OYOL Week 10

Week 10 addresses meal planning. Finally an assignment I am already doing (and a post I had already written) that won't take time to implement before reporting about! I've been meal planning for several years and the effort is definately worth it. I try to do a cooking day each month for two reasons- I don't have to put as much thought into what to make (once the cooking day plan is made) or as much time into making it. Here is what I made last week:


Breakfast:
2- Buttermilk Oatmeal Bread

Lunch:
2- Buffalo Chicken
2- Spinach Rice Casserole
8- Black Bean Burgers
8- cooked chicken breasts

Dinner:
2 + 1 lunch portion- Italian Chili
2-Chinese Barbecue Chicken
1-Balsamic Beef
1-Balsamic Chicken
2-Teriyaki Beef
1-Crockpot Chicken Fajitas

Red Sauce in the crocpot that was used to make:
2-Meat Sauce with homemade turkey sausage
2-Meat Sauce with turkey sausage, peppers, and onions (to be used as a pizza topping)
2-Plain Red Sauce

I think I've been striving for more variety than is necessary. I'm trying to find ways to make meal planning easier. In the past few months I've developed themes for breakfast and lunch and this month did the same for dinner. It really helps when I find myself thinking that I don't know what to cook.

Breakfast:
Sun: protein bars/shakes/smoothies
Mon: eggs
Tue: protein bars/shakes/smoothies
Wed: oatmeal/cream of wheat
Thurs: protein bars/shakes/smoothies
Fri: eggs
Sat: cottage cheese pancakes/waffles

Lunch:
salads- 4 times (2 types twice/week)
leftovers/sandwiches (2 times/week)
bean and rice casserole/black bean burgers- (1 time/week)

Dinner:
Sun: Loaded Chicken Salad or Tuna Salad (I try not to cook on Sun)
Mon: Soup
Tue: Beef
Wed: Dinner at Church
Thurs: Fish
Fri: Pizza
Sat: Chicken

In coming up with my cooking day plan I picked two recipes to make for each theme and we'll eat it twice. This really made the freezer cooking plan easy to come up with. I've already strayed from eating the theme night meal on the day I specified, but in the end it doesn't matter. We're eating, I haven't been cooking as much, and I know the meals we'll be eating this month!

Nov Freezer Cooking

I'm doing a super simple couple of hours of freezer cooking today. We'll be out of town for Thanksgiving and since we're almost a week into the month, I don't need as many meals. Here's what I'm working on right now:

*cooked chicken- I put split breasts in the crockpot with some chicken broth, season salt, pepper, and garlic powder and set it to cook for 6 hours on medium. This chicken will be used in salads mostly.

*lime tacos- since the crockpot was in use and I am working with split breasts rather than boneless, I decided to try boiling it in water that has some chicken base added along with the chili powder and lime juice. I will see how it tastes when it comes out and possibly add more if it needs it. I will probably leave the corn out since I don't have any and use it as a quesadilla filling instead of as tacos.

*sweet potatoes- several are baking in the oven for Sweet Potato Streusel muffins. I'm not sure when I'll make them but thought they sounded good. Since the boys are still reluctant to eat veggies, I will just hide them.

*Italian Sausage Sauce- I usually buy Italian turkey sausage but neither Food Lion or Walmart had any, so I bought two pounds of ground turkey and used this recipe. It didn't have quite as much flavor as I hoped so I might use this one next time. After cooking it I added a little more Italian seasoning, pepper, garlic powder, and salt. I added three cans of stewed Italian tomatoes that I pureed and a couple pinches of sugar and simmered. I had enough for three meals. Tonight and another night this month we'll have zucchini crust pizza. I'll top it with the sausage sauce and cheese. Later this month I'm going to add some peppers and onions to it and serve it over spaghetti squash.

*I have two whole chickens. I'll freeze one and put the other in the crockpot before church in the morning. I'll cook it on high and we'll have roasted chicken and salad for lunch (as long as the power doesn't go out which happened last time I did this)! I'll make loaded chicken salad (chicken, mayo, celery, apples, raisins, pepper, lemon juice) for dinner and then freeze any chicken that is leftover. Later this week I hope to make sausage patties and brown bag burrito filling.

On a random note, I thought I'd share some of the recipes I found earlier this week. They were all a result of my desire to not go grocery shopping. While we ate well, I realized I should have just gone shopping because I wasted so much time searching for things to make.

*Thai Honey Peanut Chicken. Along with that I sauteed some squash, zucchini, onion, and cooked brown rice in sesame oil and added some fresh ginger. Anthony and I both really liked it and Graham even at the chicken by the handful (still working on using a fork with him).

*Reed couldn't have the above dish because of the peanut butter in it. I found a recipe for zucchini bread that didn't have eggs or milk since we were out of both. I cut this recipe in half and made mini muffins with it. They were too sweet but a huge hit nonetheless.

*For breakfast I made three servings of oatmeal according to the containers directions and added a couple of tablespoons of brown sugar, peanut butter, coconut oil, and coconut flakes. Super tasty!

*Thanks to my mom's suggestion I used some ground beef to make Swedish meatballs that I baked in the oven. I mixed a can of cream of mushroom soup, milk, white cooking wine, garlic powder, and nutmeg to make a sauce for them. I served it over spaghetti and we liked this as well (except Reed who refuses to try spaghetti). We have half of it in the freezer to enjoy again soon!

I'm Done

Ahhh! I'm done and very pleased. 8 hours of cooking (and being mom too) produced:

5 bags cooked chicken for salads
1 bag cooked chicken for chicken salad
1 buffalo chicken
2 sausage
2 fajita
2 lime chicken tacos
1 mushroom steak kabobs (minus mushrooms)
2 spinach rice casserole
1 south of the border pie
2 1/2 minestrone soup
2 tomato soup
2 chili
2 Italian grilled chicken
1 marinated steak
1 chicken for Parmesan crusted chicken
2 cooked rice

11 lunches and 16 dinners and to top it off all of the dishes are done!

Freezer Cooking- South Beach Style

Since we started dieting in June, I have not been able to take advantage of freezer cooking. Oh how I've missed it! Since I've figured out what works for us and fits into the diet's parameters, I'm going to take a stab at freezer cooking- South Beach style. I've had lots of ideas running through my head on what I wanted to cook so in an effort to get them all together here's my list:

Basics
brown rice for Spinach Rice Casserole and South of the Border Pie (will post recipe since my mom wanted it)
black beans (need to soak first)
bacon (for salads)
cooked chicken for salads and mustard chicken

Meals
chili (will post recipe)
tomato soup
minestone soup
lime chicken taco (cooked last night so they just need salsa and freeze)
crockpot fajitas
turkey sausage

Marinades (mix marinades, dump in bag with meet and freeze)
Italian grilled chicken (will grill when we eat)
beef kabobs (just the meat, will add mushroom when we eat them)
buffalo chicken (for salad- pour wing sauce on chicken and freeze)

I better stop blogging and get started! If I accomplish half of what's on the list I'll be happy:)