Monday, October 29, 2012

Weekly Menu Retrospective #85

Welcome to my weekly roundup of the past week's eats. I prefer to report what we ate in the last week, rather than what we're planning to eat in the coming week. Why? The reason is pretty simple: although I usually have a general idea of what we're going to eat in the next week or so, life often unfolds a little differently than planned, and I adjust my menu plan on a near-daily basis to accommodate leftovers and other not-possible-to-plan-ahead circumstances. I find this is the easiest way to ensure that I minimize our family's food waste. I'm also willing to admit that I'm a rather spontaneous cook, given to preparing foods that strike me as the most appealing thing to eat right here and now!

If you'd like a whole book full of inexpensive, quick and kid-approved recipes,
check out my book, Cheap Appétit : The Complete Guide to Feeding Your Family for Less Than $400 a Month (While Eating Better Than You Ever Thought Possible) on Amazon (Amazon.com, Amazon.ca and Amazon UK) and Barnes and Noble.  It's gotten multiple 5 star reviews!! I've included page references to recipes that are in the book in my menu plans so you can locate them quickly. For more details about the book, go here.  

Breakfasts:
Granola (p. 92), Aloha Muffins (p. 99), Blueberry Pancakes, Baked Oatmeal (p. 91)

Lunches: 
leftovers, sandwiches, pizza 

Dinners:

Monday: Turkey and Vegetable Coconut Curry (variation of this recipe, p.136)

Tuesday: Cabbage and Beef Soup (p. 167)

Wednesday: Chicken Enchiladas (p.127), Colourful Cabbage Salad (p. 207)

Thursday: Make-it-Your-Way Potato Hash (p. 140)

Friday: Black Bean Chili (meatless version) (p. 160), Cornbread (p. 212)

Saturday: Fried Rice (p. 139)

Sunday: Smothered Pork Chops (variation of this recipe, p. 143), Raspberry Cheesecake

In keeping with my local and organic challenge, I'd also like to note the local and/or organic items on this week's menu:

Organic: coconut (in granola), coconut oil (in granola), coconut milk, canola oil, raisins (in granola), sunflower and pumpkin seeds (in granola), tortilla chips (for snacks)

Local: potatoes, carrots, onions, apples, cabbage, cucumbers, ground beef, pork, sausage and chicken legs (from VG Meats), honey (unpasteurized), milk, eggs, sour cream  

Local AND organic: peanut butter,
sesame seeds (used to top bread loaves), oats (in granola), cornmeal, red peppers.

For more great meal ideas, check out Menu Plan Monday at orgjunkie.com.
  
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Saturday, October 27, 2012

I'm Dreaming of a Waste-Free Christmas


I know, I know - it's not even Halloween and here I am talking about Christmas! Actually, I'm a bit late getting around to Christmas-oriented discussions this year (just like I've been behind in most everything else these last few months.)

For the last couple of weeks I've been intending to write a "getting prepared for Christmas" type of post but as I've been mulling things over it's sort of transformed itself from my original intent. As so often happens in life (well, at least in my life!), a particular issue suddenly comes to the forefront of our attention and grabs us in a way that takes over our focus.

For me, it's been the non-sexy topic of waste. When I was writing my book, I ended up thinking about and researching food waste far beyond my original intent and it's an issue about which I've become passionate. I'll have a lot more to say about that in the coming weeks. Food waste issues led me to thinking more about packaging waste and garbage, recycling, and plastic...it's snowballed and taken on a life of its own!

Although I consider myself someone who doesn't waste much (buying a lot of items secondhand and often finding second uses for things most people would toss), I've realized I could be doing even better than I am at avoiding waste of all kinds, and that it's time for me to take on some new challenges in this department. While there are many small changes that I plan on writing more about over the coming weeks, I wanted to start thinking NOW about ways I can reduce waste over the holiday season, since being prepared is half of the battle!

As I sat here and contemplated further, I realized not only do I want to avoid material waste, but wasted time, energy and money, too (well, that last one goes without saying around here!)

Here are some of my current ideas about how to reduce ALL of these kinds of waste this holiday season:

Just say NO: Well, that does sound a bit Scrooge-like, but I think you know what I'm getting at :) Your family's holiday time and resources are precious so don't overcommit to social activities or gift giving. Pick the few activities that are meaningful and politely decline the rest. More and more people seem to be open to discussions about toning down or eliminating gift-giving and now is a good time to start those conversations before people start shopping.

