Weekley Menu 9/17 – 9/23

Posted on September 17, 2012 by Amy

Check out the organization on Amy! I have been in organization mode lately. I rearranged my short/tank top drawer last week, put all of Kamryn’s school work from last year in a binder (yes, I keep everything – even the little pictures her friends made her), started new binders for this year, categorized my recipe binder and organized all of my PTA ~~crap~~ stuff.

When I am organized, I do my weekly menu. When I’m not organized, we eat out. I’m hitting up skinnytaste.com again – it treated me well last week.

Monday – Chicken Piccata – I don’t think I have had this before, but there was a comment on the recipe that said chicken piccata isn’t usually breaded. Oh well – I like breaded stuff better and I have breadcrumbs so it’s going to be breaded. I don’t, however have capers and I don’t know if I’ll make it to the store today.

Tuesday – Tacos/Tostadas – This was Kamryn’s choice. That girl loves tacos and so do I. I recently started buying tostadas and melting cheese on them. I love it. Anyway, I have a bag of tostadas already so I most likely won’t buy the shells.

Wednesday – Vietnamese Shaking Beef (Bo Luc Lac) – This sounds intriguing. The recipe suggests serving it over a bed of greens and tomatoes. I’ll probably do that for me and Ryan and let the kids have it over rice.

Thursday – It’s Ryan’s birthday. He gets to choose where we go to eat.

Friday – Cheesy Zucchini Enchiladas – I’m really trying to get at least one vegetarian meal or more a week. I know I could never go 100% vegetarian, but I don’t need to eat meat everyday either. These looked pretty good and my kids like zucchini.

Saturday – Crock Pot Buffalo Chicken Lettuce Wraps – Another Kamryn choice. It’s football season and what better than some kind of wing related entrée? Kamryn loves bleu cheese as well and when she saw the picture of a wrap with a pile of bleu cheese on it, she was sold.

Sunday – Pizza – I haven’t made pizza for awhile because it’s been so hot and I can always eat pizza.

Happy eating!

Weekly Menu 6/25 – 7/1

Posted on June 25, 2012 by Amy

After my run to the store for pizza supplies yesterday, I made sure to grab the stuff for tonight’s dinner. I also went to Costco this morning to get some other supplies and decided to rearrange my whole scheduled week of meals with what I had on hand and what I picked up the last couple of days.

Monday – Tacos – Regular, run of the mill tacos with the mix and ground turkey. Nothing special.

Tuesday – We’re going to the fair! I’ll be sure to post about all the crap that we eat.

Wednesday – We have a playdate with friends.

Thursday – Patty Sandwiches – These are named after my friend, Patty who introduced me to these a few months ago. Take some good crusty bread and toast it, top it with a layer of pesto, mozzarella, tomato and then drizzle some balsamic vinegar over the top and top with the other slice of bread. It’s very simple, but REALLY good.

Friday – Costco Chinese Chicken Salad – If you have not had this yet, you have to try it. It will easily feed two adults and 2 kids. All you have to do is get the lettuce (one bag of the pre-washed stuff or cut up your own).

Saturday – Pizza is on the menu, but I may end up switching that up since we had it last night and I just ate the leftovers for lunch.

Sunday – We are going to a pool party at our friend’s house.

This week is a little thrown together because of the activities we have going on, but if I didn’t plan something on the days we didn’t have anything scheduled, I can almost guarantee that we would be going out to eat on those days and that would make it a really bad dinner week.

Pizza Pizza!!

Posted on June 24, 2012 by Amy

This afternoon we were watching a show about the best pizza places in the country so I had to go off our weekly menu and make some pizza tonight instead.

The convincing pie that had me back at the store picking up a few things was the Mac ‘n Cheese pizza. I have been wanting to make this for awhile, but always thought I had to make the mac ‘n cheese first and that was a little too much prep. I wasn’t going to throw some Kraft crap on my pizza, it was going to have to be made from scratch.

