Rainbow Chard

Last night, Melinda cooked up some rainbow chard from Aubrey's and my lil' organic garden! It tasted great. I'll post pics of the garden soon.

A week of real food...

After suffering through three weeks of microwave dinners, I switched back to cooking real dinners and bringing homemade sandwiches to work for lunch. (See menu here.)

First of all, having a menu and the necessary ingredients on hand made enacting my dinner plans easy. I didn't have to think about what to make. Second, I started making dinner right when I got home from work. This way, I was able to satisfy my typical 6pm hunger and if anyone wanted to eat later, they were free to reheat any leftovers. We're all adults in the house, we can fend for ourselves! I needed to give up my "Mother Hen" point of view and re-evaluate my need to have "dinnertime" be a regularly-scheduled group activity. I have, and it feels great!

Third, I wanted to be flexible in what day I ate the meals on the list. I've found that if I make a list of menus that are not date-specific, I fare better than if I commit to having fish on Monday and chicken on Tuesday, for example, because I never know what I'll feel like eating that evening. I shopped for all the ingredients on my weekly list on Sunday and was ready to go Monday-Friday. The one day I did commit to was Wednesday when I made whole wheat noodle lasagna for everyone who came to our Project Runway finale party. Every inch was gone by the end of the show!

Lastly, I incorporated fresh meats and vegetables into the dishes. Not only did they taste much better than any microwavable food, but my hunger was satisfied longer. I managed to make everything on my list, save for the shrimp gumbo. Fortunately, that will be on this week's menu list, as the shrimp are safely stowed away in the freezer and can be thawed pretty quickly.

Back to Basics

After three weeks of nothing but The Great Microwave Experiment (blugggg) for dinner, I have planned a weekly menu of home cooked meals for the next 6 days.

• Fish tacos
• Thai chicken with string beans and rice
• Lasagna with veggies and pork sausage
• Rosemary garlic pork chops with rice and peppers
• Shrimp gumbo and jalapeño cornbread
• Chicken noodle soup and toasty ham & cheese sandwiches
  

Hopefully these slow-cooked meals will give me satiety and some pep. The frozen dinners were tasty but they never really filled me up nor did they give me the energy I need. I feel sluggish and foggy all the time now. Some real food is needed, stat!

What we're eating

Last night we had mac n' cheese with organic beef mixed in. I browned the beef (see left) and Melinda made the noodles. It was delicious. I had seconds, in fact.





We also found that one of our onions decided to sprout. It's grown another two inches since I took this photo last week! I may just pot it and see how far it grows.

Things I love to eat, but have never prepared

I'll be honest, I like cooking, but i love eating. I'd rather indulge in someone else's gastronomical delights than stand over the stove any day.

However I think it's time I learned how to create my own versions of the following dishes so as to not have to rely on others when I want a taste-treat.

Here are 10 dishes I like to eat but don't know how to make:

1. Homemade Cream of Tomato Soup
2. Pad Thai
3. Chicken Enchiladas with verde sauce
   
4. Bread Pudding
5. Bacon-wrapped anything. (How do you get the bacon to stay on?)
6. Ice Cream
7. Baklava
8. Hummus (not from a box!)
9. Naan
10. Calimari (do I really want to know?)