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”.
Last weeks actuals were a good bye to the wonky old oven and hello to the new one. Things did not go smoothly so there was pasta, rice pasta stovetop until yesterday and I may have to re learn some cooking temps and times recipes as this oven cooks faster and doesnt dry meatballs out like the old one did.
Last night we had Budget Bytes Barbecue meatballs with cheesy grits and swiss chard.
Plans are cheeseburger Friday and the wish list for next week includes
Lasagna
Beef stew
Pizza, not homemade but take and bake from Aldi
Quiche
@ChristinaM I’ve only ever had it vegetarian, at home, and it was simple and delicious – no grinding anything (vs the recipe I linked), just sliced onions, grated ginger, whole spices, a sliced green chilli, coconut milk, and when all that has melded, a bunch of assorted vegetables (carrot, cauliflower, peas, potatoes, green beans, or whatever else is on hand, it’s very flexible).
I may do that instead of grinding the onions and garlic, which would create a thicker / more curry-like base. Will report back.
We eat it with appam (soft dosas) or idiappam (steamed rice noodles) or rice (my dad doesn’t like the first two ) – I think I might boil some Thai rice noodles and use those.
Hi, all! Cooking for 2 in Chattanooga, where it’s chilly outside (but nothing like the East Coast/Canada are getting) and toasty inside thanks to DH’s handyman skills
Breakfast: Cinnamon streusel coffee cake from my Mom’s recipe files
Saturday, February 4: Pork chops with kale (pork for him, kale for me, haha), twice-baked potatoes
Sunday: Black bean and squash chili, biscuits?, pear kuchen
Monday: Broiled not grilled shrimp with couscous and Swiss chard
Tuesday: Scrounge
Wednesday: Spinach and ricotta gnocchi from an old Bon Appetit
Thursday: Scrounge
Friday: TBD, maybe takeout/eat out?
Stay warm, everyone! May your furnaces function appropriately and your kitchens filled with cozy food. Happy cooking!
So sorry about the bento box experience, and I’m glad you’re feeling better. LLD has been telling me various Canadian city’s temperatures to make me feel better about our chilly weekend. Just makes me feel bad for everyone going through it!
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:
) – I think I might boil some Thai rice noodles and use those.
