Monthly Archives: October 2013

Dinner Menu for the week of October 27th

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I am running on fumes.  Dave was out of town for most of the week.  My housekeeper came on Wednesday, and my house was a shit-show by Friday morning.  I stand in AWE of single parents.  You just plain rule.

Pity party is over, so moving on to the re-cap.

The soup rocked my world, and is now occupying much of the deep freezer space.

I forgot to go to the store/was too embarrassed to go in public unshowered, and in the same clothes from the day prior/could not bear to muscle two toddlers into the car, so I did not get to eat my yummy salmon on Tuesday.  Pretty sure I ate the remainder of the kids meal for my dinner.  Since I cannot recall what it was, it was clearly amazing.

By Wednesday, I had a bit of a second wind, and I made the kids chicken tenders for dinner.  They were SO awesome!  Really cool because they can be frozen and then just re-heated when needed.  I see this getting added to my next cookapalooza weekend.

I know that I keep telling you about this chicken in the crock pot, so I will not go on and on and on about its deliciousness. Moved it to tonight because the bird was not quite defrosted.  I decided to roast some veggies (sweet potatoes, carrots, and zucchini) to go with the chicken, and found a recipe that suggested tossing the veggies in some bacon grease prior to roasting.  I thought….well, I DO happen to have some saved bacon grease.  I mean, why am I saving it, if I was not planning to use it to cook something.  It was the most humongous hit ever.  Between the chicken and the veggies, I have never seen the boys eat so much.  (Lets hope full bellies means sleeping past 6 am!)

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Here is what we are planning to make this week:

Sunday: Tomato basil chicken stew using the left over crock pot chicken

Monday: Left over soup

Tuesday:  Ready to harvest more peppers from the garden!  Making southwestern stuffed peppers.

Wednesday:  Dave’s birthday, so we are going out to dinner!

Thursday: Chicken and avocado salad

Friday:  Pizza night!

Saturday: Sausage, egg, and biscuit casserole.  Adapted from this recipe, but plan to make my own biscuit dough.

This week I am also going to stock up on some muffins for the freezer.  We go through them SO fast.  I am planning to make cinnamony apple pie muffins, whole wheat carrot applesauce muffins and another round of pumpkin muffins.

Hope everyone has a safe and FUN Halloween!

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Dinner Menu for the week of October 20th

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Getting right to it tonight with last week’s highlights.

The shrimp tacos were great, but the big winner was the meatballs!  I thought I would have enough to freeze, but only 3 ended up making it to the fridge.  Made a mental note to double the recipe next time.

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I finally got around to making the pumpkin muffins this afternoon.  On a whim, I used a different recipe.  What a great decision!  Now…I have had some really amazing pumpkin muffins, but these really are the very best I have EVER had.  Ever.  Trevor was sneaking them off the cooling rack.

In addition to what was on the menu, in keeping with my pumpkin obsession, I made pumpkin french toast on Sat morning.  I subbed in maple syrup for the brown sugar in the recipe.  Honestly, you could leave that out altogether, and it would still taste great.  Trevor and I loved it, but Lucas and Dave were not terribly impressed.

This week is going to be a bit wonky due to some commitments that will take one or both of us out of the house for dinner.  Here we go…

Sunday:  We skipped seafood tonight because I needed to re-stock the kitchen with my favorite soup.  This chicken enchilada soup is SO versatile, and freezes great.  I used a huge red pepper from our garden, two large sweet potatoes instead of russet, and tossed in a jalapeno.  I did not have any butternut squash, so I used the acorn squash that did not get used last week.  (Ahem)  Instead of transferring to a blender in batches, I used my immersion blender.  So much easier.  This will do a really good job stocking the freezer.  YAY!

Monday:  Soup made on Sunday.

