Dinner--or Dessert--Tonight

[Economizer]

I am going stop eating out. Burgerless dinner out rarely costs under $10, for one, around here.

So, tonight at home:

Peak Iced Tea
French Dinner Rolls [toasted w/spread]
Hormel Roast Pork w/gravy [6.5 min. Microprep]
Margaret Holmes seasoned cabbage [can/heat 5 min.]
Misc. Canned carrot rounds [can/heat 5 min.]
Bonus: 2nd frozen complete microwaveable meal awaits]

Dessert selection scheduled 2-4 AM!

[Economizer]

I am going stop eating out. Burgerless dinner out rarely costs under $10, for one, around here.

So, tonight at home:

Peak Iced Tea
French Dinner Rolls [toasted w/spread]
Hormel Roast Pork w/gravy [6.5 min. Microprep]
Margaret Holmes seasoned cabbage [can/heat 5 min.]
Misc. Canned carrot rounds [can/heat 5 min.]
Bonus: 2nd frozen complete microwaveable meal awaits]

Dessert selection scheduled 2-4 AM!

Puts just enough South in your mouth to nourish a drawl.

[Charlotte]

I love the ideas this thread gives me. As the new semester is about to begin, I'm looking for easy, quick, healthy meal ideas that I can keep in the rotation and take some stress off as things get busy. Anyone have some go to meals they prepare when they are short on time?

[mamselle]

I made shepherd's pie with some variations the other day; there was less ground beef that I thought in the freezer, so I mixed it with some finely diced ham and it was quite tasty!

Herbes de Provence spices might have helped blend the two...

I also ended up with more mashed potatoes for the lid than expected (see a long discussion on that, several threads back).

I made potato rolls with the extras--added Bisquick, and all the other ingredients (butter, etc.)--very good, also.

M.

[Puget]

I love the ideas this thread gives me. As the new semester is about to begin, I'm looking for easy, quick, healthy meal ideas that I can keep in the rotation and take some stress off as things get busy. Anyone have some go to meals they prepare when they are short on time?

I've become a huge fan of this sheet pan recipe, served over couscous or pasta or just with some crusty bread: https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1021277-sheet-pan-baked-feta-with-broccolini-tomatoes-and-lemon

You can mix up the vegetable assortment and riff on it however you like. Fast, tasty, and makes good leftovers.

[Stockmann]

Baked salmon with red peppers, potatoes, garlic, orange, asparagus, olive oil, white pepper and ginger, with soy sauce in lieu of table salt. For sides, green beans boiled in beef stock with a bit of olive oil, drained and used the broth to cook couscous seasoned with cumin, and tomato, potatoes and zucchini fried in olive oil with a drizzle of avocado oil, seasoned with pepper, garlic and soy sauce.

Most of our recent meals have been pretty simple and routine, except for cooking Mexican food (chilaquiles) the other day - I made the sauce from scratch, with tomatoes, a quarter onion and serrano chillies fried on a dry pan, then chopping it all up (after removing seeds from the chillies) and frying them with garlic, lime juice, soy sauce, olive oil and avocado oil, using chia as thickener.

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

Damn, Stockmann, that sounds delicious!

We had:

Beverage: Water.

Main: Veggie 'chicken' nuggets, sauces, mac & cheese, tossed salad & watermelon.

Dessert: Chocolate peanut butter ice cream.

[ab_grp]

Wow, Stockmann! I agree, that is quite a feast! And I don't think I have ever had chilaquiles, but I recently made a huge batch (3Q) of ranchero sauce for my husband's birthday.  The two of us managed to eat most of it over a bunch of meals, and we saved some to freeze for another time.

EPW: I don't eat much ice cream these days, but I LOVE chocolate peanut butter! There's a fancy restaurant in the conference center on my old campus that had a pretty extensive and lavish buffet with lots of beautiful desserts, but if you asked nicely you could get some secret chocolate peanut butter ice cream from the back!