Mac ‘n cheese pizza isn’t unique to one pizzeria. I have had it at a couple of different places and it’s pretty standard – cheese and pasta and usually some kind of white sauce. I thought maybe an alfredo sauce would be good, but then that can be kind of heavy and rich so I put my mac ‘n cheese pizza on the back burner until I saw the show today.

I don’t remember the name of the pizzeria that they were featuring, but the guy making it said it was the easiest pizza they made. He started with a crust (duh), sprinkled a little mozzarella on top of that, squirted some crème fraîche on top, then added plain noodles and put it in the oven. When it came out after about 8 minutes, that was when he topped it with cheddar cheese.

That seemed easy enough. I have never had crème fraîche that I know of, but whenever I hear someone mention it I think of the South Park episode when Randy treats the Food Network like porn. As it turns out, crème fraîche is just like sour cream, but from what I read, it won’t separate or curdle when it’s heated. That was worth the $4.99 I paid.

You can also make your own crème fraîche, but it involves intentionally letting some cream and buttermilk spoil on your countertop for about 12 hours. I don’t think I could bring myself to eat it after knowing how long it sat out. I prefer to let someone do the spoiling for me.

Here is the finished product:

Mac ‘n Cheese Pizza

My only complaint was that I didn’t cook it long enough. It was good, but it could gone about another 5 minutes in the oven.

I also had to make a mashed potato pizza. That one turned out perfect!

Mashed Potato Pizza

Weekly Menu 5/29 to 6/3

Posted on May 29, 2012 by Amy

This week, as well as last, has been a bit crazy with lots of activities and goings on. I’ll give you the menu as I have it written, but I don’t think we’ll get most of the meals in this week.

Tuesday – Pasta W/ Meat Sauce – I have about 8 billion 3/4 used boxes and bags of pasta. You would think I would learn to just buy the same kind of pasta so I can easily make the unused portions, but that would be far too simple.

Wednesday – We are planning a little afternoon trip to Legoland tomorrow so we will either still be there at dinner time or on our way home in which case we’ll probably pick something up.

Thursday – I have a going away dinner for a friend who is moving across the country. I have pizza on the menu, but in lieu of making it from scratch, I’ll suggest Ryan orders it from somewhere.

Friday – Orange Chicken – I love this chicken so much, but I’m trying to figure out a way to being a little more efficient when making it. It’s a little time consuming, but it’s so good, it’s worth it.

Saturday – Ham & Cheese Turnovers – These are really good and the kids love them. You really can’t go wrong. Ham – good. Cheese – good. Bread – gooood.

Sunday – Gnocchi W/ Sage Butter – I haven’t made this for years and I kind of did my own improvisation of it. I tried to grow a little container garden and the sage was the only thing that actually produced anything. I kind of fried the leaves in butter and they were delicious. They get nice and crispy. I may try doing that again instead of using the dried sage like the recipe calls for.

Weekly Menu

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Amy

As promised, here is the menu for the week. I just realized that I haven’t tried a lot of these recipes, but they were given rave reviews online.

Monday – Chicken Corn Chowder – I made this last night and it was really good. I had picked up some of the cooked, grilled chicken at Costco over the weekend so I used that and it made this one of the fastest soups I have ever made. The good thing about this was that it was fairly light so I could see eating this in the summer. You don’t actually add cream to it, but blend the milk and some of the corn together so it’s not a heavy, cream-based soup.

Tuesday – Fish with Sautéed Spinach and Tomatoes – This was a recipe that I made up. I saute fresh spinach with garlic and throw either fresh or canned tomatoes in with it. As far as the fish goes, any kind of fish will do, but I usually use some kind of white fish. I have baked it, fried it in a pan with a little cooking spray and cooked it in a foil pack – it doesn’t really matter. This is probably the healthiest meal I make. The only other thing I may do is make some quinoa and mix all the spinach, tomatoes and quinoa together and throw the fish on top.

Wednesday – Pizza – I have some left over pepperoni from the last time I made pizza so I’ll use that and I’ll probably make my mashed potato pizza again. The pizza link will take you to the dough recipe I use. One suggestion if you make your own pizza – use real mozzarella. I think cheese makes the pizza.

