Let’s use this thread to share concise weekly dinner menus for each week in February. It’s helpful if you can include your location and how many people you are feeding. Links to recipes are always appreciated, and sources help.
“The torch of love is lit in the kitchen.” What will you have for your Valentine’s Day meal?
The main dish here is likely to be steak, although a heart-shaped pizza is also on the possibilities list. And I’m planning to see whether this Chocolate Chunk Bread Pudding lives up to my decade-old memories of it.
When it comes to meal planning, are you a rebel? We’ve laughed together as we discussed that some weeks as soon as we make a plan we reject what’s on the list for tonight. My own plans sometimes have as many circles and arrows as a complex football play diagram, but at least I have a starting point and reminders of what ingredients are on-hand. We all know plans can change, so it’s fine (practically expected) when your week gets rearranged from your posted plan. You may choose to report actuals for the prior week to share ideas with others.
The January discussion is still available for reporting the last week and follow-ups
Reminder – Keep your comments menu / food related. And in the interest of faster viewing times, please use the Knife&Fork “like” under a comment to indicate you liked it or want to echo what was said by another, rather than posting a separate comment.
I made this coconut lime red lentils soup from vegetarian times, and I will make it again…it was fantastic… first day we had it with roasted veg, second day we had it with shrimp…delicious both ways! https://www.vegetariantimes.com/recipes/coconut-lime-lentils/
Hello from another snowy Friday in Ottawa, Canada. I’m winding down another quiet week and shall enjoy it while it lasts since my social engagements will be picking up this upcoming week. It will be nice getting out again. My menus during the next few months will involve finishing up bits and bobs in the freezer. I have enough beef, pork and fish to last until the end of March and I have enough chicken to last until the end of April. That’s not factoring in the meals I eat out so my freezer finds may last a little longer. I paid for my CSA this week and it starts in the middle of May so I hope my freezer is as empty as possible by then.
Today: Take out lunch this week is a bento box. I will have a salad for dinner with the two solitary chicken wings I found in the freezer last weekend.
Saturday: Off to see a live opera in I-don’t-know-how-long! I will have dinner before although I haven’t decided where. Right now I’m dithering between Japanese or Asian fusion.
Sunday: Greek salad and a rainbow trout fillet based on this recipe.
Monday: garbanzo vegetable green curry. I will only make half of the recipe this time since I have 2 tbsp. of green curry paste and a cup or a cup and a half of cauliflower left that I want to finish up.
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Tuesday: chicken cacciatore, pasta of some sort on the side.
Wednesday: liver (last serving!), roasted veggies on the side (delicata squash, zucchini, red onion)l
Thursday: First film society screening of the winter season. I will walk to the theatre and randomly pick somewhere to eat on my way there.
I’m thinkin’…
•Beef Broccolini (using stuff from the freezer)
•Minestrone with decadent grilled cheese sammies (more freezer purging)
•veggie burritos (bell peps, zuke, brown rice, black beans, pico, cilantro, guac, cheese, sour cream)
•crab anything, if the price is fair
•quesadillas or chile verde or both
•breakfast for dinner, probably french toast or quiche if crab isn’t available for crab earlier in the week
•chicken paprika (I make mine with V-8 juice) more freezer purge
• tomato beef curry to round out Lunar New Year
Freezer purging is going well. I’m making room for crab meat, if I am so blessed, trout and summer produce when it gets here. I still have lots of berries to make into ‘very berry jams and jellies’ before the weather gets too hot.
Cooking for two adults and a tween in the Boston burbs. I have a lot of people-ing to do this coming week, as my company’s moving into its new office space + two get-together with different sets of friends that semi-accidentally got scheduled back to back. I plan to become one with the couch on Friday evening.