We have been itching to use our new cascatelli pasta (https://www.salon.com/2021/03/29/what-to-know-about-cascatelli-pasta/) designed by a food podcast host over the course of several years of research.  This weekend is very rainy and yuck, so we are in the process of making Marcella Hazan's bolognese sauce to go with it.  I know it's not the kind of pasta suggested in her recipe, but I don't care.  The sauce has been a bit of a labor of love (i.e., it has taken a while to make), and it is simmering now and for the next few hours.  This is the first time I've tried this recipe.  I usually use one I love from a restaurant that used to be local to me.  But this recipe has so many good reviews, might as well try it.  I kind of wish we had doubled it, but if we like it, then we can do that next time.  It sure smells good.  And I think this might be the first recipe I've used freshly grated nutmeg in (very little! 1/8 tsp)

[evil_physics_witchcraft]

Wow, Stockmann! I agree, that is quite a feast! And I don't think I have ever had chilaquiles, but I recently made a huge batch (3Q) of ranchero sauce for my husband's birthday.  The two of us managed to eat most of it over a bunch of meals, and we saved some to freeze for another time.

EPW: I don't eat much ice cream these days, but I LOVE chocolate peanut butter! There's a fancy restaurant in the conference center on my old campus that had a pretty extensive and lavish buffet with lots of beautiful desserts, but if you asked nicely you could get some secret chocolate peanut butter ice cream from the back!

We have been itching to use our new cascatelli pasta (https://www.salon.com/2021/03/29/what-to-know-about-cascatelli-pasta/) designed by a food podcast host over the course of several years of research.  This weekend is very rainy and yuck, so we are in the process of making Marcella Hazan's bolognese sauce to go with it.  I know it's not the kind of pasta suggested in her recipe, but I don't care.  The sauce has been a bit of a labor of love (i.e., it has taken a while to make), and it is simmering now and for the next few hours.  This is the first time I've tried this recipe.  I usually use one I love from a restaurant that used to be local to me.  But this recipe has so many good reviews, might as well try it.  I kind of wish we had doubled it, but if we like it, then we can do that next time.  It sure smells good.  And I think this might be the first recipe I've used freshly grated nutmeg in (very little! 1/8 tsp)

Secret menus are very cool! There is so much good food on this thread. Personally, I'm trying to eat more plant-based foods for health reasons, but I can go off the path every now and then.

[ab_grp]

There is a ton of good food on this thread! So many great inspirations and ideas.  As for being plant-based, we have a vegetarian daughter who is with us half-time (and a vegan and a carnivore who aren't), so we tend to go for meat in the off weeks.  When schedules weren't so crazy, we tried to be a little more adventurous on the plant side (for example, a lot of Ottolenghi recipes) but now it's hard to have the time or energy.  And... she doesn't really like vegetables too much, so that makes it fun to try to figure out!  We have a lot of go-to meals.  I really appreciate seeing all the veggie meals and recipes here.

[hmaria1609]

BBQ ribs and sausage

[mamselle]

I'm confused

Did you say your vegetarian daughter doesn't like vegetables very much?

How does that work?

《Puzzled》

M.

[ab_grp]

Mamselle, it is as odd as it sounds.  She does like fruit quite a lot and has an expensive fruit habit.  But her main food groups beyond that appear to be chocolate (and hot chocolate), peanut butter, and beans.  She does eat eggs, thankfully, and she now likes to make herself a fried egg sandwich on English muffin with some cheddar cheese and a slice of tomato in the mornings.  She likes roasted asparagus and cherry tomatoes and potatoes.  Pizza, pasta, veggie burgers (including the bank-breaking Impossible Burger at Burger King), fries, BLTs with fakin (though she misses bacon) work.  We can slip some veggies by her in chili if she's not paying attention, and she likes a particular frittata that has bell peppers.  She does eat some veggie lasagnas, likes spinach cheese bake, and will eat a very basic salad (greens and cherry tomatoes) if there are enough croutons.  ;-)  Oh, she does like eggplant parm and eggplant pizzas.  This may seem like a lot of options, but it can get old quickly! Unfortunately, it seems as though recipes use spices to make things more interesting in the veggie world, and she is not a big fan.  She is becoming more open to new dishes as she gets older, so it is getting somewhat easier (a lot of the above has just been of interest more recently), but for a few years it was quite a challenge.

[mamselle]

Ah--ok, got it.

How old is she?

Taste buds get more liberal with age...she might grow into the spices she avoids now.

M.

[ab_grp]

She's 17, and I hope you're right! She's good about trying new things but just doesn't have much of an adventurous palate (yet?).  One of my worries is that she will (hopefully) be moving onto a college campus next year and won't necessarily have a lot of options open to her or storage space, so I hope she will find some more ideas that appeal to her before then and not end up on a chocolate and peanut butter diet with some eggs or an apple here and there.