Thursday – Turkey-Veggie Meatballs – I have not tried these yet, but they seem like a good way to get some extra vegetables in our meals. I don’t find ground turkey to be full of flavor, but unless I used 80/20 ground beef, the lower fat beef isn’t that great either so I might as well eat something a bit leaner and healthier, right?

Friday – Curried Chicken Salad – I always confuse curry and cumin and I while I like them both, I think cumin smells like B.O. so when I saw this I hesitated because I couldn’t remember what one made me gag when I smelled it. Luckily, it’s not the curry. I’m a little curious to see how the kids like this. I’ll be using more of that cooked, grilled chicken for this so I don’t have to actually cook a chicken breast.

Saturday – Potstickers with Edamame and Springrolls – This is kind of a tapas dinner. I love appetizers. I don’t know what it is, but I have been known to order 2 or 3 or 4 appetizers for dinner at a restaurant. The potstickers are another purchase from the Costco trip.

Sunday – Pork Tenderloin w/ Gorgonzola Sauce – I am not a fan of most kinds of pork unless it’s cured and smoked; AKA, bacon. It always comes out dry and and bland. Yuck. I’m usually good with a tenderloin, but throw some Gorgonzola cheese on it?? Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m going to like that. My kids love blue cheese too.

I’m looking forward to eating all my dinners this week! It also helps that 2 of the 5 pounds that crept on over the last couple of months magically disappeared after my run. I know, it’s only water weight, but humor me.

Extra Cheese Is Two Dollars

Posted on April 19, 2012 by Amy

Whenever I eat pizza I think of the movie, Do The Right Thing. I haven’t seen the movie in years, but I can’t order a slice and not think of Radio Raheem saying “Two slices.” Ahhhh, Spike Lee and the 90’s.

I used to consider myself a pizza purist. By that I mean I stuck to traditional American toppings – pepperoni, mushrooms, black olives, green peppers and onions. I’ll eat any of those toppings in any combination. I don’t like sausage and Canadian Bacon is OK but I prefer pepperoni.

There are those that swear by the quirky pizzas like Buffalo Chicken, Bacon Cheeseburger, Mac-n-Cheese or any other fusion pie, but when I get a craving for pizza, I want a traditional crust, sauce and toppings.

Last month I went out for my friend, Janis’ birthday. We went to Urbn Pizza for drinks and dinner (it’s so trendy they don’t even put the a in Urban). I checked out the menu before I went to see what kind of deliciousness I would be dining on. All I saw were a lot of strange topping combinations which were undoubtedly wonderful, but there was not one traditional pizza option on the menu.

And then I saw the Mashed Potato. The description was White pie w/ mozz, pancetta, fresh mozz, parm. Now we’re cookin’ with fire. That pizza was soooooo damn good. There was a perfect amount of cheese, pancetta and potato.

I love a carb overload when it involves potatoes. One of my favorite things to eat with Thanksgiving leftovers is mashed potato sandwiches. Something about carb on carb makes me happy.

Tonight I made my own mashed potato pizza. I didn’t use all the fancy ingredients like they did at Urbn Pizza. I started with my favorite crust recipe. This is the best crust I have ever made. It’s super easy and you don’t need to have a mixer, even though it says it in the instructions. I just use a wooden spoon. I like to give my crust a little pre-bake before I put my topping on so it’s a little firmer. Oh, and don’t bake it at 350 degrees – jack it up to 450.

Once my crust had cooked for about 5 minutes, I topped it with 2 servings of instant mashed potatoes, a cheddar/mozzarella cheese mix and some bacon. I threw it back in the oven for about 7 or 8 minutes and then topped it with a little olive oil drizzle.

I forgot to take a picture when it was still whole.

This was fantastic! I ate half of it myself. Ryan made the mistake of leaving a piece behind and going for the pepperoni pizza I made. I, of course, ate it and then he claimed it was a test and I failed. I told him he failed – we have been married for almost 9 years. If he thinks I’m going to pass up eating all of my favorite foods on one convenient little square of dough, he is mistaken.

One delicious serving suggestion was throwing a little hot sauce on top.