Weekly Meal Plans

Menu 7/5/2009

1. Flank Steak Fajitas w/ Spanish rice 2. Marjoram Chicken w/ rice w/ Tomatoes with Pesto 3. Butter Chicken Curry w/ Chana Pulao 4. Garlic Studded Roasted Filet w/ Roasted Potatoes with Pesto 5. Burgers w/ Roasted Beets and Carrots 6. Gwen’s Favorite Peanut Noodles 7. Mom’s Chicken w/ Baked Lemon Pasta w/ Grilled Eggplant

Gazpacho Pepper poppers - stuffed and bacon wrapped Garlic Scape and Basil Pesto

The main challenge in meal planning this week is that I’m very, very tired.  Meal planning while exhausted is difficult!  The real challenges for planning involve using up all the produce and Lance being gone two nights of the week.  Lance’s absence is the reason for the peanut recipe in meal 6.  

Most all of these (recipes are ones that I’ve made before.  Gazpacho has become my favorite summertime snack so I’ll be making it for the third week in a row this week.  I’ve also had the realization that it makes a fantastic substitute for salsa to go along with chips.  Who knew?  Art couldn’t resist the call of jalapenos at the market so he bought six that he will turn into pepper poppers.  I’ll be posting those even though I won’t actually be eating them.  I’ll also be making pesto for general munching as well as the potatoes in meal 4.  

The (recipes that aren’t new this week come from a few different web sites.  

I’m not making a sweet this week since we’ve still got Philly Chippers left over from last week as well as the cookies that came with our CSA box.

You’ve probably noticed that we do have Mom’s Chicken rather often.  This is because it’s awesome, easy, and goes with just about any side dish I could make.

Menu 6/28/2009

1. Gyro Meat with leftover Cucumber Yogurt Sauce w/ Greek Potatoes 2. Slow Cooker Creamy Pork Tenderloin with Vegetables w/ rice 3. Broccoli, Bacon, Cheddar Quiche w/ Ham, Brie, Peas Quiche 4. Moroccan Chicken w/ Quinoa with Squash, Garbanzo Beans, and Cumin 5. Filet Mignon with Mushrooms w/ Swiss Chard Strudel 6. Slow-Roasted Beef w/ Caprese Pie w/ Swiss Chard Cheater Greens 7. Pan-Glazed Chicken with Basil w/ Beet and Potato Roesti

Peach Crisp Gazpacho Zucchini Bread
Philly Chippers

Again my main challenge for the week is figuring out who to use up all of my produce.  Every meal this week uses at least one thing from the market, if not more.  

The recipes are a combination of recipes from my collection, the internet, Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything and The New Basics Cookbook.  

All three of us will be home all week for dinners, but I’m going to be making a quick trip to see my parents on Wednesday.  I planned a slow cooker meal for that day to make life a bit easier so I won’t need to rush to get dinner together when I get home from a long day of driving.  

I’ll also be making Peach Crisp for a sweet treat, Gazpacho for lunches, and a few loaves of Zucchini Bread for eating and gifting.

We’ve got company coming over the night I’m making quiche, so I’m making two different ones for variety and also making a dessert that we can eat while hanging out - cookies.

Menu 6/20/2009

1. Mom’s Chicken w/ Spaghetti with Tomatoes, Chives, and Lemon Basil
2. Lamb Burgers with Cucumber Yogurt Sauce w/ Cabbage and Potato Gratin 3. Filet Mignon Roast w/ Roasted Beet Risotto w/ sautéed chard
4. Smothered Yellow Squash (and Zucchini) with Basil w/ chicken and pasta 5. Sloppy Joes w/ Pattypan Squash Fritters w/ Horseradish Sauce 6. Chicken Breasts with Balsamic Vinegar and Garlic w/ Pancetta and Sesame Coated Turnips 7. Shredded Chicken with Sesame Mustard Sauce w/ Sesame Noodles Weekday Lunches – Gazpacho, Loaded Egg Salad, and French Bread

The one and only challenge for this week is that I have a ridiculous amount of produce to use.  I have restraint issues when I’m at the market and it definitely shows in my Saturday purchases.  Every meal this week features vegetables from the market and our CSA box. 

