Monday, May 26, 2008

Menu Plan Monday - May 26th

First of a review of last weeks' meals, which ended up being quite different from what I had planned here.

The Russian Chicken stir fry is always a hit, and I need to remember to post the recipe. It's really quite easy. I'll try to remember to link the recipe here when I post it.

We did have fish on Wednesday but instead of doing it in the oven we borrowed a deep fryer and had deep fried fish and fries with Mom's famous sauce. I'll try to remember to post and link recipes for those too.
Thursday we had meatballs and rice. Once again a family favorite and I need to remember to post the recipe for the meatballs.

Last week at Dewey's Treehouse I read about a fast and easy Mac and Cheese recipe that I decided to try out. DD loves Mac and Cheese but I seldom make it because it's so much work and takes so many pots. I was hoping this was going to mean she could have it more often. Well, it was not a hit! It was more like KD than our homemade Mac and Cheese and DD was terribly disappointed. I did add some steak sauce and mustard to the recipe hoping to make it taste more like our but it didn't work. After we ate what we wanted for supper I ended up experimenting a bit to see if I could save the day. I put the leftovers in a casserole dish, topped it with crushed crackers, grated cheese, parmasan cheese, and paprika and put it in the oven for about 45 minutes. DD ate this the next day and said it was much better, so I may try the recipe again and make a few adjustments. We'll see.

Saturday I made BBQ chicken pizza and it was yummy!

Sunday I made fast and easy Chicken and gravy, which I have to post a recipe for, and deep fried fries and onion rings, as we still had the deep fryer we had borrowed.

Sooooo...very different from the plan for last week. Oh well. Such is life. :) Look like I have my work cut out for me posting all the recipes too. Hope I remember to do that.

On to possibilities for this week. :) Today is over and done with. We had left overs. For the rest of the week I'm just going to make a list of possibilities without assigning days to them

Tacos
BBQ Pork Chops, baked potatoes, caesar salad
Chicken Nachos
Goulash
Shake 'n'Bake Chicken, mashed potatoes
Traditional Sunday cooked dinner


I wonder how much this menu will change. :)

Sunday, May 25, 2008

BBQ Chicken Pizza

Crust
Dissolve a small package, or 1 Tbsp, of active dry yeast in 1 cup of warm water. Add 1 tsp sugar, 1 tsp salt, 2 Tbsp vegetable oil and 2 1/2 cups of flour. Mix til all combined. Knead on floured surface adding more flour as needed til it feels right. Place in bowl, cover and let rise for a while, the longer you wait the more it will rise. We accidently bought multigrain flour last time we bought flour and I think we are all growing to like it. It adds a nice texture and taste to the pizza crust.

Topping preparation
While the dough is rising, chop 1 boneless skinless chicken breast into small cubes and throw into frying pan with a bit of oil. Sprinkle with seasoning salt, pepper, garlic powder, oregano, onion powder, chicken OXO envelope, worchestershire sauce, and soya sauce. Fry til chicken is cooked. Chop up some red, green, yellow, and orange peppers, and some mushrooms. Grate some cheese.

Putting the Pizza together
Stretch dough to cover a greased pan. Spread BBQ sauce on top, as much or as little as you like. For our last one we used Chicken and Rib BBQ sauce and it was yummy, but any BBQ sauce will work. Sprinkle the cooked chicken over top, then the vegetables, and last of all the cheese.

Cooking
Bake in 450 oven for about 12-15 minutes.

Yummy. yummmy, yummy!

Saturday, May 24, 2008

Doctored Chicken Noodle Soup

1 envelope chicken noodle soup
1 envelope chicken or beef OXO
1 onion
1 carrot
1 potato
a handful of spaghetti noodles broken into small pieces
seasoned salt
pepper
garlic powder
oregano

Fill a medium saucepan with water and place on stove to boil. Pour in both envelopes. Chop onion, carrot and potato and throw in. Throw in broken spaghetti. Sprinkle spices to taste. Simmer until vegetables and noodles are soft.

