Weekend Menu Planning

I have been on summer vacation for the past two weeks now and have probably cooked one time.  There are a couple of reasons for this–but not really any good ones.  I haven’t blogged because I haven’t been cooking–but I also haven’t been blogging because one of my students dropped my camera on the last day of school and broke it. Excuses, excuses.  No blogging, no camera, no homemade meals…

I have been eating out way too much as a result. This. Needs. To. Change. Today.

Camera or not, here is a blog post and camera or not I will be posting recipes and attempting pictures with my phone.

Yesterday, we finally went grocery shopping.  Here’s what I got:

• pizza dough
• olives
• cherry tomatoes
• basil
• mozzarella
• regular tomatoes
• chicken breasts
• hamburger
• ciabatta bread
• mushrooms
• green onions

Here is a tentative plan:

Feta Rice Stuffed Tomatoes                                                                                                      I will hollow out some tomatoes and stuff them with a feta rice dish that I made earlier this week. (Feta rice: 1 cup of rice, 1 cup of milk, 1 cup of stock, cumin, mexican oregano, garlic, a large handful of corn, 1 onion, some feta cheese. Saute the spices, garlic, and onion. Add the rice to the pan and toast it for a minute or so. Add the liquid, corn, and feta. Cover with a lid and cook until rice is tender.) After stuffing tomatoes, I will bake them in the oven at 400 degrees until they are bubbling and done.

Tomato and Olive Salad

This week, for Jeff’s birthday, I bought a TV and an Xbox.  He has been gleefully playing his games, and I have been watching Jamie Oliver’s old show, “Oliver’s Twist,” on Netflix. Let me just say this: I absolutely love Jamie Oliver. His food is accessible, passionate, playful–and Jamie seems to embody those characteristics as well.  Super love him and super love his show.  This recipe is from one of his episodes.  It looked delicious.

                                                                                                                                                              Calzones

I don’t have a recipe for this, but I think I will throw in whatever sounds good at the moment. I have some artichoke hearts, sun-dried tomatoes, and mushrooms that sound like a lovely combination.  I still don’t know what to do with the hamburger or chicken that I purchased, though.  Maybe meatballs, and a chicken soup?  I begin work again tomorrow (Summer School) and I need to start thinking about packing lunches again. 

Sunday Morning Menu Planning

Sunday: 

• Lunch:   Out.  I think we will take a long walk this afternoon and eat wherever we end up. 
• Dinner:  Tacos.  Market of Choice has some ground beef on sale right now.   It wasn’t on sale, but I bought some anyway. 

Monday: 

• Lunch: Soup and/or sandwich
• Dinner: Leftovers

Tuesday:

• Lunch: Trader Joe’s convenience lunch.  Something frozen.  We’ll see what looks appetizing today.         
•  Dinner: French Lentil Caviar Salad with a Poached Egg

Wednesday:

• Lunch: Hummus, crackers, veg
• Dinner: Breakfast

Thursday:

• Lunch: TJ’s convenience lunch
• Dinner: Out (payday!)

Friday:

• Lunch: Out
• Dinner: Wing it

I’ve decided to micromanage my week’s meals a bit more than usual.  What I usually do is make a list of a few dishes on the weekend, cook them, and divvy them up for lunches and dinners and call it good.  The problem I still run into, however, is the temptation to eat out, even when we cannot afford it–even when we have leftovers.  I am so tired when I get home–too tired to cook and leftovers just don’t sound good on some nights.  So, I’d like to start choosing some quick and easy meals that I can cook in minutes on weeknights so that I don’t have any excuses to eat out.

Sunday Menu Planning

I am feeling completely uninspired on the cooking front these past couple days.  I think this whole week has been uninspired.  I spent my whole vacation waiting for my vacation to happen–and now, here I am: Saturday afternoon.  I need to do chores, cook for the week, and do some lesson planning before school starts on Monday.  Break is, effectively, over.

The recipes I’ve decided to make this week come from, easily, one of my favorite blogs, Smitten Kitchen. This trio of Indian recipes looks really good.  The first recipe is a sour cabbage salad that highlights lemon juice and whole mustard seeds.  I’ve never bought or used mustard in its seed form, but it was cheap at my local supermarket, so I definitely won’t shy from it if it comes up again in recipes.  The next is a simple, yellow daal–and if you recall, I need to use up my grains and legumes, so this recipe looks perfect for that purpose.  Finally, I’ll make a black-eyed pea curry.  I’m looking forward to moving towards a more vegetarian diet again, and I think these three recipes will be a good transition back into meat free meals.

I also plan to make this bean salad, which is used as a sandwich filling.  I think I’ll use a different type of beans instead of garbanzo beans, though, in this recipe.  Garbanzo beans tend to taste like wet dog to me.

P.S. I bought some kimchi from a local Asian foods market in Eugene.  I think they make it on-site. I’ve never had it before.  I’m pretty excited.

Interesting Food Links, News, and Recipes

• Tater tots are delicious little nubs of potatoey goodness.  But have you ever given much thought as to how they came to be?  You know, they don’t grow in the ground all crispy and cylindrical.  The fine folks at Serious Eats, J. Kenji Lopez-Alt in particular, in his column “The Food Lab,” have give us a step-by-step tot making process.
• Some crispy cod nuggets to go along with your homemade tots?
• Chinese cows produce human milk?
• In honor of spring, here are some fabulous salads…
• And a handful of yummy wild rice recipes.
• It’s not spring until I see fresh, local asparagus in the markets…but I can anticipate the arrival with these delicious recipes…