Weekly Meal Plans

Menu 1/8/2017

  1. slow cooker cassoulet
  2. double-trouble meat loaf
  3. leftovers
  4. grilled pork tenderloin, sweet and savory mustard sauce
  5. FFS
  6. FFS
  7. FFS 

I had initially picked a different cookbook but then I realized that I’m going to be out of town this weekend which means no cooking, and the nights I will be cooking are protein-only nights so 4 hour “braise forever” recipe aren’t well suited for the nights I’ll be cooking!  I changed from my initially selected cookbook to Michael Symon’s Carnivore: 120 Recipes for Meat Lovers.  I’d already started going through this cookbook and putting post-it tabs on the recipes that looked interesting.  Pretty sure I tabbed 80% of the recipes in the cow section.  Meal #1 is a holdover from last week as I didn’t take into account my lack of desire to cook after emptying the kitchen for painting.  Oops.

Menu 1/1/2017

When creating my goals for 2017, I identified cooking (and blogging) to be an Area of Concern.  To address this, I came up with three goals to work toward:

  1. Pick one physical cookbook when meal planning each week and choose at least one recipe from that book for the week’s plan
  2. Blog all (recipes cooked from cookbooks
  3. Blog all weekly meal plans

So here goes nothing!  I’ll be including the cookbook in my weekly meal plan post and I’ll post the (recipes later on in the week, after I’ve cooked them.  I hope that these goals will help me get back in the habit of blogging both (recipes and meal plans.  I’m going to start with a pretty low bar and probably skip the picture thing.  If I do include pictures, they’ll be taken with my phone at the table without even an attempt at “prettiness.”  Sorry, not sorry.  I think pictures might require some investigation on my part because I believe that Picasa is no longer a viable photo host.  So.. we’ll see.  For now I just want to get back in the habit of putting words on the screen.  

  1. food out on way home from movies
  2. bacon-wrapped stuffed chicken (RFES), asparagus
  3. frozen thing in slow cooker
  4. FFS
  5. out due to kitchen painting
  6. [one-pan paprika chicken with potatoes and tomatoe](http://www.simply(recipes.com/recipes/one_pan_paprika_chicken_with_potatoes_and_tomatoes/)s

  7. slow-cooker cassoulet out due to kitchen painting

  8. (lunches) omega sardine salad (RFES)

I chose Run Fast. Eat Slow. as my first cookbook for 2017.  As with many “new” cookbooks, I found it rather lackluster.  Not a lot of the (recipes called to me, not a lot fit in with my way of eating, and it just didn’t feel super exciting.  Perhaps I’m just jaded?  I don’t know.  It’s a nice cookbook - lots of options for varying diets such as veg*n, gluten free, dairy free, etc.  Just not very thrilling for someone who doesn’t eat a lot of grains.  

My kitchen is getting painted (OMG YAY!!!) at the end of the week, so I planning on not being able to use it for that night.  I’ve also got my winter term class and a court appearance of unknown length due to an assault I witnessed a few months ago.  It should be an interesting week!  

I am dubious about my ability to find duck legs for meal #7, but my backup plan is to use bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs.  I’m also planning on using boneless, skinless chicken thighs in meal #6.  As often happens when I’m meal planning, I don’t notice trending ingredients - I had not intended for this to be such a chicken heavy week!

Thanksgiving 2016

I am not prepared, but here’s the meal plan.

Thursday
No Knead Bread (for eating)
High-Heat Roasted Turkey (No heritage turkey this year.) Apple-Raisin Bread Stuffing (single batch) Green Bean Casserole (1⁄3 batch) Cream Cheese and Chive Mashed Potatoes (single batch) Sweet Potato Casserole (single batch) Gravy Pumpkin Bread storebought vanilla ice cream
Molten Lava Cakes x1.5

Friday
Breakfast: Bundt Cake, eggs, grapefruit, homemade bacon
Lunch: sandwiches
Dinner: slow cooker 15-bean soup with sausage and spinach, marbled pumpkin cheesecake bars (biscoff for crust)

Saturday
Breakfast: overnight eggs benedict casserole, grapefruit Lunch: sandwiches
Dinner: grilled burgers, fries, belgian-style dipping sauce

Sunday
Breakfast: leftovers, eggs
Lunch: out or sandwiches
Dinner: Thanksgiving Leftovers!

Menu 3/6/2016

  1. broccoli, chicken, cheese goop w/ rice
  2. leftovers
  3. instant pot curry (lamb in pot, sautéed cauliflower)
  4. chicken stir fry (leftover teriyaki sauce, veg)
  5. breakfast for dinner (eggs, sausage, hash browns w/ onions, peppers, mushrooms)
  6. leftovers
  7. post-race chipotle

This is the first week of the new eating plan.  Super easy foods supplemented with bulk cooking and leftovers from the freezer.  I’m actually cooking one more night than intended this week, but that’s to offset going out for meal #7.

