Four.Twenty.Eight

Menu Plan Monday with Bonus Recipe!

My menu plan fell apart somewhat last week (as you will see below).  This week's menu plan is brought to you by Sammy.  I asked him to brainstorm with me what to make this week.  He came up with the whole thing and did a good job, too!

1. Salmon with creamy caper sauce, zucchini & squash with parmesan - This fell apart last week.  We did take-out one night because I got a terrible allergy attack and cooking was not on my agenda.  Spring/Fall allergy sufferers, do you feel my pain?

2. Bison burgers with tomato and avocado, wheat buns, chips on the side

3. One-Pot Quick Hoppin' John (See recipe below - a one-pot meal that uses mild Italian sausage, brown rice and black-eyed peas - a Cajun-styled meal) - this will be a two-night meal, Sammy loves this meal.

 

One-Pot Quick Hoppin' John

Ingredients
1 pound bulk mild Italian sausage, hot or regular (I buy whole sausages and remove the casing, I buy chicken sausages, but typical is pork)
1 cup chopped onion
1 cup chopped green pepper
1 cup chopped celery
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 (14 oz) can chicken broth
1 cup converted brown rice, such as Uncle Ben's Fast & Natural
salt to taste
½ t black pepper
½ t red pepper flakes (or to taste, this can be spicy!)
1 bay leaf
2 (14 oz) cans black-eyed peas, rinsed & drained

Procedure
Saute the sausage, onion, green pepper, celery, and garlic in a large pot over medium-high heat. Drain and return to the pot. Add chicken broth, rice, salt, peppers, and bay leaf. Bring to boil, reduce heat, and simmer 15 minutes, stirring ocassionally.

Drain and rinse black-eyed peas, then add to the pot and simmer an additional 5 to 10 minutes, until liquid is absorbed into the rice.

Serve with Tabasco or other hot sauce.

Menu Plan Monday

It always helps me stay on my menu track if I put it in writing!  Here's my plan for the week:

1. Pork Tenderloin, Green Beans with Toasted Pecans & Wheat Biscuits
2. Adobo Lime Chicken Tacos (SUCH an easy recipe that I will share soon) - 2-night meal
3. Salmon with Creamy Caper Sauce, Zucchini & Squash with Parmesan

For breakfast on the go: Ezekiel Cinnamon Raisin Toast

For lunch at the office: Salmon salad & crackers, frozen Evol burritos or this Kashi frozen meal I still have in the work freezer

Menu Plan Monday

It has been a while since I've shared my weekly menu plan.  Here's what I have on the docket this week:

1. Hatch Chile & Pecan-Stuffed Pork Tenderloin (Sammy wanted this one at Central Market and the butcher said it didn't freeze well, so darn it all if we have to eat it this week!) We are pairing it with some stir-fried asparagus and the infamous wheat biscuits.
2. Healthy Soft Tacos (We eat this a lot, but it is just so darned easy, and it works into two nights worth of meals.)
3. Hatch Chile Pre-marinated chicken breast sandwiches (on wheat buns topped with tomato & avocado) with baked chips on the side

Yes, it appears we are overloading on the flavors of the Southwest this week, but I guess it's a good thing we like it!  We kind of go nuts on stocking up the freezer during the Hatch Chile Festival that Central Market takes part in every year.

I slacked a bit on my planning, so it was necessary to use the freezer and try to keep it easy.  Apparently my freezer and my recipe database are chock-full of Southwestern-style recipes.  Ah, well, this is what I came up with and it will probably work just fine.

Menu Plan Monday

The menu plan will be cut shorter this week, and that will be good for the budget!  Today was a relaxed, eating out day, and Friday will be pack-the-bags day for the next week's COLORADO trip, so that amounts to dinner plans for only Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.  Here's what I have planned this week!

1. "Bruschetta" style turkey burgers (from the freezer) with Chip-Ins chips

2. Leftover beef & chicken fajitas

3. Either grilled turkey tenderloin or grilled garlic-pesto marinated chicken breasts (both from the freezer) with a veggie to be determined

Menu Plan Monday

Sticking to the budget!  I would say we are doing pretty well reigning in the big, bad grocery budget.  This week, like I mentioned in this post, we are partially raiding the freezer.  I'll notate that on my menu item.