Favour experience-type gifts, food gifts, and other simple homemade items: These types of gifts are very well received in my experience, and generate little waste. I'm aiming for totally reusable packaging this year, with any "adornments" to the packaging from recycled and reused materials. You can find 10 of my favourite quick & easy homemade Christmas gift ideas here. If you do choose to purchase new items, pick ones with minimal packaging that is recyclable or reusable..

Consider giving less gifts: I am a big believer that less can be more when it comes to gift-giving. I've watched as my kids have gone from content and satisfied after opening a couple of well-chosen gifts, to frenzied and overwhelmed after opening a large pile more. When it comes right down to it, most of us don't really need much in the way of "stuff" these days. Taking the time to mindfully choose that one special gift ensures that the gift-giving experience will be satisfying for both the giver and the receiver.

Choose reusable wrapping options: Gift bags can be reused many times and most of us frugal folks have a big stash we've saved from previous years. Cloth bags or furoshiki are an even better option as they will last much longer than paper gift bags. I've recently become infatuated with the latter and plan to see if I can make some furoshiki squares from scrap fabrics I have lying around the house. Some extra-large T-shirts would be great to cut up for this purpose as T-shirt material doesn't fray so you won't have to hem them. I still have some wrapping paper in my stash and I want to challenge myself to have that be the last wrapping paper I buy!

Switch to a digital holiday greeting tradition: Christmas cards generate an astounding amount of waste. I know they are fun to receive, but where do they all end up when the season is over? We do save ours to recycle into gift tags, etc, but we already have more than we can use for the next decade or so! We stopped sending holiday cards a few years ago - both for environmental reasons and because neither of us particularly enjoyed the task of assembling and mailing (not to mention the cost of the postage). Also, with Facebook and email, we're in more regular touch with most people these days anyway, so the holiday greeting doesn't seem as necessary as it did when you didn't hear from friends and family all that often. One thing we neglected to do, however, was actually tell the people on our list that we no longer send out cards. I think some of them may think that we just don't love them anymore (oops!) This year I plan to send out a holiday email with photos and updates on our year. That way everyone will know that we're thinking of them, they'll get to see what we've been up to (if they don't already know), and there won't be any waste generated.

Tone down the decorating: Now, don't get me wrong - I love making the house all festive at Christmas time. I just think buying a lot of (usually way overpackaged) stuff to decorate with is unnecessary. I don't need more "trimmings or trappings" at my house. I can make good use of what I already have, and if I want to add something new I can probably create it with things I already have around the house or by gathering some natural materials from around the neighbourhood. Garlands can be made with cranberry or popcorn strings (both of which can be composted when you're done with them). If you really do need some "new" Christmas decorations, check Freecycle, thrift stores and yard sales - there are always tons of holiday items available! We do get a real tree every year (this is important to all 4 of us) and luckily our city recycles the trees for a variety of uses in the community.

Plan your feast carefully: I know this is the one time of year where it's easy for me to get carried away with all those special holiday foods. But you all know that food waste makes me crazy! So, yes, make sure your favourite foods are all represented at your festive meals, just try to be realistic about how much will get eaten and have a plan in place for dealing with any leftovers. For any leftover items that are highly perishable, consider sending extras home with guests (in reusable containers, please!) Also, if you're hosting a party, use regular dishes instead of disposables. If you happen to have a really cool group of friends, you could make it a BYOD party (bring your own dishes) where all the guests bring their plates and flatware, thus reducing the dish-doing strain on the hosts.

I'm feeling pretty optimistic that we can pull off a (nearly) waste-free Christmas this year!

Do you have any additional tips to add to my list?

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Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Finally - A Fall & Winter Clothes Shopping Trip!

I believe I've mentioned that life's been crazier than usual around here at least once or twice :) A sure sign that things have gotten a bit out of hand is that the fall and winter clothes shopping trip that we normally do around the end of August (hitting up a Value Village 50% off day) just happened on Saturday. Yup, *after* Thanksgiving! Hey, at least we got it done before Halloween.

