Meal plan for 1/31/10-2/6/10

Edited to mark what we've consumed so far

Mains
** means it's a quick meal, meant to be made M/Tu/Fri
means try to make this in advance

• bacon-wrapped pounded chicken rollups of some kind
  
• rack of lamb, from French cookbook
  
• herb-roasted whole chicken, from p263 in make it fast**
  
• red onion jam stuffed pork rib chops with port, pecans, fruit from make-ahead book just broiled them instead
  
• chicken cordon bleu from p251 in make it fast book**
  

Also I made up some ground turkey nachos as a quick dinner (turkey and cheese was from this weekend's shopping, mixed in a diced onion, rotel, chips, barley, and corn from the stockpile, a little leftover spaghetti sauce, and some cilantro that was kicking around the fridge trying to go bad, plus some barley simmered in black bean soup, also from the stockpile). Yum! Even though the pantry challenge is officially over with, I still have a lot of stuff in my pantry. Overall, even though I love to cook and try new recipes, I am trying to keep the quality/variety up while spending less by moving toward a stock-up model for grocery shopping. Made and froze for later:

• lasagna with ground beef and spinach
  
• baked ziti with pork sausage p.226 in make-ahead cookbook -- altho I didn't end up using the pork sausage, just some meat sauce I came across in the freezer
  

Ideas for later:

• chicken enchiladas, p 255 in make-ahead cookbook**
  
  • need tomato sauce, canned jalepenos, sharp cheddar, corn tortillas
    
• jerk chicken
  
  • need scallions & molasses
    
  • p 289 in make-ahead book for marinade recipe**
    
• crispy asian-flavored chicken thighs with sweet-and-sour sauce, cold sesame noodles
  
  • need egg noodles, sesame oil, red bell pepper, scallions
    
  • p 97 & 98, make-ahead cookbook
    
• pork loin chops something??
  
• ground pork something??
  
• shrimp something??
  
• chicken something??
  

Um, delicious. Thai-style Slow Cooker Chicken

This worked out incredibly well.

Simmer 1-1.5 lb chicken breasts (I didn't thaw them) for 8 hours in a mix of:

• 1 can coconut milk (I used the low fat kind)
  
• some lime juice
  
• splash of rice wine vinegar
  
• sweet curry powder and galangal powder to taste (I would've used ginger if I hadn't had galangal)
  

So tender & tasty! I served it with cooked carrots, brown rice, and snips of cilantro.

Pantry Dinner & Kitchen Resolutions Put to the Test!

So, it was bound to happen -- we came home tonight with nothing on the meal plan to suit a quick Tuesday night meal, and not much in the pantry. So many things from the meal plan had to get refiled into February because I didn't have the ingredients, and the situation looked a little impossible. Silly me. I felt like I had nothing, but I pushed myself to be patient and think, not just reach for the takeout telephone. The shelves were low but not empty, and surely if I were actually poor or starving I would be amazed at the variety despite its eclecticism.

I had everything I needed, I just needed to put the picture together. Here's what I came up with: italian chicken with leeks (running low on spices, had to tap the stockpile there, and the leeks were a random little baggie my girl pulled out of the freezer when she was playing), sauteed spinach (which I'd meant to use in a different dish that I then could not make due to lack of shopping), whole wheat pasta (half a box left over from some other meal, which had fallen down back behind things), sorta-alfredo sauce, and mashed potatoes. The chicken had to be defrosted in the microwave (ugh...but it was frozen solid despite sitting in the fridge for 24 hours), and the alfredo sauce was made with fontina and brie instead of parmesan, and the mashed potatoes were the rest of the free box of instant potatoes I opened earlier in the week. When it was all assembled, DH was impressed that we'd gone from "nothing" to filling every pan on the stove.

While I finished up, I also sent him down on a delayed errand to dig supplies out of the deep freeze for me, and he came up with a bunch of different veggies. Now I have a plan for tomorrow, and a very short shopping list (just milk) for tomorrow.

Pot Roast

I think pot roast needs a new name. Imagine a delicious cut of beef, simmered for hours and hours in apple juice and red wine vinegar, sprinkled with peppercorns and herbs, piled up with onions and garlic and tomatoes. Kitchen-smells-wonderful, fork-tender, oh-I-want-seconds, make-sure-you-save-all-the-leftovers -- yes. "Pot roast" -- awww, do we have to call it that? Although it does bring to mind the Tom Lehrer lyric about bullfighters facing down "half a ton of angry pot roast"....I think it has a serious brand identity issue. Today's roast was sirloin tip roast -- and although I know almost nothing about cuts of meat, my sense is that sirloin tip is a better cut of meat than chuck roast, which is what I typically find at the store. I thought we might turn the rest into a chili dinner later in the week, but I'm not sure we have enough leftovers! I suppose we are fortunate to only have the two of us eating full meals -- I can't imagine how families with, say, four teenagers manage to keep enough protein in the house!

Week 4 of the Pantry Challenge

The Goals:


- Only spend half our grocery budget, preferably less!
As of the end of 1/23, we've spent 42.9% of our budget, and we're 74.2% of the way through the month. Hooray! I guess we won't really hit "preferably less" but it does look like we'll come in at about half. I think we'll need to restock on milk and fruit at some point, but I don't expect to do a big shopping run. There aren't that many good deals in the papers this week, so it's hardly worth the trouble (or the risk of ruining my plans :D).
- Eat from the pantry as much as possible -- in part so that I can get it better organized.
The hardest part about this lately has been figuring out what to feed the baby. She can be a little picky, and some of the things I come up with are either saucy or spicy in a way that doesn't really work for her -- we just weren't stockpiled particularly well with toddler-friendly alternatives.
- Stick with my kitchen resolutions and boost our preparation for my maternity leave in the spring. 

Made/froze so far:
• 2 dozen rolls
  
• Chopped carrots
  
• Eggrolls
  
• Beans
  
• Mac & cheese for Stella's packed lunch
  
• Bread -- 1 baked, 2 frozen loaves [we've now used 2 of the 3 loaves, next week we'll probably want to make more].
  
• Peanut butter kiss cookies
  
• applesauce [need to make even more]
  

Meal plan for the rest of January

We picked up our CSA delivery for the month, so it's time to plan meals for the rest of the month. I feel a little discombobulated trying to do this on a Tuesday night with no shopping planned, but I guess it does encourage me to stick with the whole pantry cooking thing.

Mains
** means it's a quick meal, meant to be made M/Tu/Fri -- may have make ahead work

• Hot banana curry shrimp with brown rice & veggie stirfry
  
  
  
• pork loin chops in apple-cream sauce
  
  
• pot roast, using sirloin roast -- shredded beef chili with the leftovers **
  
  
• bacon-wrapped pounced chicken rollups of some kind
  
• rack of lamb, from p325 in make it fast**
  
• herb-roasted whole chicken, from p263 in make it fast**
  

February meals

• red onion jam stuffed pork rib chops with port, pecans, fruit
  
  • need red onion, orange, pecans, blue cheese
    
• chicken cordon bleu from p251 in make it fast book**
  
  • need ham, swiss
    
• lasagna with ground beef and spinach
  
  • need ricotta, mozzerella
    
  • will need to freeze spinach to prevent spoilage
• baked ziti with pork sausage**
  
  • need ricotta, parmesan, ziti. p.226 in make-ahead cookbook
    
• chicken enchiladas, p 255 in make-ahead cookbook**
  
  • need tomato sauce, canned jalepenos, sharp cheddar, corn tortillas
    
• jerk chicken
  
  • need scallions & molasses
    
  • p 289 in make-ahead book for marinade recipe**
    
• crispy asian-flavored chicken thighs with sweet-and-sour sauce, cold sesame noodles
  
  • need egg noodles, sesame oil, red bell pepper, scallions
    
  • p 97 & 98, make-ahead cookbook
    
• pork loin chops something??
  
• ground pork something??
  
• shrimp something??
  
• chicken something??
  

Apparently I am looking forward to unfettered shopping in February :). Edited to remove all mentions of needing marinara sauce...wow did I find a lot of that stuff already in my freezer today...along with things that have been in there for a long, long time. I might need a cook from the pantry challenge twice a year....!

Spaghetti & Meatballs

Tonight's dinner was a nice combination of easy, popular, and cheap -- spaghetti and meatballs.

My usual approach for meatballs is to combine the ground meat (in this case, ground turkey breast) with egg, milk, and fine breadcrumbs, mixed by hand and made into balls. I opted for the longer but easier method of cooking them -- baked in the oven while we did various other things, like clean the kitchen (the dishes were really getting out of hand after our weekend of ad hoc meals and snacks) and try to comfort The Napless Wonder in her exhausted misery (poor thing was ready for bed by 730 pm...wonder when she'll wake up....).

For the sauce, I mixed some canned fire roasted tomatoes with some cherry tomatoes that were threatening to go squishy and a can of cream of mushroom soup to make a tomato cream sauce. We had some red pepper puree that I'd frozen and then defrosted, which added a little bit of invisible vitamin power to the whole concoction. The pasta was whole wheat spaghettini.

Unfortunately, there were no leftover noodles or meatballs to send in our girl's lunch :( she likes noodles and meatballs quite a bit, but we were hungry it seems! We do have some leftover sauce, and I'm thinking about making either some kind of stromboli or or else lasagna with it. We do have a container of fresh spinach to contribute to either meal, and some nice lasagna noodles....but not much in the way of cheese. But meal planning is a task for tomorrow, when I'll actually know what meats to plan around.

Dinner tomorrow will either be North African stew or banana curry shrimp -- both will be from the freezer. Since it's a Tuesday, quick and easy will rule the day.

Frugal Map on BargainBriana.com

I was actually going to post about this anyway, but then I noticed that she is having a giveaway to promote the new site. So, if you think the existence of a contest will color my review, skip this post :).

Anyway! This is the sort of thing I have been hoping to find for a while, and I'm glad that someone has finally done it. I have family in Texas, Georgia, Oregon, and New York, and when they are curious to understand what I'm talking about with coupons and deals and such, I can't be as helpful without local bloggers to refer folks to. Plus I am always on the lookout for more locals to keep an eye on.

The Frugal Map is a clickable map of the US which lets you view bloggers in your state. It's a simple concept, but a big benefit to people trying to save money. There are plenty of frugality blogs out there, and you would go nuts trying to follow all of them (plus they often "rebroadcast" content from one another, so there's a diminishing return after a while). Reading a local blog or three carries some additional benefits -- not only do they often highlight truly local deals or give reviews of individual franchises of big chains, but their store circulars will more often match yours. It's definitely frustrating to head to the store to collect on a great deal you just read about online, only to find that it's some kind of regional thing -- plus it can be a little disheartening to read week after week about the great deals to be had at someplace you can't possibly visit!

Pantry Challenge, Week 3!

We are going to make it all the way to the CSA delivery on the 19th without a major protein re-supply run! I've picked up a few deals here and there as supplements, but the giant twice-weekly meat shopping extravaganza at Whole Foods has been avoided. I don't expect we'll do this well next month, since it only actually lasted us about 3 weeks max, but at least I have the breathing room to stockpile based on some sales -- like I did with shrimp last week, and I'm doing with chicken breast and juice this week.
The Goals:


- Only spend half our grocery budget, preferably less!
As of the end of 1/17, we've spent 38.5% of our budget, and we're 54.8% of the way through the month. We're approaching a better spend rate, but I haven't done any meal planning or really thought about what to eat past Monday....
- Eat from the pantry as much as possible -- in part so that I can get it better organized.
One fun thing this week is that my husband has been getting involved in the challenge -- suggesting meals, or asking if we should pull something or other out of the freezer. This is making our cooking a little more democratic, which is great. In the past, I was the one with the stack of cookbooks and the grocery list and the web browser full of tabs, working out a combination of tasty, interesting, savvy recipes to yield a meal plan. I always ask for ideas and such, and grocery shopping and cooking have always been a 100% team effort, but usually I end up being the "creative" force. Mostly this is because I enjoy it and I'm pretty good at it, and while he loves to eat what we make and is just as supportive and helpful as anyone could be, he generally can't remember what something tastes like, or imagine whether it will be good based on a recipe or ingredients (going to restaurants with him has always been very amusing....I've never met anyone else who had no memory or imagination for flavors). When all the meal components are whatever's in front of you with minimal supplement, it's a lot easier to participate. At any rate, it has made this week of the pantry challenge more fun to have my forever companion working at it with me.

As far as the organizing thing goes....it's getting there. The fridge in particular is starting to look quite bare. But it's amazing how much stuff we had packed into the pantry shelves....I don't think we'll need to buy brown rice for months and months....also it is taking a while to figure out what to do with all these cans of soup, since we don't actually eat soup all that much...I have some thought that cans of vegetable soup would be perfect for baby food if run through a blender, but the baby who might eat such a thing won't be born for another 2 months, and then won't be eating baby food for 6 months after that....so it's a little early to crack open the cans.
- Stick with my kitchen resolutions and boost our preparation for my maternity leave in the spring. 

Made/froze so far:
• 2 dozen rolls
  
• Chopped carrots
  
• Eggrolls
  
• Beans
  
• Mac & cheese for Stella's packed lunch
  
• Bread -- 1 baked, 2 frozen loaves [we've now used 2 of the 3 loaves, next week we'll probably want to make more]. I don't know why we didn't do this earlier -- it is pretty easy to get into a cycle of making up 3 loaves of bread dough every few weeks, and being able to just pop out a loaf and bake it up on demand is so nice!
  
• Peanut butter kiss cookies [by request from the DH, who is not only a cookie monster, but also remembers adoring these when my niece and I made them at Christmas -- if they all stay out on the counter, they will disappear fast....so some of them are headed for the freezer!]
  

Pantry Challenge, week 2!

The Goals:


- Only spend half our grocery budget, preferably less!
As of the end of 1/14, we've spent 33.3% of our budget, and we're 45.2% of the way through the month. We'll need to slow down our spend rate if we're going to come in at 50% of our budget. We're eating up the budget a little more quickly than planned because I took advantage of some sales to stock up on frozen shrimp and I also ended up re-supplying my sugar stockpiles...those cinnamon rolls are calling to me!
- Eat from the pantry as much as possible -- in part so that I can get it better organized.
We have mostly been eating either from our meal plan or else defrosted stuff I am discovering in the freezer, but I've gotten a little creative with bits and pieces from the back of the fridge and cabinets as well. Mmmm, and Chinese takeout.
- Stick with my kitchen resolutions and boost our preparation for my maternity leave in the spring. 

Made/froze so far:
• 2 dozen rolls
  
• Chopped carrots
  
• Eggrolls
  
• Beans
  
• Mac & cheese for Stella's packed lunch
  
• Bread -- 1 baked, 2 frozen loaves
  

Meal Plan, 1/10/10

Breakfasts:

• pumpkin pancakes [freezer]
  
• pop tarts [pantry]
  
• yogurt [fridge]
  
• cereal [pantry]
  
• fruit [need to shop]
  

Lunches:

• Kaylea's takealong lunches [need to shop]
  
• Grilled cheese sandwiches
  

Dinners:

• beef roast something
  
• chicken thigh something
  
• veggie burgers, maybe w/chili or soup?
  
• lamb roast
  
• onion-coated chicken
  

Side Dishes:

• salad
  
• squash and potatoes with rosemary in crockpot
  
• roasted carrots
  
• potato-carrot pancakes
  

Prep for future:

• a cake
  
• tortillas
  

Week 1 of the Pantry Challenge: Status Update

The Goals:


- Only spend half our grocery budget, preferably less!
As of mid-day on 1/9, we've spent 15.3% of our budget, and we're 30% of the way through the month. The snowy weather is helping out in this respect....who wants to shop for anything more than the bare necessities in weather like this?
- Eat from the pantry as much as possible -- in part so that I can get it better organized.
We have mostly been eating defrosted stuff I am discovering in the freezer, but I've gotten a little creative with bits and pieces from the back of the fridge and cabinets as well.
- Stick with my kitchen resolutions and boost our preparation for my maternity leave in the spring. 
So far, so good!

Made/froze so far:
• 2 dozen rolls
  
• Chopped carrots
  
• Eggrolls
  
• Beans
  
• Mac & cheese for Stella's packed lunch
  

The first week has been pretty smooth. I need to make some bread, since our stockpile is now empty, and I didn't get a chance to make tortillas, so we've drained our tortilla chip stash down to pretty much zero by having nachos instead of tacos on two nights (leftover beef roast, yay). Overall, we've eaten more leftovers/frozen things than I had planned (you never know what you'll discover when you thaw something out...) and we ate things in a slightly different order, so the non-leftovers meals are stretching further into the month -- we may bridge the gap with our next CSA delivery with some room to spare. My cinnamon roll plan was put on ice when I realized...duh....I have no granulated sugar. We have ingredients remaining for these meals/entrees:

• veggie burgers, maybe w/chili or soup
  
• steak
  
• lamb roast
  
• onion-coated chicken
  

We also have the ingredients for these sides:

