Falling from Pride

So, last week I decided to reactivate the blog and share my wonderful meal-planning knowledge with the universe.  Because I am the BEST at meal-planning. 

You're familiar with the term pride before a fall, right? 

I gapped out on one of the basic guidelines of meal-planning.   

CHECK WHAT'S IN THE HOUSE FIRST.

I was seduced by the promise of $2 bunches of broccoli when I didn't actually need broccoli.  All for the savings of $.99.   Not a big deal, but I hate food waste, so I made a quick change to Saturday's dinner to allow me to use up Brussels sprouts that were already in the house, and made a big batch of broccoli soup.  

Good thing I did, because by Friday night, as a result of some work-related chaos, things had gone sideways meal-wise, which leads to another meal-planning guideline:

LIFE IS UNPREDICTABLE.  SOMETIMES THE BEST PLAN IS TO FORGET THE PLAN.

I struggle with this one, mostly because of the previously mentioned aversion to food waste. 
This time, instead of completely abandoning the plan, I repeatedly adapted it throughout the week.  It went from this:

To this:

Instead of going out for dinner on Friday, we went out for lunch on Saturday and had broccoli soup both nights.  Sunday's salmon cakes, salad and beets were dropped (all the ingredients will keep), and Saturday's planned meal was subbed in.  And because Monday's Chinese greens made way more than anticipated, they made a reappearance on Thursday where they were refreshed with some peanut sauce and some stir-fried chicken breast.  (Again, everything from Thursday's planned meal could be easily postponed.  I just left the frozen items in the freezer.)

Because I had a plan to work with, we had home-cooked food every day.  No take-out.  No processed food.  No extra food expenses.  Overall, I'm pleased with how my almost-but-not-quite plan worked out. 

Smile

A flower.  In Canada.  In January.  What's not to smile at?  They're predicting snow for tomorrow.  

Gratitude

Spotted this at the foot of the centoaph while out walking on my lunch hour today.

Hope

This little leaf caught my eye while I was out walking.  The photo was an afterthought.  I had to talk myself into being the weirdo on the curb of a busy street, in the rain, taking pictures of a leaf.  

Meet Marvin

I understand that posts with animal pictures get more hits.  With that in mind, here's a gratuitous photo of our cat Marvin:

You're welcome!

If this isn't enough Marvin for you, you can follow him on Instagram.  He's @marvinmeowmeow.  

What's for Dinner?

This is what my morning looked like.

Actually, my morning looks like that about once a week. I go through the grocery-store flyer, I make my grocery list, and I plan our meals for the week.  This has been going on for years.  

It's so much a part of my routine I'm surprised when I find that other people don't plan their meals.  How do they decide what to cook? What if they don't have the right ingredients?  Don't they waste a lot of food?  How do they manage on busy days?  Isn't it expensive?

When people find out I plan our meals they have just as many questions for me as I have for them.  

Maybe if I share my routine here, it will answer some questions.

Let's start with this week.

I realize that much of this will only make sense to Hubby and me. That's OK.  We can work with that.  Let's start with some basics.

First, you see that my week doesn't include Friday.  That's intentional.  We go out for dinner or get take-out on Friday.   (And that's not because it was easier to divide my dry-erase board into 6 sections instead of 7.) 


At the top of each day is the dinner plan.  I include where to find the recipe when there is one.  So, for example, on Sunday I'm making a double batch of Meghan Telpner's salmon cakes.  (The leftovers will be frozen for later meals.) The recipe is in a "black binder" full of recipes I've printed/copied over the years.  We're also having a salad from the cookbook "Recipes from the Root Cellar", aka "Root Cellar" by Andrea Chesman. 

Because there is limited space on the dry-erase board, I use short forms for the cookbooks we'll need.  This week I'll also use "Red's 5-Ingredient Meals",aka "Red's", by Stephanie Kay,  on Wednesday. 

Under the meals there are starred notes.  In most cases it's what I need to prep for the next day's meals.  On Sunday I'll cut up the cabbage for Monday's dinner and thaw home-made chicken soup for our lunches.  In other cases, it's a reminder to do other kitchen/prep tasks.  On Saturday, if all goes according to plan, I'll make yogurt in my Instant Pot in the morning, and I'll prep muesli while the oven is warm from our chicken dinner.  (I prefer to lightly toast the oats/nuts/seeds for my muesli.)

That should be enough to get us started.  Let me know if you have any questions.  I'll share more details about what goes into each plan over the coming weeks.

(*Note:  I don't get anything for the links above.  They're there for your information.  Hope you find them useful.)

I'm Back!

Ummm...

Hi?

Yup, it's been a while. 

How have you been?

Me?  Well, I've been thinking about writing.

And food.

A lot.  

So I've decided to try to put some of my thoughts into words.  We'll see how it goes.

Stay tuned!