Since there wasn't another 50% off day on the Value Village horizon for the foreseeable future, we decided to head over to Talize since fellow Hamilton blogger Jentine of My Edit is a huge fan (and far more fashion conscious than I've ever going to be). I'd been there way back when they first opened (I think that's getting close to a decade ago as I seem to remember my kids being quite small). Anyway, for whatever reason we'd never gone back (it's a bit more out of the way for us than Value Village so it mostly fell off my radar I think). I'm happy to report that we had a very successful trip and I'm now an official Talize convert :) Overall I found the selection better organized, with more higher quality items and a lot less stuff that looked like it was ready for my rag bag compared to Value Village. As it turned out, they were offering 50% off on clothes with pink and purple tags, and about half the items we selected fit this category, so we did still receive a significant discount on our purchase.

We did also make a quick trip over to Value Village as they have a much larger shoe selection than Talize and we'd struck out in that department. We made a couple of good finds there, then hauled the whole lot home to be photographed and laundered.

(My apologies for the less-than-stellar photos. By the time we got home, daylight was starting to fade, and I really wanted to get this stuff in the wash as I had two teenage boys pestering me for their new duds. I did the best I could with the light I had to work with!)

Teenage boy #1 (13 year old) ended up with the following:


- A new winter jacket (I'm SO relieved we found something he agreed that he would actually wear!! He's definitely the most style-conscious person in our household).
- 3 pairs of jeans (again, nearly a miracle considering how picky he is about fit). One of them is actually not black since we found a gray pair that met with his approval (I'm not sure why, but he won't wear blue denim)
-2 black T-shirts
-2 American Eagle hoodies (only one in the picture as he was already wearing the other one!)
-plaid button-down shirt
-black belt


Teenage boy #2 (15 year old) got a pretty good haul, too:





 -2 button-down shirts
-2 long sleeved knit pullovers
-2 black T-shirts (one short sleeved, one long sleeved)
-2 pairs of jeans
-a pair of New Balance runners
-a pair of winter boots

Plus I found a couple of items for myself:



-A pair of yoga pants in brand new condition (I was really thrilled to find these as my current pairs are looking more than a bit long in the tooth)
-A pair of hiking boots

The boots I'd picked up in hopes they'd fit my 13 year old. They *were* in the men's section. After he tried them on and reported they were too small, it occurred to me that the style was not all that different from that of my favourite boots that died last year. I tried them on and they fit me! So, even though they're technically men's boots, I don't really care :) I don't love them as much as my old expensive pair, but at $14.99 and in brand-new condition, they'll get me through until I can splurge on another really good pair again (which isn't likely to be this year).

The grand total for this shopping expedition was $170.50 for 21 items, or an average of $8.12 an item (not bad with a winter jacket and 3 pair of footwear in the mix!)

That brings our total spent on clothing so far this year up to $344.47. Over a third of that was on shoes and boots since my boys' feet just keep getting bigger! I'm hoping their feet are just about done growing as one of them already has larger feet than my husband and the other's are about the same size.

I think we're now just about covered for fall and winter clothes. We still need to find some winter boots for my 13 year old, and hubby needs a new pair of dress shoes. We also need to stock up on socks for the boys. I'm hoping that should be it until the end of the year! It looks like we'll come in a lot lower on our clothing expenses than we did last year, when we went about $150 over our typical $400 annual budget.

Have you found any great thrift-store deals lately?

Monday, October 22, 2012

Weekly Menu Retrospective #84

Welcome to my weekly roundup of the past week's eats. I prefer to report what we ate in the last week, rather than what we're planning to eat in the coming week. Why? The reason is pretty simple: although I usually have a general idea of what we're going to eat in the next week or so, life often unfolds a little differently than planned, and I adjust my menu plan on a near-daily basis to accommodate leftovers and other not-possible-to-plan-ahead circumstances. I find this is the easiest way to ensure that I minimize our family's food waste. I'm also willing to admit that I'm a rather spontaneous cook, given to preparing foods that strike me as the most appealing thing to eat right here and now!

If you'd like a whole book full of inexpensive, quick and kid-approved recipes,
check out my book, Cheap Appétit : The Complete Guide to Feeding Your Family for Less Than $400 a Month (While Eating Better Than You Ever Thought Possible) on Amazon (Amazon.com, Amazon.ca and Amazon UK) and Barnes and Noble.  It's gotten multiple 5 star reviews!! I've included page references to recipes that are in the book in my menu plans so you can locate them quickly. For more details about the book, go here.  

