Tuesday: Wednesday: Jambalaya
Thursday: Lentil Stew
Friday: Sunburgers and Kale Chips
Saturday: Risotto, Sauteed Peppers with Onions and Bok Choy, Roasted Brussel Sprouts, Carrots and Beets with Greek Salad, Biscuits and Apple Crisp with Ice Cream
Sunday: Mushroom Soup, Caesar Salad and Biscuits
Pasta - Dave Cooked
So, I'm still cleaning like crazy. It has turned into something of a spring cleaning which I guess on the up side is good because I'll have it done ahead of time. Of course, by the time spring rolls around we will have abandoned all the new "homes" I've created for things and will be piling it all on top of the fridge again. But, that's alright, the point is that is was done at some point, right? Nobody actually expects that it'll stay that way.
Harper has been dying to wash the floors (crazy kid). Today she comes down and says to me, "We better clean these floors today mom, cause dere perdy derdy!"
Recipe
I cleaned all day and so I planned peanut butter sandwiches for supper, maybe a stick of carrot on the side to balance it out. When we got home from skating I went running and left Dave to make the sandwiches. He instead scoured the house and made a lovely pasta salad instead, I love it when that happens! There was no recipe (and when I went back to see, no picture either), he made some brown rice pasta and tossed it with tuna, olives, shredded mozzarella cheese, tomatoes, cucumber and sun dried tomatoes. Basically whatever he could find in the fridge, he tossed it all with a little olive oil. It was quite good, a tad dry so I added a splash of balsamic to mine, perfect.
Sauteed Garlic Shrimp, Asparagus, Roasted Veggies and Potatoes with Tomatoes/Basil Salad
Happy Valentine's Day! I know last year I made heart pizzas and said that this year I would do something fun and share it the week before, clearly I was crazy! This year, I could be found at the grocery store at 8:30 last night wondering around with a friend trying to find a book or token of something for my kids and figure out what I could make for them for dinner. I am a procrastinator, there I said it - I've been meaning to admit it for awhile but haven't gotten around to it, yet it has been gnawing at the back of my mind for quite some time now. I was considering going without any real Valentine's day hoopla, but before Hannah went to bed she was frantically wrapping little gifts she had made for each of us and I broke at the last minute. I got the girls each a little book that I knew they would love, which made me feel good and bad all at the same time.
I'm not going to get all down on the commercialism of this "holiday". We're all people with free will, do what you want for Valentine's day (although, that's impossible when your kid would then be the only kid in the class without a backpack full of little paper valentines that he/she's painstakingly stayed up late writing their name on), but I did want to make a change this year. Every year we usually buy the girls a little book or something. I try to avoid giving them chocolate on a day where they will already get cookies and candies from school parties. Sometimes, like this year, I give them each one little chocolate too (so I buy a bag of them, Dave and I eat the rest the night before while watching T.V. and save two for the girls...perhaps I've said too much).
Hannah's school sent home a letter at the beginning of the month asking each child to donate $3.50 of their own money and in lieu of exchanging valentines they bought a school box to send to Africa and made a special valentine to put in the box for the recipient. I was thrilled! This made me think; I've always kind of looked at this holiday as either a) a reason to watch sappy movies and indulge in chocolate b) a justification for Dave and I to go out and spend money at a restaurant in either the six weeks leading up or following Valentine's Day or c) a day to do fun, cute little heart shaped things with the kids, but never a day to actually celebrate and teach about love. This is why I felt good and bad about buying the books. I had wanted to start putting meaning to this day, and instead of buying something for the girls planning a family activity and doing something nice for someone else, but alas that procrastination thing! Valentine's day snuck up on me and I realized the night before that I had not spoken to anyone about my plans. By the time dinner rolled around, Hannah was actually sick and the whole idea kind of got put on the back burner. So, next year I will (hopefully, hopefully, hopefully) take this holiday and put some meaning into it for my family.
Recipe
Now that I've rambled on forever, I chose a dinner that was not heart shaped but, some of the girls favorite food.
I sauteed the shrimp in a little olive oil and garlic. Cut up potatoes (Harper's fav), Brussel Sprouts (Hannah's fav) and carrots (mmm...well, we just seem to have a lot of them right now) tossed them in olive oil and a little salt and pepper and roasted them in the oven at 400F until the potatoes were nice and crispy. I steamed the asparagus and tossed together some tomatoes and basil. In the end Dave worked late and Hannah got sick after school so Harper and I sat together and had a lovely valentine's day dinner!
We topped it all off with sliced strawberries, which I had sliced this afternoon and added a little sprinkle of sugar, a splash of balsamic and tiny pinch of black pepper (trick I got from my mom who got from...somewhere), and whipped cream.
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| I may have topped mine with a little splash of Khalua. |
I kept Hannah home from school today, she seemed completely better but had been up all night sick. Her and I were dragging a little this morning from being up during the night so much yet she refused to nap because she was feeling better, so it was a bit of a touch and go day. The most amazing thing happened this evening though, Dave worked late and around four o'clock the girls disappeared upstairs and played up there happily without fighting or getting into anything they weren't suppose to for two hours. When they would notice me checking on them they didn't stop and follow me downstairs AND when I went up to get them for dinner they came down right away without arguing!
Recipe
We had lots of leftover shrimp so I made jambalaya with what I had left in the fridge.
