A Simple Week Day Dinner Menu
Well, what a few months we have had! We experienced a fire in our home, and while everyone (and mostly everything) is totally fine, we had been living nearby with a VERY limited pantry. We lived three months in this weird living situation - and it had a HUGE impact on how I prepped our dinners. It’s far less stressful than how I was cooking dinners before so I thought I would share! A reminder that this is for a family of four that includes a nearly 2 year old and a 4.5 year old so take what you will with that information.
I’m also curious to see if I can maintain this going forward. As you can tell from my previous blog posts, I do like to experiment with recipes at mealtimes, but that definitely isn’t the most stress free method. I’m finding the girls will eat more when I’m sticking to a basic meal plan. And at the end of the post, I’ll let you know what our current plan is in Phase 2 of Weird 2021 Living.
Anyway. Here is what I do! First, I pick a protein to base my meal around. Then, I add in a pasta/rice and veggies!
Proteins: I have been ordering the frozen meat boxes from SMC Dairy in our delivery order. I love having local meat AND it also gives me a place to start my meal with. They have mixed chicken boxes (breasts, thighs, legs) and also mixed meats (couple chicken breasts, boneless pork tenderloins, ground sausage, ground beef). I try not to serve the same type of meat two nights in a row. The ground beef is the most versatile that I’ve found — I’ll do meatballs, mini meatloves, or chili with this. Ground sausage is the toughest - I usually break it up in bigger pieces and cook on the stove, and mix with pasta. (Give me your ideas for ground sausage!)
Fells Point Meats!
Love their crock pot box.
Next, I pick a rice, pasta or bread to add to it! I try to vary it so that the girls will eat it - they’re less likely to eat a lot of something if they just had it the night before. Kids!
Sides: While the meat and veggies are cooking, I cook up the rice or pasta on the stove. I vary between spaghetti, penne, white jasmine rice, homemade naan bread, or some other pasta - the girls’ have been into picking out their pasta shape at the grocery store, too!
Veggies: I typically roast some combination of brussels sprouts, green beans, and broccoli. The 2 year old will often eat a little of this - which was surprising! But with little pressure, I find they are less picky. I roast them on one side of baking sheet, and roast/cook the meat on the other side of the pan! Sometimes the temperatures are a little different so I will start the veggies early.
Bonus Tip: I was rotating between a few recipes and instead of pulling them up on my phone constantly — I wrote them down in the notes page of my planner! Yes, I love a paper planner - which I ought to write a post about, too! Anyway, it was SO helpful to just flip to those pages when I wanted to cook those and to have them out so my husband could help cook, too!
There you have it! A simple way to have options at dinner each night. I have also considered making some sauces at the beginning of the week, which would have really amped these up, but that might have to wait until we have our full pantry back. Pinch of Yum has an excellent starting point for sauces to really elevate these basic meals. For those of you with a full pantry (ahem, everyone) - I highly recommend making a sauce or two!
Overall, this has worked out to be a really efficient method for coming up with dinners throughout the week — leaving little waste since we also have a leftovers night on Thursday or Friday to finish up whatever we didn’t eat! Saturday has turned into sushi or take-out night, and Sunday has been dinner at great-grandmother’s house. TBD if I keep this up when life returns to “normal”!
Next up — Since we’ve moved into our basement (until construction is done), I’m trying to use our kitchen sparingly. This has put me back into slow cooker/crock pot world. Will share my tips on that in a later post!