Breakfasts:
Granola (p. 92), Banana Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Muffins (p. 96), Apple Cinnamon Pancakes, Baked Oatmeal (p. 91)

Lunches: 
leftovers, sandwiches, pizza 

Dinners:

Monday: Pork with Cabbage, Apples and Onions

Tuesday: Thai-Style Peanutty Pasta (p. 147)

Wednesday: Italian Meatball Subs (p.126)

Thursday: White Bean and Barley Soup, Pizza Breadsticks (a variation of this recipe, p. 214)

Friday: Western Omelette Wraps (p. 124), Creamy Cucumber Salad (p. 205)

Saturday: Sausage on a bun with sauteed onions, Easy Oven Fries (p. 194) (made with red potatoes from a Waterdown farm)

Sunday: Lemony Chicken and Spinach Pasta (p. 150), Apple Crisp (p. 220)

In keeping with my local and organic challenge, I'd also like to note the local and/or organic items on this week's menu:

Organic: coconut (in granola), coconut oil (in granola), coconut milk, canola oil, raisins (in granola), sunflower and pumpkin seeds (in granola), tortilla chips (for snacks)

Local: potatoes, carrots, onions, apples, cabbage, broccoli, spinach, cucumbers, ground beef, pork, sausage and chicken legs (from VG Meats), honey (unpasteurized), milk, eggs, sour cream  

Local AND organic: peanut butter,
sesame seeds (used to top bread loaves), oats (in granola), red peppers, green onions and herbs from our backyard garden

For more great meal ideas, check out Menu Plan Monday at orgjunkie.com.
  
Love what you read here? Find out how you can help support this blog. 

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Thursday, October 18, 2012

Our October Food Co-op Order


We received our October order from the Ontario Natural Food Co-op last week. It's a bit smaller than some of our previous orders. We're still well stocked on bulk oats, cornmeal, raisins, and coconut so I didn't need to order any of those items. Since we just bought 40 more pounds of meat from VG Meats last month (10 lb each of pork chops, chicken legs, ground beef and Italian sausages) our freezers are also very full, so I have limited space to store extra bulk items right now.

Here's what we ended up getting:

Front row (on floor):
10 kg Oak Manor organic whole wheat flour, $21.39 (local)
4.1 kg Nuts to You organic peanut butter, $46.88 (local)
Full case (12 x 400 ml) Thai Kitchen organic coconut milk, $26.96

Left hand chair:
Filsinger's organic apple cider vinegar, 500 ml, $3.16 (local)
Dutchman's Gold honey (unpasteurized), 2 x 1 kg, $16.96 (local)
Camino cane sugar (organic, Fair Trade), 1 kg, $6.09
Oak Manor organic popcorn, 2 x 1 kg, $12.30 (local)
Oak Manor organic pumpkin seeds, 1 kg, $10.64

Right hand chair:
Celestial Seasonings Gingerbread Spice Tea, 3 x 20 ct box, $10.29
*Natracare pads, 14 ct box, $4.91
Simply Natural organic Dijon mustard, 330 ml, $2.64
Oak Manor organic sunflower seeds, $5.80
Wholesome Sweeteners brown sugar (organic, Fair Trade), 681 g, $5.03
Nature Clean liquid soap, 1 litre bottle, $6.17 (Canadian)
Nature's Path organic flax seed, 425 g, $5.78

*I'm still using my homemade menstrual pads, but I've had to concede that they aren't that comfy for my hot yoga classes, so that's what the Natracare pads are for - since I'm only using them for my yoga class, this box should last me a year :)

Grand total: $183. 18 (after a $1.82 COD discount)

The big splurge this order is the peanut butter. It's produced in Paris, Ontario which is very local to us to I couldn't resist giving it a try. I really hope we love it as we certainly have a lot of it now! I'm also trying out Oak Manor's organic whole wheat flour for the first time as well. Everything I've bought from them thus far has been absolutely top notch (their popcorn pops up incredibly light and fluffy with very few unpopped kernels) so I'm expecting to love the flour, too.