Olive oil
3 baby orange peppers, chopped
2 small onions, chopped
3 cloves of garlic
1 28oz can of tomatoes
1 cup of veggie stock
2 cups of minute brown rice
1 bay leaf
1/2 cup steamed edamame beans
1 cup shrimp
In a pot put rice, veggie stock, 1 cup of canned tomato juice (reserving tomatoes) and bay leaf and cook according to rice package directions.
Heat a glugg of olive oil in a large pan and saute onion for five minutes, add the peppers and garlic and cook until onions and peppers are soft. Add in the tomatoes and breaking them up, the rice (when ready) and simmer on low for 20 minutes, if shrimp is raw add them in and cook until they're cooked stirring frequently. As I was using leftover shrimp I added them in with the edamame beans at the very end taking it off the heat and stirring until they warmed.
Lentil Stew
A friend of mine popped by this evening to watch some of the hockey game, she showed up with a bottle of red wine in one hand and freshly made brownies in the other! N'uff said, clearly she's the BEST!
Recipe
Always popular around here, quick and easy to boot, find it here.
Sunburgers and Kale Chips
Well, today before the girls got in the tub Harper peed in the potty. I think it surprised her, it shocked me. It also pretty much sealed the fate of our day. She did really well for her first day and as I was putting her to bed to she said to me, "I"M BIG! I'm sooo proud of myself!"
Recipe
We had these from this post with kale chips.
Risotto, Sauteed Peppers with Onions and Bok Choy, Roasted Brussel Sprouts, Carrots and Beets with Greek Salad, Biscuits and Apple Crisp with Ice Cream
This morning Hannah woke up beside me and said, "I have to get up to make the cookies, I planned it last night!" Honestly, I thought she was dreaming, but she actually got up and went downstairs. Dave and her worked together looking at different cookie recipes and then she made up this one:
3 Tbsp white sugar
3 Tbsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 Tbsp cocoa
Rind of one orange
1 egg
1/4 cup margarine
1/4 cup of milk
Preheat oven to 350F.
Mix all the dry ingredients in one bowl, in a separate bowl beat the egg and then add it to the dry ingredients along with the margarine and milk. Stir all ingredients together and then plop by the spoonful on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper and bake for 10 minutes.
Mix icing sugar and juice from part of an orange together and ice the cookies.
I was so proud of her, they turned out to be really yummy, Dave gave her guidelines as to the ratio of wet and dry and they looked at tons of recipes and then she decided what and how much to add, she really picked the right parent to help her with this too. I don't actually have a lot of patience, there's a shocker, which is one of the reasons why I like to cook and not so much bake, but Dave on the other hand has a lot of patience for that kind of thing. The only problem is later on she said to me, "I know what kind of cookies I'm going to try and make tomorrow." I think she may need to switch it up to some healthy experiments.
Recipe
We were invited over to friends for dinner tonight and to play games, but with Harper trying to use the potty we didn't want to stray too far from home (although it was not really a very successful potty day). So, they brought everything over to our place and cooked for us here, I know - we have really great friends! It was delicious.
Mushroom Soup and Biscuits
I was off gallivanting almost all day today. I went out to brunch and to see Stuart McLean this afternoon. I had never read or listened to any of the Vinyl Cafe and I immediately fell in love with his animated, funny, Norman Rockwellish stories. Then Dave and I were off to the hockey game tonight, our babysitter was hurt in a game and so my cousin offered to have the girls for a sleepover. It was their first sleepover (other than at my mom and dad's) and it was a huge hit.
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| It started with make your own sundays...really, it was bound to be a hit! |
Recipe
Dave made this mushroom soup recipe from Jaime Oliver: jaime's dinners the essential family cookbook. We had it with leftover biscuits from last night and were going to have ceasar salad with it but there was no time ad I flew in the door, we ate packed and ran out the door to drop the kids off and head to the game.
a small handful of dried porcini
olive oil
1 lb 6oz mixed fresh wild mushrooms
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and finely sliced
1 red onion, peeled and finely chopped
a knob butter
a handful of fresh thyme. leaved picked
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 1/2 cups veggie stock
a handful of fresh flat-leaf parsley, leaves picked and roughly chopped
2 Tbsp mascarpone cheese
1 lemon
optional: truffle oil
Place the porcini in a small dish, add boiling water just to cover, and leave to soak. Get a large casserole-type pan nice and hot, then add a good couple of lugs of olive oil and your fresh mushrooms. Stir around very quickly for a minute, then add your garlic, onion, butter and thyme and a small amount of seasoning. After about a minute you'll probably notice moisture cooking out of the mushrooms and at this point add half of your porcini, chopped up, and then the rest left whole. Strain the soaking liquid to remove any grit, and add it to the pan. Carry on cooking for about 20 minutes until most of the moisture disappears.
Season to taste, and add you stock. Bring to the boil and simmer for around 20 minutes. I usually remove half the soup from the pan and whizz it up to a puree at this point, then pour it back in, adding the parsley and mascarpone, and seasoning carefully to taste.
You can serve this soup as you like, but there are a few things to remember when finishing it off. Mix together a pinch of salt and pepper with the zest of one lemon and the juice of half of it, then spoon a little of this into the middle of the soup. When you go to eat it, stir it in and it gives a wonderful flavour. Other things you can consider are little slices of grilled crostini put into the bottom of the bowls before the soup is poured over. Or you could even quickly fry some nice looking mushrooms and sprinkle these on top of the soup. If I was going to use truffle oil, then I would use it on it's own - a few drips on the top just before serving.
I hope the sun shines down on you this week! Happy Louis Riel Day to all you Manitobans!
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| Wishing you a restful week! |
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