Tuesday:  Moving seafood to Tuesday, and cooking up some baked lemon salmon with asparagus

Wednesday:  Cobb salad with hard boiled egg, bacon and avocado

Thursday:  Whole chicken in the crock pot, steamed broccoli and wild rice.  I get two whole pastured chickens a month, and this not only feeds us for several days, it also makes delicious stock!  If you have not yet tried to cook a whole chicken in a crock pot…it is time.  You will not believe that it took you this long.

Friday:  Open face chicken melts using the left over chicken

Saturday:  Avocado Bacon Breakfast wrap

Looking forward to more pumpkin recipe hunting on pinterest this week!  Enjoy your cooking adventures.

Dinner Menu for the week of October 13th

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We took a trip to the pumpkin patch today over by the coast.  The air was crisp, and being surrounded by pumpkins made me feel all happy and content.  Pretty sure I have mentioned before, but I sure do love fall.

The boys had SO much fun running around, and taking a ride on the train.  We brought our new wagon for two that Trevor’s Mimi got him for his birthday.  It has a small caboose that hitches on behind, and it was just what we needed to pull around our pumpkins.

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The big winner from last week was the chipotle chicken sweet potatoes.  Yum.  Knowing Dave is not a sweet potato fanatic, I made his on regular potatoes.  Both of them turned out delicious, and they were really easy to make too!  The boys ate the innards for lunch the following day.

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The second winner from this week’s adventures in cooking was an impromptu batch of peanut butter chocolate granola.  MAKE THIS PEOPLE!!!

Sunday:  Honey Lime shrimp tacos on home made corn tortillas

Monday: Left over shrimp tacos

Tuesday:  Quinoa stuffed acorn squash inspired by a recipe in this post.   Side story here.  I accidentally neglected my CSA customization last week, and an acorn squash was in my box.  Hmmm.  Never in my life…  This could be the hot mess of the week/month/ever.

Wednesday:  Grilled cheese and tomato bisque

Thursday: Chopped salad with quinoa, sweet potatoes and apples

Friday: Parmigiana meatballs over whole wheat spaghetti

Saturday:  Poached eggs over asparagus.  We usually serve this with bacon.

My pumpkin adventures this week will include pumpkin granola bars, and pumpkin muffins.  YAY!!!

Enjoy cooking this week everyone!

Dinner Menu for the week of October 6th

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Oy…October snuck up on me.  But, since it is here, I must confess…I love Fall.  I love everything about Fall.  I love pumpkins, and mulling spices, and the color orange.  It is time for warm sweaters, and cute knee high boots, and scarfs.  And, check out this AMAZING pumpkin latte recipe!!!.

I spent a long weekend with a friend down in San Diego.  We stayed up late chatting, drank some wine, and squeezed in a few hours of amazing training on some chemical free products.  It was a nice little break from the norm.  Breaks from the norm make dinner menus LATE.  This creature of habit is out of whack.

Last week’s menu winner was the quinoa bake.  It was SO easy, and was really tasty.  I blessed another family that welcomed a new little one with this meal as well, and they were impressed.  If you you are even slightly open to cooking with quinoa, this one is a fabulous place to start.

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This week’s menu:

Sunday:  We actually got take out from Chipotle.  Food Babe recently did a piece on what to eat at Chipotle, and I feel semi-ok with their menu.

Monday:  Potato Soup (out of the freezer)

Tuesday: Mexi-Chicken with black beans and brown rice

Wednesday: Chipotle Chicken sweet potato skins.  Sweet potatoes are a very close second to anything that is pumpkin flavored.  Could be that they are both orange.  Regardless….I am anticipating this meal most.

Thursday:  Parmesan Asparagus Orzo and a side salad

Friday:  Fish taco bowls.  We have been talking about this dish since the last time it made it on a menu.  It was time.

Saturday:   Pumpkin pancakes. (You knew it was coming.)  Subbing in maple syrup for the brown sugar, and will make enough to freeze.

Given my love/obsession with pumpkin, I am planning to give these pumpkin muffins a go this week as well.  Can.not.wait.  For real.

Hope you all have a fabulous week!