There's nothing like Chicken Noodle soup when you have a cold or flu, but we like ours doctor up a bit. I've been downing this stuff all this week hoping to drive a bug away. :)

Monday, May 19, 2008

Menu Plan Monday - May 19

We are now totally sick of ham! Here's a review of last week's menu:
The Linguine with Saucy Ham and Peas was a flop. DS thought it was okay but DD and I did not like it at all. It was totally tasteless. It may be because I guessed at the amount for the spices because I forgot to write down the measurements when I copied the recipe and I was too lasy to get the book out and look it up. I doubt I'll try it again to find out, but we'll see.
Because I couldn't find any perogies anywhere in town the Perogy Ham Casserole was out so I made the Cheesy Red Rice. Once again DD was not impressed. I was slightly impressed, and once again DS loved it. I think DH would like it too but he was out of town so I may make it again some time so that he can try it.
I loved the Ham Pinwheels! DD was slightly impressed and DS thought they were pretty good. I think they would make a great finger food to take out some time or to serve when friends come over for the evening. Very fast and easy to make. I will make it again.
I ended up making 2 homemade pizzas - one normal pizza meat pizza and one chicken ranch pizza. They were both yummy.
I thoroughly enjoyed my homemade baked beans. I simply followed the recipe on the package of beans. I'm really the only one in the family that loves baked beans so everyone else just endured them. :)
Everyone enjoyed our traditional Sunday cooked dinner with chicken and all the fixins.

Today I made hash with the leftovers. It was pretty good. I also made a pot of homemade chicken soup for dinner. I have a terrible head cold and I was hoping it would help.

Now on to plans for the rest of the week:

Tuesday - Russian Chicken stir fry or wrap
Wednesday - fish of some sort, probably oven deep fried
Thursday - Something with ground beef - probably lasagna
Friday - BBQ if the weather is nice, though this could be moved to the first nice day for it
Saturday - Sweet n sour chicken and rice
Sunday - traditional Sunday dinner but this time with roast

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Menu Plan Monday - On Tuesday May 13 :)

I completely missed Menu Plan Monday last week because I was out of town for most of the week. I'm late posting this week because yesterday was my eldest son's 20th birthday and I was busy getting back on track from being away so long and whipping up a meal of his favorites for him. Soooo...I'm a day late but I'm trying to get back on track.

First of all back to a review of the last menu I posted. The leftovers on Monday were enjoyed by all. The Honey Baked Chicken was a major big hit! I served it with Mom's Fancy Fried Rice. A yummy meal all round. Wednesday was homemade Mac and Cheese with Winning Weineers. The basic recipes are from Company's Coming Lunches cookbook, but I make some minor adjustments. I'll probably post them one of these days. Thursday was homemade spaghetti, especially for my husband, and served with Caesar salad for especially for my daughter. Some day I'll get around to posting my recipes for these. Friday we hit the road and that was the end of my cooking for a week. As you can see I didn't stick to the plan I posted but I seldom do.

As I mentioned earlier, yesterday was my eldest son's 20th birthday. A tradition at our house is that the birthday person gets to plan the meals for their birthday, or else I just plan the meals so that they get to enjoy some of their favorite foods on their birthday. DS still lives at home and I love that he does, but he's out the door before 7 in the morning and works until about 6 in the night so the only meal I had to worry about for him was supper. He is a pleasure to cook for because he loves everything but I know that ham and salads are among some of his favorites. I seldom make either so I decided to make both for him for his birthday, along with his traditional favorite birthday cake - homemade peanut butter cake with peanut butter icing. The cake and icing recipe are in Company's Coming Cakes recipe book. The ham was just a toupie that I cooked with a bit of water. I like ham with sauce but his favorite way to have it is just plain. The salads he likes are my mom's traditional potato salads - egg, beet, mustard, vegetable, and also a macaroni salad. I can't make them as good as my mom but I do the best I can. He assures me I do a good job, but we both know it's not really as good as Nan's.

Today I was searching the recipe books for recipes to use up the left over ham. I found 4 interesting recipes. I may try at least one of them some time this week. I was planning on making one of them tonight but then I realized that it would just be me and little one tonight as two are out of town for the rest of the week and two had a supper meeting tonight. I ended up cooking a couple of chicken legs using my own modifications to the Honey Mustard Grilled Chicken recipe. I didn't grill it but threw it in the oven in a casserole dish with a few additional spices. It turned out pretty good. I served it with Minute Rice.


So, here are some tentative plans for the rest of the week:

Wednesday - linguine with Saucy Ham and Peas from Company's Coming Cook For Kids Recipe book

Thursday - Cheesy Red Rice or Perogy Ham Casserole - both from Company's Coming 4 Ingredients Recipe Book.

Friday - Homemade Pizza and maybe some Ham Pinwheels from Company's Coming Cook For Kids Recipe book

Saturday - Baked Beans and rolls

Sunday - Chicken and vegetables