I’ve found that having a cookbook for the week is sort of difficult when I have so many specific ingredients to plan around.  Many of the new (recipes I’m using this week come from that never-ending resource – the internet. 

Since all three of us will be home all week I’m also planning on making a few dishes for lunches.  I’ve been eager to attempt an Asian-flavored gazpacho and there’s nothing like egg salad loaded with tomatoes, green onions, and bacon. 

I’m also skipping a sweet of the week this week, since It seems like we’ll have plenty of food otherwise!

Updated 6/23/2009: I’ve had to shuffle around dishes due to the butcher not having ground lamb on grocery day and the need to use up some produce sooner than otherwise intended.  These things happen which is one of the reasons I don’t tend to plan meals for certain days of the week.

Menu 6/14/2009

1. Chicken with Goat Cheese Sauce w/ Polenta-Crowned Kale Casserole 2. Porcini-Crusted Filet Mignon with Fresh Herb Butter w/ Disappearing Zucchini Orzo
3. Elegant Garlic Chicken w/ Golden Summer Squash with Dill and Chèvre 4. Grilled Pork Tenderloin with Fresh Herbs w/ Braised Turnips with Poppy-Seed Bread Crumbs For Art: Chicken Parmesan w/ pasta and Thai Peanut Sauce for “Thai Burritos” Sweet of the Week: Lemon Ricotta Cheesecake

This week is another challenging one for food planning because Lance and I will be gone Tuesday morning through Friday morning.  This means that I’m only cooking dinner for four days, that I need to figure out how to use everything from the CSA box, and that I need to cook a big batch of something(s) to ensure that Art has plenty of food while I’m gone.  

I’ve also come to the realization that I’ve got a ton of dessert/sweet (recipes that I’ve saved from various places on the internet.  I really should start trying some of them and this works better if I plan ahead of time instead of just trying to find a recipe on the fly that works with ingredients I have.  

The cookbook I’m using in planning this week is The Gardeners’ Community Cookbook by Victoria Wise.  These (recipes are featured in meals 1 and 3.  The other (recipes come from various other places or are (recipes I’ve cooked before.  

I’m using the produce from the week in (recipes 1, 2, 3 and 4.  I’m also trusting Art to use up the broccoli and cucumber while I’m gone and trying not to be too sad that I’ll miss those.  Hopefully we’ll get more next week!  

Recipes I’ve cooked before will be posted and linked soon; new (recipes will be posted and linked as they are made.

Menu 6/7/2009

1. Chicken Crepes w/ salad
2. Smoked Salmon with Fresh Dill and Capers
3. Chicken baked in white wine marinade w/ Frizzled Cabbage
4. Fajitas with zucchini, squash, flank steak, yellow onion w/ Zataran’s Spanish rice (We decided we had enough food without the rice.)
5. Southeast Asian grilled flank steak w/ tempura fried patty pan squash
6. Honey roasted chicken with rosemary and Dijon in the crock pot w/ Pasta Caprese
7. Chicken Dijon w/ sautéed turnip greens w/ rice

This week poses some interesting challenges for my meal planning skills.  First and foremost, I’ve been wanting to make Chicken Crepes since I started this blog project not only because they’re amazing, but because I want to tell the story of the first time I made the almost 20 years ago.  

Second, Art is traveling for work this week.  He ended up not traveling last week so that he could stay home and take care of me since I damaged my knees during an Aikido class.  This means that salmon can, again, make an appearance on the menu.  

