What's For Supper? {link-up}

Rather than attempt to write up all that I've been doing lately in a coherent blog post, I'm joining in Simcha Fisher's meal plan link-up.

Saturday
Mr. Husband made dinner that night since the kids and I had just returned from a visit to my parents in North Carolina. He made Two-Ingredient Crockpot Chicken, pasta olio e aglio, and steamed sugar snap peas. I sat on the couch while the kids tore through all of the toys they hadn't seen in a week, and talked about how tired I was.

What's For Supper? {link-up and a recipe}

Linking up with Simcha Fisher. I'm getting back on the horse of meal planning. Italian food is featured heavily this week, mostly because being a busy musician makes me feel more inclined to make family recipes that I could cook in my sleep.

Five Faves Wednesday: Advent

Before I had children, I worked at a Catholic school. A large part of my job during Advent was to prepare middle and high school students for a Vespers prayer service that featured performances from almost every musical and dance group in the school. Everything, from the music and dance, to the entrances and exits from the stage, to the invitation of alumni to join us in the end to sing "Night of Silence" (a partner song with "Silent Night"), had to be executed perfectly. Although the process put a considerable amount of stress on the students and teachers alike, each Vespers service was beautiful and reverent. There were other traditions that made the season special-- schoolwide"Advent Angels" (a way better variation on "Secret Santa"), and every year I'd use the last class before break to read my younger students "The Polar Express" and make elaborate paper snowflakes.

What's for Supper {pt. 3}

Linking up with Simcha Fisher.

Let's pretend that I actually planned our meals this week instead of what I really did, which was wing it with whatever needed to be used up out of the fridge.

Saturday
Despite our resolutions to junk our collapsing gas grill, a half-full tank of propane is a terrible thing to waste. More grilled chicken + barbecue sauce, pasta e olio, and nuked frozen veggies.

Sunday
Mr. Husband was working another late shift. Incidentally, we had a repeat of Friday's dinner, which was macaroni and cheese. I tried to alleviate the shame of my utter laziness by adding a few things from the refrigerator that really needed to be used up: spinach and bacon. Fancy schmancy.

Monday
At 1 PM, I realized that not only did I not have a dinner plan, but I had to be out of the door by 6:30 to get to my first orchestra rehearsal of the season. I made Two-Ingredient Crockpot Chicken with rice and broccoli. We were actually out of salad dressing, but I found a 1/3 full can of pizza sauce in the fridge that did the job nicely.

Tuesday
A red bell pepper in the fridge and a can of Ro-Tel in the pantry inspired me to improvise a Tex-Mex -ish chicken stir-fry. I cubed some boneless skinless chicken breasts, browned them in a pan, added chopped pepper and onion, then the Ro-Tel, heaped on cumin and chili powder, and served it over rice. It came out better than I thought it would.

Wednesday
Meatballs. My half-Italian heritage seems to come with a biological imperative that I make this dish at least once a month or I'll crave it constantly. That being said, based on what was in my pantry and the perfectly-browned-in-the-pan-meatballs gene skipping a generation, I had to deviate from the old family recipe.

Instead of using flavored bread crumbs, I pulverized our freezer cache of hamburger and hot dog buns.

Instead of pan-searing or broiling the meatballs briefly, I cooked them most of the way in the oven.

If I don't do this, my meatballs fall apart and my kids learn new four-letter words they shouldn't know.

I cooked the sauce separately and added the meatballs at the very end. Nobody complained.

Buon appetito.

Thursday
I tried to have an off week from it, but then some last-minute company had me resort to it. P I Z Z A. It's an easy way feed a bunch of people because it's easy to make, inexpensive, and everybody likes it. Including Sir Toddler, who is auditioning to be the next Little Ceasars guy.*

Friday
Enchiladas. I know, I know. They've been on every link-up. But I had decided a month ago to deliver an enchilada meal to a friend who's just had a baby, and the day for that was yesterday. So now I'm in the mood for them again.