Menu 2/28/2016

  1. grilled meats (delmonico steaks and salmon), rice, stir fried veg, teriyaki sauce x2
  2. L - FFS
  3. L - FFS
  4. L&G - out
  5. crunchy oven-fried fish x2, tartar sauce, salad
  6. frittata (potato, broccoli, bacon, cheddar)
  7. kheema pav w/ peas x4, rice

I’m trying to get into my new routine with cooking and meal planning and posting meal plans.  The idea is that I’ll do freezer stuff and “easy” meals during the week, and then I’ll cook in bulk on the weekend to keep the freezer stocks varied.

Menu 2/21/2016

  1. chicken and bacon pot pie with bacon cheddar biscuits (chicken from freezer) x2
  2. leftover night
  3. white chicken chili x4 (2 bsb, 2bst)
  4. leftover night
  5. maroni’s meatballs x4, sauce, pasta
  6. layered enchiladas x2, sauce (6bsb) – poach chicken in slow cooker
  7. shepherd’s pie x4 – potatoes in pressure cooker

I’m going to try to get back into meal planning.  I’m cooking a lot of things in bulk this week so I can stock up the freezer.  I’m really failing at feeding my people right now and I need to rectify that.  Lots of bulk freezer stuff.

Thanksgiving 2015

I figure I should post this before the holiday!  I had hoped to have my vegan bff join us, but it’s not to be.  But I still veganized lots of things just in case she was able to come!

Thursday
No Knead Bread (for eating)
High-Heat Roasted Turkey (No heritage turkey this year due to the farm having troubles.  Hopefully next year.) Apple-Raisin Bread Stuffing (Note for 2016: one batch was great) Green Bean Casserole (2⁄3 batch with vegan mushroom soup instead of canned stuff) (Note for 2016: try 1⁄3 batch, 1lb beans) Cream Cheese and Chive Mashed Potatoes (made with vegan cream cheese and soy milk) (Note for 2016: one batch was great) Sweet Potato Casserole (made with earth balance and extra sweet potato instead of eggs) Gravy Pumpkin Bread (made in the form of muffins) (Note for 2016: muffins took 22 minutes) storebought vanilla ice cream
Molten Lava Cakes x1.5

Friday
Breakfast: Bundt Cake, eggs, grapefruit, bacon
Lunch: roast beef for sandwiches
Dinner: taco salad

Saturday
Breakfast: sausage strata Lunch: roast beef sandwiches
Dinner: out after voice recital

Sunday
Breakfast: leftovers, eggs, grapefruit
Dinner: Leftovers!

Menu 9/13/2015

  1. tandoori lamb meatloaf, smokey roasted cauliflower
  2. potato and sausage casserole
  3. leftover night
  4. [pollo al marsala](http://www.thethinkingtraveller.com/thinksicily/guide-to-sicily/food-and-wine-in-sicily/sicilian-(recipes.aspx#meat), [sicilian eggplant and pine nut caponata](http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2015/02/sicilian-eggplant-pinenut-caponata-vegan-recipe.html)
  5. leftover night
  6. italian ziti bake
  7. slow cooker corned beef, garlicky sautéed cabbage, rye bread

It’s amazing how much quicker meal planning seems now that I’ve made a second night a leftover night due to college constraints.  Meal 1 is a holdover from last week.  The rest of the meals are planned around the various vegetables I picked up at the farmers market this weekend.  

The ziti bake isn’t something that I’d normally make these days, but the guys love pasta and it’ll be easy enough for me to put some of the non-pasta ingredients in a smaller dish and bake them up just for me.

Menu 9/6/2015

  1. quiches from freezer
  2. chicken (one pack frozen breasts, one pack thighs), frozen fajita veg, frozen sour cream, frozen enchilada sauce, canned beans, frozen cheese, tortillas (I have no name for this, but it will be delicious.)  
  3. leftover night
  4. one-pan pork tenderloin with green beans and potatoes
  5. leftover night
  6. tandoori lamb meatloaf, smokey roasted cauliflower This was a bad day, we ate out instead.
  7. cinnamon slow cooker chicken, bag salad

And this begins the new schedule of two leftover nights a week.  Now that I’m in college, I’m going to have less time to cook and the family consensus was to add a second leftover night on my other class night.  I’ll do slow cooker meals on that night when necessary but, otherwise, we’ll just eat leftovers.  We’ve had more leftovers than we know what to do with most of the time, so this should be a good plan.  

In addition to dinners, I’ll be baking some sweet potatoes and freezing them for later use.  I’m thinking spicy tuna cakes from nom nom paleo.  I’ll also be making spicy cheddar shortbread and barbecue sauce to take to a labor day party.  The first recipe since I saw it recently and thought it looked delicious, and the second so that there’s bbq sauce I can actually eat.