The beginning of the week is so full of possibilities. Ambitious lists are made, procrastination is sworn off yet again. Laundry is done (usually on Sundays – Sorry Mrs. Collins) . Above all else, the week’s meals are more or less planned and grocery shopping is done – never on an empty stomach which only leads to disaster of the “why do we have 4 different kinds of frozen pizza in this bag?” type.
O and I didn’t always plan out the menus for the week. Before we had the Little Bean we would pick one or two involved meals from our ever expanding shelf of cookbooks, to cook together – not caring if it wasn’t ready until 9 or 10 o’clock; the preparation was just as fun as the consumption. Now that we have our little guy to contend with, there are several things that have changed our approach to meal preparation
Time – or lack there of. With the current teething situation, Little Bean might wake up after only a couple of hours after he goes do sleep at 7:30, efficiency is key. Noise – the kitchen and bedroom share a wall so late night clanking of dishes and pots and pans is not welcome. Tag team – that’s how we cook now instead of together. I’ll cut this while you run the bath water; you start the pasta while I put his PJs on; the timer is set for 15 minutes but stir it a few times so it doesn’t stick while I do story time…and so it goes, until baby is sleep and dinner is ready.
All of this because, baby or not, we still love to cook. But we don't cook every night - hello leftovers - they make lunch the next day (and dinner) much easier.
So, what’s on this week’s menu?
Breakfast: Ginger pumpkin muffins (with crystallized ginger); hard boiled eggs
Dinners: sake sea bass w/ wilted greens and rice; curry sweet potato and butternut squash stew; Cannelloni beans w/ chicken andouille sausage and veggies
Other: marinated vegetable salad
In the spirit of full disclosure, I should say that I made two batches of muffin this week - one breakfast muffin with crystallized ginger pieces and raisins, and one dessert muffin with walnuts and simi-sweet chocolate chipsdelicious. I’ve also been toying with reducing the amount of sugar in the recipes of my baked goods. You can barely tell the difference, and I don’t feel as bad having a muffin for breakfast when I know it’s not entirely sugar laden – I save that for things like cookies and brownies.
Last night was first time since the Little Bean arrived 6 months ago that my muffins haven’t been overcooked (yay me)
The hard boiled eggs are just for me, they're easy to take to work, O doesn’t like hard boiled eggs so he’ll just have to do with muffins until I decide to make frittatas again.