*We took him to Uno's once and ordered him a kids' pizza. He ate all but one slice. HE'S TWO. The pizza was bigger than his head.

What's For Supper? part disappointing {link-up}

Again, I shall join in Simcha Fisher's link-up, even though our meal plan for the past week turned out very unexciting. When I proofread this post, I found an overuse of the words "easy" and "tasty," so I guess those were the themes of the week.

Saturday
Mr. Husband was working a 4-12 shift, so I took the night off. Sir Toddler and I ate hot dogs with frozen peas (as in, not defrosted), and Lady Infant feasted on steamed broccoli. If I give Sir Toddler cooked peas, he just mashes them, so "ice cold peas" work just fine for me. We had watermelon slices for dessert with a side of shame.

Sunday
I didn't actually cook. Mr. Husband's parents were given 12 lobsters from a family fisherman. FOR FREE. Sir Toddler ate a hamburger and veggie sticks dipped in hummus, and his parents and baby sister had lobster with baked potato wedges and corn on the cob. I offered Sir Toddler a bite, but he was too busy playing with his uncle's "car shoes," a.k.a. roller skates.

Monday
I didn't really cook this meal either, as I was frazzled from trying to purchase and install the bed rail. Mr. Husband grilled some chicken brushed with Sticky Fingers barbecue sauce and served it with pasta e olio and mixed veggies. Our grill is rusting and the frame is falling apart, so it might be the last grilled chicken we make for a while.

Tuesday
Chicken enchiladas, baby. I make these at least once every two weeks because they are just so easy to throw together and the ingredients are cheap. Again, I used the America's Test Kitchen recipe, except I always forget to buy the chiles and I never have fresh cilantro so I just leave them out. This time, however, I remembered to take a picture. I also cooked the chicken in the crockpot, instead of my usual boil-at-the-last-minute, because 95º weather makes for a miserable cooking environment. Even with central air conditioning.

Wednesday
Chicken and "dirty" rice with broccoli. This is a family recipe that is one of my favorites and a snap to throw together. Just sprinkle paprika, garlic powder, dried thyme, and salt on bone-in, skin-on chicken pieces (we usually make drumsticks and thighs), and put them in a broiler pan. Or in a rimmed baking pan if you don't have a broiler pan. Cook at 350º until the meat is just about done, then broil the skin.

My skin always gets burned because our oven has one of those crappy amazing broiler drawers. Not being able to see it cook + two small, mobile children underfoot = oopsie.

While you're cooking the chicken, make some rice. I usually sautée some chopped onion, then add 1 part rice and two parts chicken broth. When rice and chicken are done, plate your chicken and throw the rice in the chicken pan. Scrape up all that yummy fond and drippings and mix it into the rice. The more chicken you make, the "dirtier" and tastier your rice will be.

Thursday
Homemade pizza. Again, we tend to have pizza at least once every two weeks because it is easy and inexpensive. It can also make use of any little leftover bits of meat and vegetables for toppings.

Friday (today)
Mr. Husband is working another late shift at his per diem job after his salaried job. He has the car and the fridge is mostly stocked with condiments. I'm not sure what we're having for dinner, but this blueberry cake (muffin recipe in a 9"x13"x2" pan) I made for our playdate this morning may play a starring role.

Happy weekending.

What's for Supper? {link-up}

Linking up with Simcha Fisher.

Now that Lady Infant has started eating solids, we are burning through produce faster than a Salad Shooter, and our grocery expenditures are starting to go through the roof. Part of Mr. Husband's and my plan to address this issue is to go back to planning our meals for the week. This is something that I did very consistently when I was in grad school and was gone two nights a week, but haven't done consistently at all since Sir Toddler was born. This is what we've been eating this past week.