Sun: white chili (I think it’s a Jamie Deen recipe?) and corn muffins (Hungryish)
Mon: sheet pan chicken schnitzel with potatoes and green beans (Skinnytaste)
Tues: fish tacos (improvised), refried black beans, and some sort of slaw for the adults / alternative veg for the kid
Weds: my double-decker socializing. Guys will have Standard Mom’s Not Home Meal #1: rotisserie chicken, cornbread ( or leftover corn muffins from Sunday), and peas
Thurs: spanakopita meatballs (Rachael Ray) with pita bread
First week of the semester, aiieee!! And I have an evening event one night, and he has an evening event on a different night, so this week is chaotic.
For two adults in San Diego:
This week’s breakfasts: My husband didn’t want birthday cake (weird!), so I might bake a more appropriate cake for breakfast this week. Perhaps the oatmeal chocolate chip from Snacking Cakes.
S: takeout - burritos
Su: We foraged, so while he had some canned chicken noodle soup, I spied a jelly donut and have no regrets.
M: (tonight) Pasta with red sauce, ground turkey, and lotsa veggies.
T: Tuna melts with chips - seafood
W: Piroshky from the freezer
Th: Good cheese, good bread, fruit and nuts - vegetarian
F: Old school tacos with leftover taco filling from the freezer.
Puerto Rican style Roast chicken from the Disporican cookbook, minus the achiote, which I don’t have on hand.
Cauliflower, not sure how yet, probably au gratin. Baked beans. Carrot & apple salad of some sort.
Roast chicken leftovers tomorrow. Kale. Soaking whole yellow peas, not sure how I’ll cook them. Probably pasta with Arrabbiata sauce
Thu
I guess lamb or frittata. Or both. I am less interested in red meat and pork lately.
Fri
Fish & shellfish stew- still deciding which type. Maybe a Bouillabaise or Cotriade for a change since we had a curry a few weeks ago. Or maybe a Norwegian Fiskesuppe since I have dill and parsnips on hand. We are tired of Cod so I will use another fish. https://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Norwegian-Cod-Vegetable-Chowder/
Getting back into the groove and enjoying planning and cooking.
Schedule also busier as I’m out of hibernation now, haha.
Sat - Chicken and mushroom pot rice (loosely based on this but with a few changes based on how I usually make the steamed chicken)
Sun - Korean spread, cooked at home and then over to friends’ place
Mon - Leftover kimchi bacon fried rice topped with an egg. Started here but ended here.
Tues - Home
Wed - Home / Out TBD – college friend is in town from Asia, but her husband just told me she woke up sick, so let’s see.
Thurs - Out for the first HO group dinner of 2023 – Parsi food.
Fri - Home. Single digit temperatures. Brr.
Sat - Home. Single digit temperatures. Brr.
Sun - Out most likely - will be ready to go into “warmer” weather, lol.
Ideas for this week, some left from last week’s list, some new:
Kerala Chicken Stew (probably with rice noodles) OR Vietnamese curry noodle soup (I don’t use a recipe, but similar to this but making the homemade chicken stock/soup first)
Entering the second month of the great fridge, freezer and pantry purge. If anyone is curious, we have a standard fridge in the kitchen and a second one in the garage, together with an upright freezer and smallish chest-freezer. We have a closet for dry goods off the kitchen, and a little dedicated shelf-space elsewhere for more. Nine months of the year, we have a garden full of food, and have outdoor storage for spuds and squashes.
The habits of shopping sales, stockpiling, and cooking our own food were formed long ago. I’m good at managing our supplies and rotating stock, and to this day it irks me to pass on a good deal. As we age, however, we no longer go through things so quickly. It’s time to take a breather and rethink our approach.
The clean out of what we have on hand should - after a rough calculation - last us another six months!
Cooking for two adults in the PNW:
FRI: A lentil and kale soup with chicken sausage from the Washington Post. Bread.
SAT: Sausage and potato pan roast from Food & Wine.
SUN: Beef on the grill. Garden veg from the freezer.
MON: Bacon and chive souffle. Green salad. Focaccia. One of my all-time favorite meals.
TUE: Huli Huli chicken kebabs on the grill. Steamed rice. Green beans.
WED: Salmon and halibut chowder. Leftover focaccia. Green salad.