My meals for the week of 6/27/11-7/1/11:

1. Grilled butterfly pork chops (freezer) with grilled broccoli and wheat biscuits (seasoning for chops & broccoli to be determined)

2. Chicken Piccata Pasta Toss (2 night meal)

3. Ground bison (freezer) crunchy tacos with Uncle Ben's Mexican Recipe Rice (pantry)

For the tacos, I will create my own taco seasoning.  I just can't do store-bought seasoning packets, they have about 2 days worth of sodium in them.  My taco seasoning will be a mixture of standard chili powder, authentic New Mexican chili powder, garlic powder, onion powder, black pepper, cumin, oregano and sea salt.

Menu Plan Monday

Okay folks.  I'm going to get back to my blog.  Here is my attempt.  Hope it meets all your expectations - or not.  :-)

I thought I would start sharing my weekly menu plan.  Maybe by sharing, I can keep on my weekly meal track!  Sammy and I found out lately that we were blowing our weekly grocery budget out of the water.  By approximately double, sometimes more.  It was really bad, and opened our eyes, so we have committed to trying to keep our weekly grocery budget around $100-120 including breakfasts and lunches.  It can be a real challenge.  Eating healthy is hard to keep in a budget and it's hard for us with our work schedule.  However, I have devised ways to keep the cost down.  A couple of ways:

1. Plan weekly meals in advance (including breakfast and lunch).  It is easier to stay on track with a plan.  Our breakfasts and lunches are either on-the-go or at work.  It is often the easy way out to go to the deli for lunch or grab a bagel on the way for breakfast, but a commitment to buying breakfast and lunch items in advance really helps the budget.  This week, I bought a package of Ezekiel Cinnamon Raisin English Muffins and I keep a small tub of butter at work.  Sammy bought Van's Frozen Waffles for his breakfast.  For lunch, I bought bread and chips and plan on using some peanut butter and jelly I already have in the work fridge for PB&J sandwiches.  Sammy will be doing Evol frozen microwave burritos.

2. For one weekly meal plan per month, raid the freezer and raid the pantry.  My theory is that one week per month, we can save a huge hunk of the budget by essentially buying very little at the store.  At any given time, I may have a partial box of pasta, multiple canned goods, or other various half-used items in the pantry.  I may also have several Food-Savered and frozen meat items stashed in the freezer.  I can find recipes to utilize what I have on hand.  I plan on using the "raiding" method to cut the budget drastically at least one week per month.

3. Eat leftovers.  I often plan one or more meals a week that I know will yield leftovers.  The leftovers can make what I call a "two-meal recipe" or they can go to work for lunch the next day.  It saves on the budget and time when you can make recipes that will yield leftovers.

4. Buy meats and produce when they have specials and use the freezer.  I will openly admit that I am a meat and produce snob, and that can be pricey.  I like my Central Market and Whole Foods.  There are just some things I won't skimp on, and that is okay with me for the most part.  With that said, I always grab the Central Market Weekly Specials out of the junk mail flyer and look for what is on special.  Sometimes they have excellent meat specials, like $2-3 off per pound on pork tenderloins.  When these come around, I either stock up, Foodsaver and freeze or I will plan a meal around what is on sale.  It may bump the budget up that week, but I know it will balance out in the future.

So, with all of those ideas, I hope to keep my budget more in check.  I will try to provide an update in the future to see if our grocery budget has dropped.  For now, here is this week's dinner meal plan.  We typically treat Friday as our dinner-out day, so I plan for 4 meals per week.  I don't set any meal to a particular day, I play it by ear and see what works best that particular day.

1. Grilled turkey tenderloin (2 in a package, I Foodsavered/froze one), strawberry & blueberry fruit salad with vanilla greek yogurt & cinnamon

2. Grilled chicken breasts, this spicy pasta salad

3. Naan bread pizzas (2 nights) - Wheat Naan bread, chopped bell pepper, jalapeno olives & nitrate-free pepperoni