Thanks! I’ve placed a hold on it from our library!
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Hi everyone,
I had a revelation this week. I have used so little vacation time this year (July-June) that I can take almost every Monday off for the rest of the academic year (except the weeks I have to see patients on Mondays) plus the entire last week of June. So that’s the plan for now. I hope it’ll get me feeling less demoralized.
2 adults who are both feeling various shades of languishing here and 1 teen who is thriving despite it all. Must be due to all the random days off of high school she gets!
Sat 4/16: daughter made dinner while I napped and it was delicious. https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/caramelized-pork-and-cucumber-stir-fry In a tragedy of epic proportions, my husband bought THE!WRONG!KIND!OF!WHITE!RICE! so daughter improvised with arborio, but made a ton of it which led to another improvisation (Tues).
Sun 4/17: chicken shawarma pie adapted from Falastin. loved it. green beans
Mon 4/18: Mac & cheese, sautéed baby chard from farmers’ market (prepared with onion, garlic, and red wine vinegar)
Tue 419: croquettes made from “risotto” which was the leftover arborio rice from Sat, mixed with some pecorino and a few eggs to hold them together. not as good as real arancini from a restaurant but a decent use of a lot of leftover rice! roasted asparagus.
Wed 4/20: leftover chicken shawarma pie, asparagus
Thu 4/21: leftover Mac & cheese, more asparagus? kinda overbought this week…
Fri 4/22: another celebration of surviving the week!
Also my daughter made the carrot cake from Dessert Person last weekend and wow it is so, so good.
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I made the chicken shawarma pie when Falastin was COTM on CH last year, and I will happily make it again sometime.
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Cooking for 1 at the Jersey Shore
Wednesday: leftover mustard/pineapple glazed ham with leftover spaghetti squash
Thursday: Pasta Cacio e Uova from Serious Eats (basically meatless carbonara) https://www.seriouseats.com/pasta-cacio-e-uovo-vegetarian-carbonara
Friday: Confetti Meatloaf (Now & Again), mashed cauliflower, broccoli parmesan fritter
Saturday: leftover confetti meatloaf, broccoli parmesan fritter
Sunday: ham and cheese quiche (why did I make a whole ham for 1 person?), green salad
Monday: homemade merguez with herby yogurt (Small Victories), balsamic marinated cucumber and onion salad
Tuesday: leftover merguez, yogurt, cucumber salad
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Okay, but now I want those improvised croquettes!
Greetings, People.
When it rains, it pours.
Cooking for two adults in the perpetually soggy PNW (aka: typical spring):
FRI: Anthony Bourdain’s Macau pork chop sandwich. DH’s request, and he is in charge of the main event. My job is to make the Portuguese rolls – I’ll use a recipe I found on Woks of Life. I’m also thinking a slaw on the side with carrot-ginger dressing.
SAT: Tomato-based minestrone with sausage and garden greens. Homemade bread.
SUN: Afghan aushak (scallion dumplings) with meat sauce.
MON: Pasta with pesto – need to finish up last year’s pesto before summer. Garden salad.
TUE: Shrimp and asparagus stir-fry. Steamed rice.
WED: Spatchcock chicken roasted on top of scallion potatoes. A little bit Cook’s Illustrated High Roast Chicken (March-April 2000), and a little bit NYT Chicken With Green Garlic Potatoes.
THUR: Pasta primavera with asparagus and peas. Leftover chicken.
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That all sounds wonderful! Please report back on the pork chop sandwich; I’ve had my eye on making that for a bit.
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I will!
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At least it isn’t snow which we had this week 
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Greetings from the Greater Boston area, where I am in the middle(ish) portion of my school’s April vacation. Not really getting out, as my current responsibility during the week is cat wrangler while we have had subcontractors in the condo renovating our master bathroom (finally!). However, I am trying to balance that by cooking something fun everyday because once I’m back to school next week, I anticipate having to do more big batch stuff. Here’s what we’ve done this week:
Sun. (4/17) - Brought mom out for an Easter lunch. Because I procrastinated on groceries, there was no leg of lamb to be found. We had Allison Roman’s slow roasted salmon with fennel, citrus, and chiles over an improvised warm lentil and asparagus salad (mustard vinaigrette). BF purchased individual chocolate truffle bomb things from the bakery counter for dessert. Dinner later was a snack of brie spread on English muffins with some tomato.