Third, there’s all of the produce to use from the CSA and other farmer’s market purchases.  I only have salad listed with Crepes, but I plan to have salad most every night this week until I’ve used up all of our salad greens.  Local produce is also feature in meals 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7.  I guess that means we’re having something local every night this week!  I had hoped to make some loaded egg salad one night this week, but I didn’t get to the market early enough to buy eggs.  

Lastly, I‘m still using Cooking Light’s 2009 Annual for a few recipes, those are featured in meals 3 and 5.  

Unlike last week, some of these recipes are tried and true.  Those will be posted soon without pictures and the pictures will be added later in the week.

Menu 5/31/2009

1. Mom’s Chicken w/ Sautéed Chard with Pancetta
2. Greek Chicken Pasta
3. Parmesan-Roasted Broccoli w/ Filet Mignon with Fresh Herb and Garlic Rub 4. Turnip-Potato Gratin w/ Lemon Grilled Chicken Breasts 5. Chicken with Creamy Mushrooms and Snap Peas w/ rice 6. Slow Cooker Lemon and Dill Salmon with Spinach w/ pasta 7. Three-Cheese Baked Penne This week involves two details to take into consideration during the meal planning process.  The first is that Art will be away from home all week for business travel and the second is that I have quite the bounty of vegetables from my CSA and the Farmer’s Market.  

The cookbook I picked for the week is the same Cooking Light Annual that I’ve been working through for the past few weeks.  Those (recipes are featured in meals 1, 3, 4, and 7.  

Lance and I will be having fish one night, since Art won’t be around.  I have a bit of trepidation about making salmon in the slow cooker, but I’m very curious to see how it will go.  

The main challenge is using all of the CSA and market veggies.  We’ll be having salad with most meals this week to use up the salad blend, head of green leaf lettuce, and radishes.  Many of the (recipes call for green onions and parsley.  The dill will go with the salmon.  The rest of the veggies are easy to find in the recipe titles.  It amazes me that, even with the local produce, half of my grocery list for the week is produce.  

You’ll notice that it’s also a chicken heavy week.  That wasn’t really planned, but we do like chicken and tend to eat more of it than other meats as a result.  Aside from Mom’s Chicken, all of these (recipes are new to me, so I’ll be posting them after trying them out and updating this post with links.

Menu 5/24/2009

1. Ham and Cheese Macaroni Bake with Peas
2. Farmer’s Market Stir-Fry #1 w/ rice
3. Quiche with green onion, swiss cheese, and bacon
4. Crunchy buttermilk-coconut chicken fingers w/ salad
5. Slow Cooker Brown Sugar Chicken w/ rice and frozen (sigh) broccoli
6. Out!
7. London Broil w/ Risotto with Peas and Prosciutto

Breakfasts and lunches are always leftovers from previous meals, so I tend to only plan for dinners unless there is a special occasion or reason to do otherwise.  I also don’t tend to plan specific meals for different days so that I’m left with the ability to be flexible during the week.  If I select a mixture of hard, easy, time consuming and quick (recipes, this gives me plenty of opportunity to adapt to whatever the week throws our way.  This week has a few challenges and goals for meal planning.

First, there is the goal of using at least three (recipes from Cooking Light since I’m trying to plan healthier meals in general.  Those (recipes are featured with meals 1, 4, and 7.

Second, there is the challenge of needing to work around the addition of Aikido practice to our lives on Tuesday and Thursday.  Art and I will be leaving the house around 6pm and not getting back until 8:30pm, but then we need to eat before Lance’s obligation at 9pm.  This means I’ve got to plan meals that either cook in the slow cooker or can be easily made ahead of time and reheated when I get home from Aikido.  Those are meals 3 and 5.

Third, I have the pleasure of using up all of the delicious bounty from the farmer’s market.  Meals 2, 3 and 7 all include food from the market including eggs, baby bok choi, green onion, young garlic, and eggs.

Lastly, there are a few new restaurants here in town that we’ve been interested in trying, so I’ve scheduled the rare night out for Friday!