Saturday:  We had dinner guests that night with a planned Amerimexican theme (my second oldest brother-in-law makes amazing margaritas) so we had loaded nachos with pulled pork, refried beans, olives and cheese (duh) on top, and guacamole and salsa on the side. Since the meat sales weren't particularly promising that week, we actually purchased premade pulled pork in barbecue sauce. It was much better than I thought it would be. I don't know if throwing a bunch of ingredients on chips and tossing it in the oven until the cheese melts really qualifies as cooking, but the margaritas were made from scratch.

Sunday: Mr. Husband was out that night. Usually that's my cue to make breakfast for dinner, but I had some tomato sauce already made from earlier in the week, plus some zucchini to use up. You may be thinking that I did some fancy veggie spiralizing, but that is blasphemy to my half-Italian heritage so we had Market Basket brand tortellini with the sauce and baked zucchini (slice into half-coins, add olive oil, salt, and pepper, bake at 400 º until browned) on the side.

Monday: I planned on meatballs, but I realized rather late in the day that we were not only out of breadcrumbs, but we had also just used up all of the sandwich bread. So bolognese sauce it was, plus green beans and rigatoni.

Tuesday: Chicken enchiladas (with grocery store guacamole) from America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook. The great thing about this type of recipe is that we use fewer pieces of chicken when it's shredded and mixed into something rather than serving a chicken dish with sides.

Wednesday: Pasta with chicken and pesto. It was really the last hurrah of my basil plants; they look dreadful now. I used the pesto recipe from The Joy of Pasta minus the pine nuts because I never have those on hand. Again, I shredded chicken into the pasta to stretch our chicken supply a bit.

Thursday: Pizza. I never make more than three pizzas (we had a dinner guest) so I make the crusts from scratch in my stand mixer, but I discovered six months ago that it made no difference in cost to buy the little cans of sauce, pre-sliced pepperoni, and pre-grated mozzarella. I usually sautée some peppers and mushrooms for toppings and assemble.

Friday:  My meal plan was originally a rice and beans dish (an attempt to cut down on our meat expenditures by eating less of it) that involved cooking the beans all day in the slow cooker. I forgot to get the beans cooking in my rush to fit in a morning run/playground romp so we had Two-Ingredient Crockpot Chicken with lemon spaghetti and (previously frozen) peas.

I'll post the lemon spaghetti recipe later, as Lady Infant is currently using my legs and torso as a pull-up bar.

From the ATP Kitchen

Linking up with Dwija at House Unseen, because when I saw her post on easy slow cooker recipes I knew this link-up was right up my alley. Sometimes I whip up an elaborate slow cooker recipe from America's Test Kitchen or The Italian Slow Cooker that involves lots of prep work browning, sauteeing, deglazing, and all kinds of fancy footwork. And sometimes, at two o'clock in the afternoon while a non-napping toddler is at my kneecaps and Queen Baby is on my hip being her queeniest, I realize I don't have it in me to make anything fancy for dinner, and I throw this together to avoid an SOS call for takeout later.

I realize now I should have typed "slow cooker" instead of "crockpot." Do I get a royalty payment from Rival now?

Or Newman's Own?

This is hardly even deserving of the title of a recipe, but here it is.  Put chicken pieces in slow cooker (here we have bone-in, skin-on thighs, but you could use any chicken pieces). Pour salad dressing on top. I've only ever used oil-based dressings like Italian, balsamic vinaigrette, Greek, etc. I have my doubts that it would come out all that well with, say, a blue cheese dressing, but you are certainly welcome to try it. 

Don't bother to center the photos.

If your slow cooker is less than 1/2 full like mine, put some foil on top.

I don't know why I took a picture of it. Or why I posted the picture. Sue me.

Depending on how much time you have before dinner, you can cook it for 6 hours on low or 3 hours on high. I would add a half hour to the cooking time if your pieces are frozen like mine.

Ta-da.

And there you have it! If you're feeling extra fancy, you can make a side salad, quarter some red potatoes and put them under the chicken, or use the broth you'll have at the end of the cooking time to make some rice, or crisp the skin in a pan with a little oil once it's cooked. Or not. This is supposed to be an easy recipe, after all.