Mon. (4/18) - Had about a pound of salmon left, so I flaked it up and adapted Rick Bayless’s Mariscos a la Vinagreta from Mexican Everyday to use it with some flour tortillas for tacos.
Tues. (4/19) - What a crummy weather day! Rainy in the morning and cold in the evening. We finished off the last of my soups stash from the freezer. This was the last quart of Lidia’s Winter Minestrone with Lemon Zest, Chile Oil, and Parmesan, which actually is a good seasons-in-transition soup I think. I added some chopped Calabrian chiles in oil to punch it up and served it with some mini shell pasta.
Wed. (4/20) - Shrimp with Black Bean Sauce from The Woks of Life over white rice. I had a hankering for comfort food and ground meat in a sauce always scratches that itch.
Thurs. (4/21) - More fish tacos. I took some frozen bass fillets out to thaw and some tomatillo salsa from the freezer as well. Probably pico de gallo to have with it too.
Fri. (4/22) - Hanger steaks and onion rings! Some kind of red wine for me and IPA for him. We’ve actually not had any adult beverages since last Saturday (just trying to be better about that, I guess).
Sat. (4/23) - TBD Not sure if we might go out.
Sun. (4/24) - Also TBD now. Was originally going to be my first stab at tantanmen, but now I am hearing that the contractor might need to do the sheetrocking that day. So, we’ll see! Might be the ATK sheetpan cod on potatoes. That popped up on my YouTube feed yesterday and looked good. 
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That aushak rcipe looks great! I am far too lazy to make dumplings these days. Thinking for myself that some nice wide egg noodles tossed with a lot of sauteed leeks and scallions, then topped with blobs of the two sauces, would be almost as good although not as inherently satisfying as dumplings. I did make proper aushak some years back and absolutely loved them.
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Well, this week I’m certainly too lazy to make my own dumpling wrappers, but I have it in me to make the dumplings. I bought some square won ton wrappers for same. Unrelated, but a fact which mystifies me - you cannot buy round dumpling wrappers in this town, anywhere! I’ve been looking for 6 years.
ETA: can’t wait to make/eat this - especially after hearing you loved them!
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Go ahead and freeze slices of the ham now. Then enjoy it twice a month for the rest of the year. Grin.
I still have frozen slices from a half-ham I cooked (for us two) in February, and chose to make salmon for Easter dinner instead of warming some of the ham.
Let me know if you need/want my scallop potatoes and ham recipe.
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I was thinking a batch Cuban ham and black bean soup for the freezer.
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Cooking for two adults in southwest Virginia where we had ice and snow Monday and Tuesday, but today is sunny and tomorrow will be close to 80!
Saturday- 4/23 steak and cheese sandwich for hubby and Angus the black Lab. Salad for me
Sunday- pan seared pork chops with gravy, husband wants rice, steamed broccoli, green beans. I will use leftover pork chops with broccoli and green beans stir fried for lunches this week.
Monday- brown beans and cornbread
For the rest of the week I have no idea. I am out of ideas.
ETA- I have told the husband that he needs to come up with some ideas for supper. Yeah we’ll see how that goes. LOL
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Happy Friday everyone where it continues to be cool in Ottawa but that seems to be the theme across North America this spring. One day summer will come. Hopefully this year ~sigh~ I started working from home a couple of months ago (right when everyone was returning to the office 
and it’s working well. I haven’t had any internet connectivity issues and I find I can get more work done since I am not getting constant interruptions like when I was working in the office. I continue to go out for daily walks during my lunch hour so I can get my sunshine fix and also to get some exercise. I just need to free up some time to take in some social activities.
Actuals and plans for this week are as follows:
The only change I made to last week’s menu are the soups I made. I went to the Chinese grocery store to get ingredients for some of last week’s dinners and passed by some chicken carcasses the butcher just put out. I hadn’t had chicken soup in ages so I bought a chicken carcass to make some chicken soup while I was at home on Friday so the black bean soup I had planned got bumped. I made some French onion soup on Saturday so by the time I made my soups plus a couple of main course dishes I had no room left in my fridge or freezer. The peanut soup I had planned will have to wait for a bit.