THUR: Leg-of-lamb kebabs on the grill. Couscous. Baby peas.
SIX months of supplies ! Entering month 2 emulating you, and suspect I’ll be around 3 months just using the freezer accumulation, and maybe 5 months total by layering in the canned goods. I hear you on the difficulty of passing up good deals or completely depleting key proteins. So far I’ve added: half-price frozen mahi-mahi fillets, deli gyro meat (for a non-freezer meal this week),rotisserie chicken (replenish to have 2 -3 bags shredded in freezer), and on-sale ground beef to still have 1 pound in the freezer. Thus extending the process a full week or more…
It’s so hard - lol! I’ve purchased proteins once since the beginning of the year - a whole chicken on sale for $0.99/lb., and some chicken thighs in bulk to make up a big batch for DH on his birthday. But I’m constantly tempted!
Yes, crisped and chopped. I like gruyere with the bacon, but I’m sure there are other good cheese pairings here, as well. The two of us can easily finish off a half recipe.
FWIW, I never bother to dust the gratin with parm (although maybe I should try it some time).
Happy Friday from a frigid city of Ottawa where it is now -26 degrees celsius but feels like -39. (That’s -14 feeling like -38 in fahrenheit.) In otherwords it is cold I usually have a lovely half hour walk to work in the morning but today I bit the bullet and took the bus to work. It’s supposedly going up to 1 degree (34 degrees fahrenheit) on Sunday. I will live for that day! Last weekend’s plans to go to the opera got cancelled since I got food poisoning from the bento box I bought for lunch last Friday. I bought it from a restaurant I have ordered take out from in the past but I haven’t been there in a year and they have a new chef. My bento box included chicken teriyaki, shrimp tempura, and gyoza and I think the proteins weren’t cooked enough. Last week’s dinners veered from what was planned, focusing mostly on soft foods and yogurt to settle my tummy. The only planned meal I followed through with was the chickpea curry which I had on Tuesday when my stomach seemed settled enough to have a mildly spicy meal. I have a trip planned to a local gallery on Sunday afternoon so I hope nothing happens between now and then. On to my menus for this week:
Today: sandwich and salad combo lunch from the café in our food court. My steak sandwich is very good as is the couscous sundried tomato salad and fusilli with pesto sauce salad. I will have a salad for dinner.
Saturday: Beef stew in the slow cooker. The recipe I will use is from the cookbook that came with it and includes stewing beef, mushrooms, onion and cream of mushroom soup. I will have egg noodles and a caesar salad on the side.
Sunday: Off to the gallery! The gallery I am going to has one exhibition that is closing and two more that are opening. So instead of having a vernissage in the evening with wine and nibblies they are having an afternoon tea then the vernissage. I think the artists will be present and a lecture is involved. I have no plans for dinner since I have no idea what or how much is involved with the tea so I might have some chicken soup that I plan on making for lunch tomorrow or maybe something more substantal if I am really hungry.
Sorry you were sick but glad it was quick. Curious if you like the Florida movie.?.. I had forgotten it. I enjoyed it in spite of my viewing companion who was “not so much”.
I usually have a lovely half hour walk to work in the morning but today I bit the bullet and took the bus to work. It’s supposedly going up to 1 degree (34 degrees fahrenheit) on Sunday. I will live for that day! Last weekend’s plans to go to the opera got cancelled since I got food poisoning from the bento box I bought for lunch last Friday. I bought it from a restaurant I have ordered take out from in the past but I haven’t been there in a year and they have a new chef. My bento box included chicken teriyaki, shrimp tempura, and gyoza and I think the proteins weren’t cooked enough. Last week’s dinners veered from what was planned, focusing mostly on soft foods and yogurt to settle my tummy. The only planned meal I followed through with was the chickpea curry which I had on Tuesday when my stomach seemed settled enough to have a mildly spicy meal. I have a trip planned to a local gallery on Sunday afternoon so I hope nothing happens between now and then. On to my menus for this week: