Menu Plan Monday 3/22

If you were reading last week you'll remember I mentioned we'd be having "steak something" one night. My husband had moved the steak from the freezer to the fridge to thaw but we weren't sure what we wanted to do with it. We ended up making Beef Stroganoff. I had been craving it for awhile and when I mentioned it, my husband was all for it. The recipe I use is his Grandmother's. When we got married my sister gave me a recipe book with family recipes she'd gathered from my family and  my husband's family and this was included. I thought I'd share it. We loved having it again after not eating it in a while. Hope you'll enjoy it too.

Grandmother's Beef Stroganoff
1 lb. lean round or sirloin steak, cut into bite size pieces
1 large onion, choppped
1 can beef consomme
1/4 c. water
1 small can(or fresh) sliced mushrooms
dash of worcestershire sauce
1 8 oz. container sour cream
garlic salt
pepper
flour
butter(or oil)

Sprinkle beef with garlic sale and pepper. Roll in flour and brown in butter (or oil, I use canola oil). Add onion, beef consomme, water, mushrooms and worcestershire sauce to browned beef. Cover and simmer for 1 hour. Cool a bit and add cantainer or sour cream and stir thoroughly. Serve over rice or noodles.

Now onto what we'll be eating this week.

Black Bean Burritos
Shrimp & Grits
Baked Penne (carried over from last week)
Breakfast for dinner
Chinese Style Glazed Chicken Breasts, broccoli, rice

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Menu Plan Monday 3/15

So I skipped menu planning last week. Sometimes you just have an off week, ya know? I did make the Black Bean burgers I mentioned in my last menu plan. We enjoyed them although my husband commented he wouldn't want to eat them all the time. He much prefers a beef burger but I think the black bean burgers will make it back to our menu from time to time. I'm sharing the recipe as promised.

Black Bean Burgers

2 T. vegetable oil
1 stalk of celery, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1-15oz can bladk beans, rinsed and drained
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 T. cumin
1/2 cup plain bread crumbs
salt and pepper

Pre heat oven to 375. Line a large rimmed baking sheet with foil: grease lightly. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add celery and onion and cook, stirring often, until softened, 3 to 5 minutes. Add garlic and saute 1 minute more.

Pour beans into a large bowl and use a fork or potato masher to mash into a thick paste. Scrape vegetables from skillet into bowl. Stir in egg, cumin and bread crumbs. Season with salt and pepper.

Use you fingers to form into 4 patties (do not overmix) Place patties on baking sheet and bake until firm and set, about 10 minutes on each side. Serve on whole grain buns with lettuce, tomatoe and sliced red onion.

215 calories, 9 gms fat, 1mg saturated, 53 mg chol., 7 grams fiber, 8 grams protein, 28 grams carbs, 821 mg sodium.

Now onto what we'll be eating this week:

Steak something. My husband pulled the steak out of the freezer and put it in the fridge before heading to work today. Not sure what he wants to do with it.

Spicy Black-Eyed Pea Soup-from the freezer

Grilled chicken pitas and pasta salad

Baked Penne (may alter recipe some) and salad

Southern Plate's Omelet Made Easy with Toast

For more menu inspiration stop by Orgjunkie.com.

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Menu Plan Monday 3/1

My family was in town visiting over the weekend. We had a great time with a lot of laughter, a walk on the beach and wonderful food. The Chocolate-Cranberry Scones and Ham & Cheese Biscuits I mentioned last week were well received. Saturday afternoon I took the family to the local seafood market and that night my mom made her incredible Shrimp Creole for us all. I meant to get the recipe before she left but I forgot. I'll be sure to get it and share it here in the future because it's definitely something I'll be making. We have plenty of leftovers from the weekend so that's how we'll start our week of dinners off.

Leftover Shrimp Creole and salad

Black Bean Burgers(this is a new recipe. I'll share the recipe/review next week.)

Steak, baked potatoes, salad(carried over)

Garlic Chicken Pasta with Spinach

Turkey Tacos

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Menu Plan Monday 2/22

My family is coming to visit next weekend. My mom has already asked to cook one night. We'll probably go out to eat the other night they're here. Our Saturday should prove to be busy so I'm planning to whip up some of these Country Ham & Cheese Biscuits (I'll use leftover spiral ham) and these Chocolate-Cranberry Scones on Friday so we can just grab these for breakfast Saturday morning.

Here's what we'll be eating the other days.

Homemade pizza

Spiral sliced ham, mashed potatoes, steamed broccoli, cornbread

Spicy Black Eyed Pea Soup

Spaghetti and salad

Steak, baked potatoes, salad(moved from previous week)

For more inspiring menus stop by I'm An Organizing Junkie's Menu Plan Monday.

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Menu Plan Monday 2/15/10

This weeks was a fun week in the kitchen for me. I'm not a big fan of cooking meals but I love baking and making treats. Last year I decided to make treats for my family for Valentine's Day instead of buying them. I (and they) enjoyed it so much I decided to make this a tradition. I surprised them with completely different treats this year. I made them Conversation Heart Fudge, Peanut Butter Heart Cups and Devil's Food Cake Balls. I adapted a couple of the recipes. For the Peanut Butter Heart Cups I just used Nestle semi-sweet chips instead of buying and melting down the hearts (less expensive) and I made red candy hearts using Wilton candy melts instead of the chocolate hearts. For the Cake Ball recipe I just substituted Devil's Food cake mix for the Red Velvet. All of these recipes can be adapted slightly to be made for all occasions.

Now for the meal planning. This week we'll be having:

French loaf pizza

Baked Chicken and rice

Black bean soup (moved from last week)

Steak, baked potatoes, salad

Italian skillet meal with ground turkey/pasta

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Menu Plan Monday 2/8/10

I strayed from last week's menu plan quite a bit so I'll be moving a few of those things to this week's menu. The thing about keeping a well stocked pantry is that you can improvise when the mood strikes. My youngest kept asking for mashed potatoes last week and so instead of the Chicken Parmesan pizza I decided to do something else with the chicken and serve mashed potaoes with it. While looking around I found this recipe for Ritz Cracker Crumb Chicken. I added some garlic powder to the cracker crumb mixture for a little extra flavor. It was so good! Without a doubt the juciest chicken I've ever made. However, I would suggest not looking at the nutritional information if you want to make this recipe. ;) I won't be making it often because of that but we sure did enjoy it this time.



This is what we'll be eating this week:
Turkey Joes & carrot sticks
Baked pork chops, mashed potatoes, salad
Crockpot roast & veggies
Black Bean Soup
Valentine's Dinner*-Red Hot Love Burgers, Spicy Fries and Love Potion Ice Cream

*Our Valentine's dinner is a long standing tradition. Early in our marriage we were broke like so many young married couples. Ground beef and some inexpensive frozen fries were all we could swing. My dear husband made that dinner special by shaping the burgers like hearts and heating them up with spices and tobasco sauce. We have continued that tradition since that Valentine's Day and we enjoy it as a family now. The Love Potion is from Baskin Robbins. We always buy a small container every year to enjoy after our dinner.

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Menu Plan Monday 2/1/10

In keeping with my goal to cook more from scratch this year I made my very first pie crust last week. Shocking I've made it almost 40 years having never done that before. I made it for the pot pie I was making for dinner. The recipe I used made enough for two crusts though so I had one left over. I wrapped the extra up and kept it in the fridge for a couple of days before I decided what to do with it. I finally decided on Chocolate Side Pies. The turned out perfectly.

I just made the recipe up as I went:

Roll out crust and cut 4 circles with large cup. (kneading and re-rolling as needed)

Mixed together cocoa powder and sugar.

Spoon mixture onto crust circle and dot with butter.

Fold over and crimp edges and prick vent holes with a fork.

Sprinkle with a little sugar.

Bake at 425 degrees until done approx. 12-14 minutes.

Now onto what we'll be eating this week:

Grilled chicken breasts, rice, steamed veggies

Spaghetti with Italian sausage and marinara sauce, salad

Chicken Parmesan Pizza

Crockpot roast and veggies

Black Bean Soup

For more menu inspiration, stop by I'm An Organizing Junkie.

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Menu Plan Monday 1/25/10

If you saw last week's menu plan you know I was going to try out a Spicy Black Eyed Pea soup. I saw several recipes for black eyed pea soups around the New Year but none of them sounded quite spicy enough for my tastes so I decided to experiment on a recipe of my own. It actually turned out to be exactly what I was hoping it would be. My ultra picky 6 year old even ate it.

Here's the recipe:

1 cup dried black eyed peas(soak overnight)

1/2 yellow onion-diced

1/2 cup brown rice

1 can diced tomatoes with jalapenos

1 cup water

24 oz. chicken broth

1 T. canola oil

Add spices to taste-I added black pepper and red pepper flakes

Saute onion in canola oil until tender and translusent, transfer to medium to large pot.(I used a 3 quart pot.) Add black eyed peas, tomatoes, rice, water and broth. Bring to a boil and reduce to medium/medium-low heat and cook for approximately 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes or until peas and rice are as desired. Enjoy!

This is what we'll be eating this week:

Tacos

Pork chops, potatoes, salad

Chicken pot pie

Stuffed baked potatoes

Breakfast for dinner

Stop by I'm An Organizing Junkie for more menu planning inspiration.

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Menu Plan Monday 1/18/10

My menu this week is going to be just a basic plan. It's been a slow process building up the stockpile since moving and there's not much meat in the house. I'm planning to go to Winn Dixie since they seem to have the best prices on things we like this week. And while I generally know what I plan to get, I'll make my final decision when I get there. But here's what I'm planning at this point.

Pasta with italian sausage in marinara sauce, salad

Spicy Black Eyed Pea Soup(I'm just totally making this recipe up. I'll let you know how it goes.)

Breakfast for dinner

Pork Chops, salad, roasted potatoes

Roasted chicken and veggies

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Menu Plan Monday 1/11/10

It's a birthday week at my house as my husband is celebrating his birthday on Friday. That meal isn't planned yet since he still hasn't decided what he wants other than the cake. Our pantry is looking better but I'm still seriously lacking in the meat department around here. Since one of my goals is to cook from scratch more, I've been looking up new recipes to try.

Sandwiches, chips, fruit
Slow Cooker Orange Chicken, brown rice, broccoli
Salsa Chicken and Black Bean Soup (I bought dried black beans for this, a first for me. I usually use canned beans in recipes.)
leftovers
Birthday Dinner? and Red Velvet cake

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Menu Plan Monday 1/4/10

Wow! I've not written out a menu plan since mid-November. Things were so busy with the move and holidays that I just let it slide. But now I'm ready to get back on track. I actually have a couple of cooking goals for this year.

1)I want to make more food from scratch to further eliminate the processed stuff from our diets.

2) Once we get our stockpile in better shape, I plan to start doing some bulk cooking and participating in baking days/once a month cooking carnivals.

Given our stockpile is rather low at this point, I couldn't come up with a full menu plan for this week. I have some of my shopping for the week planned out but not all of it. Some of it will depend on what kind of deals I find in the stores as well. But here's what I have so far:

Breakfast: cereal, nuts, yogurt, pb&toast/waffles, muffins, fruit

Lunch: sandwiches or leftovers

Dinners:
Sloppy Joes, roasted new potatoes, carrots
Red Beans and Rice
Scrambled eggs, biscuits, canadian bacon

For more great menu ideas, stop by I'm An Organizing Junkie.

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Menu Plan Monday 11/16/09

I'm totally unorganized going into this week. I just put together a quick menu plan. It is subject to change.

Papa John's Pizza(school fundraiser)

Grilled tilapia, baked potatoes, salad(I enjoyed this so much last week I'm craving it again)

Chicken and wild rice casserole,salad

Grilled cheese sandwiches, raw veggies

Quinoa and Black Beans

For more menu inspiration stop by Orgjunkie.com.

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Menu Plan Monday 11/9/09

Keeping it simple this week so I don't have any recipes to share. Here's what we'll be eating.

Pizza
Tilapia, baked potatoes, salad
Grilled cheese sandwiches, soup
Pasta marinara, salad
Scrambled eggs, toast, fresh fruit

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Menu Plan Monday 10/12/09

It's a new week so it's time for a new menu. Before I get to this week's plan, I wanted to share a review and idea from this past week's menu. We tried this Saucy Pepper Steak for the first time this week.

I actually really liked it. It calls for barbeque sauce and I found that it gave the meal a nice kick. It was also quite inexpensive. I spent less than $5 for everything although I did forget to buy the onion and just used a green & red bell peppers. I already had the steak($1.31 manager's special), barbeque sauce(free), soy sauce(@ .05 cents) & rice(cost for this use @ .25 cents) on hand. It is definately a recipe that we will keep in our rotation in the future.

We had leftover meat mixture from the turkey joes we had for dinner earlier in the week. I decided to liven up the leftovers for Saturday's lunch. I heated up some of the mixture and spooned it into some crescent roll dough and rolled it up. It was a hit here and a nice change from a regular turkey joe.


Now onto what we're eating this week:

Chicken Pot Pie-Carried over from last week's menu.
Vegetarian Pasta e Fagioli
Chicken Quesadillas
Breakfast for dinner
Pizza

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Menu Plan Monday 10/5/09

I'm keeping it quick and easy this week as we have a few extra activities going. Here's what I'll be serving for dinner.

Grilled cheese sandwiches & soup
Saucy Pepper Steak-This is a carry over from last week. We changed the menu a bit mid-week.
Pasta marinara & salad
Turkey joes & baked fries
Chicken pot pie

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Menu Plan Monday 9/28/09

Okay, I'm simplifying things with my menu plans. It's a given that one night we'll eat leftovers and another night I'll just make sandwiches or whatever easy we're in the mood for otherwise known as short order night. So from now on I'll just be listing 5 dinners for my menu plan.

This week we'll be having:

Grilled turkey burgers and baked fries

Vegetarian Pasta E Faglioli-I tried this a couple of weeks back for the first time and it was delicious!

Chicken & black bean burritos

Breakfast for dinner

Saucy Pepper Steak with brown rice

Stop by I'm An Organizing Junkie for more great menu ideas.

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Menu Plan Monday 9/21/09

I'm trying to get back into the menu planning groove. I was rather uninspired for awhile but I know dinnertime goes so much better when it's all planned out. This is what I'll be serving up this week.

Monday-Chicken Pot Pie

Tuesday-Blueberry Pancakes & Bacon

Wednesday-Black Bean Burritos

Thursday-Stuffed Baked Potatoes

Friday-Easy Chicken Skewers w/ Peanut Sauce*, brown rice, salad

Saturday-Short Order Night

Sunday-Leftovers

*=New to us recipe

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Menu Plan Monday 7/13/09

Here's what we'll be eating this week:

Monday: Short Order night

Tuesday: Grilled burgers, fries & corn

Wednesday: BLT sandwiches

Thursday:Pasta marinara

Friday: Chicken wraps with pasta salad

Saturday: salmon, baked potatoes & salad

Sunday: leftovers

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Menu Plan Monday 7/6/09

On the menu this week:

Monday: Mac & cheese, raw veggies

Tuesday: Turkey tacos with fixin's

Wednesday: Teriyaki Chicken legs in crockpot with brown rice and veggies

Thursday: Leftovers

Friday: Chicken alfredo with salad

Saturday: Easy Asian Turkey Lettuce Wraps

Sunday: unplanned

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Menu Plan Monday

It's birthday week at our house. My oldest daughter's birthday is Tuesday and my birthday is Wednesday. I'll be off to the grocery store today to gather up ingredients for my daughter's ice cream cake and do the rest of my shopping. I usually grocery shop on Tuesday but we've got a full day planned.

Monday: leftovers

Tuesday: Grilled burgers, curly fries and corn on the cob with Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Ice Cream Cake(all at the request of the birthday girl) I'm adapting her cake recipe from this recipe. She wants cake on the bottom instead of cookies.

Wednesday: It's my birthday and it will only be me and my girls for dinner. I'm thinking I'll order carry-out pizza or take the girls out to Chick-fil-A.

Thursday: Meatball Calzones

Friday:Short Order Cook Night

Saturday:undecided-will come up with a simple 4th of July menu

Sunday: Grilled Chicken with quinoa pilaf

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