• yellow split pea-spinach dal
  
• squash and potatoes with rosemary in crockpot
  
• roasted carrots
  
• potato-carrot pancakes
  

Future prep items for now through the 15th include:

• a cake
  
• tortillas
  
• more mac & cheese
  

We have so many cookies plus chocolates from the holidays that I'm not sure that cake serves much purpose other than pantry de-cluttering. Then again, cupcakes are always welcome anywhere you take them. We have a two-pound pack of chicken thighs that I bought ages ago and have been avoiding because they were a mistake...I don't usually cook with dark meat. I am willing to be convinced to use them in the name of the pantry challenge, but I need to find a recipe. Maybe Cook's Illustrated can help me there -- I am willing to believe that if they call for chicken thighs in something, it's for a good reason. I have another beef roast, and some smoked pork hocks (so far, the only recipes I've found use them in red beans & rice, which I could definitely fall for).

Rustic Italian Dinner: Roasted Chicken with Stuffing, Oven-Crisp Potatoes, and White Bean Hummus

I am so proud of the dinner I made last night. It was a Wednesday dinner, and since one of my Kitchen Goals for the year is to make Wednesdays special, I was particularly pleased to have a success on the first round.

I don't usually cook whole chickens (this was my second ever) -- I've cooked more whole turkeys (maybe 6?) than chickens. But I went ahead and gave it a shot -- rubbed the bird down with olive oil, sprinkled with herbs and lemon juice (mostly green tea peppercorn seasoning, yum), then tossed a few onions into the pan, started it at 450 for 5 minutes then baked at 350 for about an hour. This worked out rather nicely, although the dark meat needed a little more oven time. I stuffed the bird with some bits and pieces I threw together -- some chopped tomatoes, a torn-up slice of homemade bread that had gotten a little old and dry, some boxed breadcrumbs, mixed with some melted butter. Why did it not occur to me before that stuffing is just dribs and drabs of whatever you have on hand?? Until this meal, I thought of stuffing as a thing you have a recipe for, or a boxed mix. Silly.

The potatoes I made from thin slices of a single potato I had kicking around the fridge, already washed and ready to go -- I think I had it around because I scaled back the quantity of potatoes in some dish in the middle of prep. Anyway, yes, thin slices, tossed with olive oil, lemon pepper, and a sprinkle of red pepper flakes for kick. This worked out incredibly well, as I managed to restrain myself from putting in too much pepper and didn't overwhelm the thin and slightly crispy slices. I spread them out on a cookie sheet and baked them beside the chicken for the last 20 minutes of baketime or so. The thinner ones stuck to the pan a bit and some pieces got too brown, so 20 minutes is probably too long.

Then, on to the hummus. This was out-of-the-park, eat-it-again-soon kind of territory. Yuuuuummmmmy. I had planned to follow a recipe for white bean crostini, and changed my mind at the last minute to making hummus instead, since we had pita chips in the pantry not bread to toast into crostinis. Great move, that. Here's what I ended up doing:

2 C cannellini beans (dried then cooked is what I used, I spose you could use canned)
2 plum tomatoes, chopped
1 onion, cut in thin slices
lemon pepper to taste
dried garlic bits to taste
chicken broth to taste
olive oil to taste
rosemary to taste

Whir up 1 C of the beans and half the tomatoes into a nice smooth blend with some olive oil to help it stick together in the food processor while the onions caramelize a bit in some olive oil in the frying pan, then add the other cup of beans, as well as the garlic, rosemary, and pepper. Add maybe 1/4 c of broth, depending on how soupy your mix is. Simmer on the stove until it thickens a bit. Add the contents of the frying pan to the food processor, and pulse a few times to blend. If it seems a bit dry, olive oil should help. The end result will be a nice mixture of chunky and smooth, perfect for scooping with pita chips.

Hooray for organization!

I had one of those little victories today -- the kind where you feel like all of your preparation and hard work is paying not only the dividends you expected, but unexpected kinds as well. We had occasion to thank a neighbor for some very kind effort he put forth on our behalf during our vacation, and what better way to say thanks than a plate of home-baked brownies, a loaf of home-made bread, and a note? I knew where my notecards were, I had the ingredients for brownies, and I had a frozen unbaked loaf of bread ready to go. My efforts in this area have been primarily motivated by trying to create a comfortable and peaceful home, but the ability to also be grateful in response to another's generosity is an unexpected extra encouragement to keep working at this home management thing. Yay!