Recipes and cooking tips for foodie families.
Featured Recipe: Chicken Barley Stew
If I told you that I could feed mom, dad, big kid #1, and little baby #2 for less than a buck a serving, you’d be like: awesome, right? Let’s add healthy, delicious, and fits in one pot so there’s no clean up: could it be possible? Continue reading
I love making an event out of dinner. It’s often the one time of the day that the whole family is together…and my oldest is only 3. I can only imagine how hectic it’s going to get later. But over dinner we can sit and talk and ask each other about our favorite part of our day. Playing with Legos for Nicholas. Walking through the door after work for Dan. Then the dog barks, Katie starts crying, and Nicholas spills his drink. Despite the chaos, the time we spend together at dinner is my favorite part of the day.
I like the idea of passport meals–you know, make an entire theme night out of something a little different than the norm, for us: Indian food. Play Indian music, find India on a map, everyone come to the table with one fun fact about Indian culture…
Ok, seriously, who am I kidding. Like we have time for that. The reality is, we walk past an Indian restaurant on the way home from Nicholas’ school and it smells so darn good that I was inspired to try to make a couple of our favorite dishes at home. And over dinner we talked about how great it would have been to have done all of that stuff.
I still love the idea of a passport meal–go ahead, try something new. You don’t need to be an expert, just follow a recipe. And if you can do all that other stuff, you are truly inspiring. I’m going to keep it on the list as one of the great ideas that we’ll get to one of these days. Meanwhile, I’m just going to enjoy the fact that we all get to sit at the table and talk for a few minutes every day.
Menu:
Chicken Tikka Masala (Food & Wine mag recipe)
Indian Spiced Greens–my take on Sag
Steamed Basmati Rice
Naan
Kingfisher Beer
How many holiday parties do you have this week? Tis the season for entertaining friends, family, colleagues…
Nicholas’ birthday falls during this time as well. At this age, it just means figuring out how many pizzas to order at the local bounce house venue, but when he gets older I’m sure it will mean cooking vats of chili for teenage boys who want to watch the game together. Wow, I just leapt ahead 10 years.
Anyway, this week I’m serving up a couple of menus that are great for weekend or weeknight entertaining, plus a great crockpot meal for the night you’re not on the go but too tired to cook!
Menu #1: Open house gathering
Everything here works great at room temperature, so you can put out on the table just before friends arrive, but you don’t have to worry about keeping heat on any of it.
Even if you’re not entertaining, this is a great weekend meal that you can use the leftovers for later in the week.
Roasted Salmon with Mustard Caper Sauce
Roasted Potatoes
Pear, Walnut, & Blue Cheese Salad
Wine: Chardonnay and Pinot Noir
Menu #2: Elegant gathering with close friends
Use the leftovers from the Roasted Salmon to make this easy and elegant dish. You can even make ahead for a great weeknight dinner party for 4.
Salmon Pot Pie
Steamed Green Beans
Wine: Chardonnay
Menu #3: Crock Pot Comfort
After you’ve had your fill of entertaining and just need a comforting crock pot meal, give this one a try. I found it on Recipe Girl’s blog, and it looks amazing.
Shopping List
1 3-pound filet of salmon, skin on
3 to 4 pounds of bone-in chicken pieces (drumsticks, breasts, thighs)
red onion
yellow onion
garlic
fresh or dried thyme
orange
shallot
2 pounds assorted potatoes
green beans
mixed greens
Bosc pear
leek
Dijon mustard
capers
olive oil
balsamic vinegar
salt
cracked pepper
walnut halves
flour
frozen peas
puff pastry
cocktail pumpernickel slices
cream
butter
sour cream
blue cheese, crumbled
white wine
This week at the farmers market there were tons of fall vegetables like greens and sweet potatoes, so I embraced it. I find that it’s a bit easier and economical to get a lot of one or two things and cook those throughout the week, rather than come up with a unique side dish for every meal. Also, I’ll be making some baby food with the sweet potatoes so I needed to get a bunch.
These meals do take some prep, but everything can be done ahead so anything can be a fairly easy weeknight meal.
Dinner Menu #1:
Sloppy Joes
Curry Sweet Potato Fries
Peas
To prep the sweet potatoes ahead, follow the recipe and bake them for only about 30 minutes. Then let them cool and refrigerate. They will still be soft. When you are preparing dinner, just pop them back in the oven for 20 minutes or so. The sloppy joes can be on the table in under 30 minutes, but you could also certainly prep the joe mixture ahead as well. I cook my peas in the microwave, covered tightly in plastic wrap, for 2 minutes, so no time at all for that either.
Dinner Menu #2:
Braised Kale over Parmesan Polenta
I love to cook one vegetarian meal per week, so this is the one. Just a good nourishing weeknight meal.
Dinner Menu #3:
Barbeque Chicken
Collard Greens
Baked Sweet Potato
This is a great one to prep ahead for a Wednesday hump day meal. It feels like a Sunday dinner, but takes very little effort when you get home from a long day. 
Simply marinate the chicken the night before or in the morning, and throw on the grill when you get home. Set the collard greens in the crock pot in the morning so all you need to do is serve them up in the evening. Put the potatoes in the oven or on the grill when you get home and don’t touch them till dinnertime. Minimal effort, maximum comfort will get you over hump day.
Homemade Baby Food:
Pureed Sweet Potatoes
~and/or~
Sloppy Joes and Sweet Potatoes
~and/or~
Pureed Peas
Shopping List:
1 pound ground beef
1 small chicken
6 ounces bacon
3 onions
green pepper
celery
garlic
3 pounds sweet potatoes
1 pound kale
leek
2 pounds collards
thyme
cumin
curry powder
olive oil
cider vinegar
brown sugar
Worcestershire
tomato sauce–8 ounce can
barbeque sauce
coarse ground yellow corn polenta/grits
Parmigiano Reggiano
frozen peas
auntieangela
gourmetmommy