k via advertising in the last 365 days. This comes with an increased revenue share, plus other perks. This was a huge milestone for me, and one of my biggest goals and accomplishments of the year!
- My other top 2024 goal was to earn over $10,000 in one month from website advertising. I accomplished this goal for the first time in August 2024!
- A secondary goal this year was to find another part of my business to hire out. Unfortunately, I was never really able to identify what this part should be, let alone who should do it. This goal is going to carry over into 2025 and be my top priority!
Thank you for celebrating all of the year’s accomplishments with me! If you’ve read this far, you’re definitely a superfan, and I’m so thankful for you!
I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comment section below. Have you made any of the recipes on this list? What was your favorite recipe on Project Meal Plan this year? I wanna know!!
Happy meal planning, cooking and eating in 2025!!
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