Today: I opted for some home made chicken soup for lunch today instead of take out since I’m going to a vernissage after work! I haven’t been to one in over 2 years and I am excited and nervous. I love going to vernissages especially since I get to meet the artists but I’m a little worried about being in a crowd again. The gallery asked us to order tickets before - they are free but a ticket will be required to get in - so I am assuming they are still limiting the amount of people they will be letting in. Refreshments will be provided.
Saturday: spaghetti and meatballs. I bought some store made meatballs from a local Italian grocery store as my take out dinner a couple of weeks ago however they come in trays of 6. I ate one and the others went in the freezer so I will work on finishing them up. Salad on the side.
Sunday: shrimp stir fry with rice on the side.
Monday: Soba noodle salad from Cooks Illustrated. https://www.cooksillustrated.com/…/1559-chilled-soba…
Tuesday: salade nicoise.
Wednesday: chicken cacciatore.
Thursday: fettucine al pesto, salad.
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Got some inspiration at the grocery store- Rao’s sauce and Buitoni three cheese ravioli. We have never had either, but both were on sale. Going to cook more rice on Sunday than needed and use for fried rice with peas and carrots. Will have leftover beans one night. I hate not having some idea of what to have each night.
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Hello from San Antonio! We’ll be going out to eat tacos and have slushy drinks in just a bit, but first a bit of meal planning for 2 in Chattanooga, starting when we get back Sunday:
Sunday, April 24: Panthé Kaukswé or Burmese coconut milk chicken from The Complete Asian Cookbook, rice, sugar snap peas, strawberry poke cake. I got a ridiculously expensive farmers market chicken, so I’ll use half of it here and half later in the week.
Monday: Pub-style burgers with peppered bacon (Cook’s Country), “house salad” with pepperoni “croutons”, same
Tuesday: scrounge
Wednesday: Jambalaya with the remaining chicken and some venison andouille that’s been languishing in the freezer
Thursday: more scrounge
Friday: potato pancakes (it feels weird to say latkes in April) and salad
I feel like this is an ambitious week, TBD if I get through it all!
Have a great week and happy cooking!
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Your weather variability is striking! Sounds like New England. I’m glad you got some inspiration at the grocery store! Spring will come, eventually…Your meals sound great to me.
It’s not weekly menu planning, but I made this Ottolenghi soup this afternoon and we enjoyed it a lot. It’s not quick and easy, but I found it worth the effort since we’ll get at least 4 meals out of it. It was great today and probably will be even better tomorrow.
We 3 adults are all dealing with allergy symptoms here in Boston and the chicken, lots of lemon, and eggs in soup on a cool-ish day felt very healthful and comforting. I followed the recipe except that I used rice instead of the pasta. The dill and fennel additions made it special for me. I just poured the olive oil/lemon juice and segmented lemons/crushed fennel seed into the pot and we’ll reheat when needed.
Avgolemono soup with fennel and dill oil
I also got the ingredients for the second celery root recipe in the Guardian article to make tomorrow (to be realistic, probably Sunday or Monday). It is still cool here in Boston so this kind of food is welcome, to me. The Guardian asks for you to register but there is no charge.
I think it would be great if your husband came up with some meal ideas. My husband and I are both retired (so not at all like your situation, where you are both working every day and you have more than one job…). I have several jobs planning for our adult son, emotionally challenged, that my husband can’t be part of (I say “can’t” out of courtesy), and he doesn’t cook.
I love cooking but those times I run out of inspiration for choosing the recipe(s), making the grocery list, doing the planning, making the grocery list, then doing all the cooking…let’s say, I run out of inspiration. Son makes his own food, so it’s cooking for the 2 older adults.
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“tacos are always the answer” - was a slogan from a CH’er that’s served me well.
Years ago, I asked my husband to tell me his favorite meals. Although “pizza - any day, any kind - frozen is fine”, wasn’t a surprise, “fried egg sandwiches with tomato soup” was a great insight and has come to the rescue more than once.
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