On a related note, I'm very excited to be participating in the first meeting of the Sourcing Action Team for the Mustard Seed, Hamilton's cooperative grocery store. We'll be hunting down all the local food producers to supply the store with a wide variety of fresh, local foods. It's going to be a big task, however, we are so blessed to live in an area where there is a lot of local food production. Having one store I can go to and purchase a huge variety of locally sourced foods is going to be so amazing! It seems almost too good to be true, but there are a lot of very committed people determined to make this happen. I just can't wait and I'm so thrilled to be a part of it all.

Have you discovered any great new local foods lately?

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Monday, October 15, 2012

Weekly Menu Retrospective #83

Welcome to my weekly roundup of the past week's eats. I prefer to report what we ate in the last week, rather than what we're planning to eat in the coming week. Why? The reason is pretty simple: although I usually have a general idea of what we're going to eat in the next week or so, life often unfolds a little differently than planned, and I adjust my menu plan on a near-daily basis to accommodate leftovers and other not-possible-to-plan-ahead circumstances. I find this is the easiest way to ensure that I minimize our family's food waste. I'm also willing to admit that I'm a rather spontaneous cook, given to preparing foods that strike me as the most appealing thing to eat right here and now!

If you'd like a whole book full of inexpensive, quick and kid-approved recipes,
check out my book, Cheap Appétit : The Complete Guide to Feeding Your Family for Less Than $400 a Month (While Eating Better Than You Ever Thought Possible) on Amazon (Amazon.com, Amazon.ca and Amazon UK) and Barnes and Noble.  It's gotten multiple 5 star reviews!! I've included page references to recipes that are in the book in my menu plans so you can locate them quickly. For more details about the book, go here.  

You will note there is a lot of turkey on the menu this week - we celebrated Thanksgiving here in Canada the weekend preceding these meals, so we had a lot of leftover turkey to use up (although I love it so much I don't think there can be such a thing as *too many* leftovers). I also made a big batch of stock to replenish my freezer stash! 

Breakfasts:
Granola (p. 92), Morning Glory Muffins (p. 98), Upside-Down Apple Oven Pancake (p. 95), Cornbread (p. 212)

Lunches: 
leftovers, sandwiches, pizza 

Dinners:

Monday: "Turkey overs" (leftovers from Thanksgiving dinner)

Tuesday: Southwestern Turkey & Pasta Soup (a variation of the recipe on p. 166) and Cornbread (p. 212)

Wednesday: Spaghetti with Creamy Vegetable Meat Sauce

Thursday: Classic Beef Burgers (p. 125) and Easy Oven Fries (p. 194)

Friday: Ham, Broccoli and Mozzarella Egg Puff (variation of the recipe on p. 181)

Saturday: Moroccan Chickpea Stew (p. 159)

Sunday: Turkey Pot Pie (p. 175), Lemon Thyme Roasted Root Vegetables (a variation of this recipe on p. 202), Old-Fashioned Butterscotch Pudding (p. 233)

In keeping with my local and organic challenge, I'd also like to note the local and/or organic items on this week's menu:

Organic: coconut (in granola), coconut oil (in granola), canola oil, raisins (in granola), sunflower and pumpkin seeds (in granola), tortilla chips (for snacks)

Local: potatoes, carrots, onions, apples, broccoli, ground beef (from VG Meats), honey (unpasteurized), milk, eggs, sour cream  

Local AND organic:
sesame seeds (used to top bread loaves), oats (in granola), cornmeal, red peppers, green onions, herbs and cherry tomatoes from our backyard garden

For more great meal ideas, check out Menu Plan Monday at orgjunkie.com.
  
Love what you read here? Find out how you can help support this blog. 

Want to stay connected in between blog posts?

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Saturday, October 6, 2012

Two Easy Things to Do with Fresh Herbs (Before the Frost Sets In)

Aside from a few straggling tomatoes that I'll leave on the vine until we officially get a chance of frost in the forecast, I've harvested just about everything from the garden that I'm going to this year. One exception to that is my herbs, most of which are still growing enthusiastically.

Knowing that I don't have much of a window left before the frost hits, I got myself outside to pick a pile of assorted herbs. Aren't they pretty?



I promptly did two things with them:



1. Packed a couple of clean quart jars with a mix of garlic chives, purple and green basil and oregano. I then poured white vinegar over them and will let them sit for several weeks.

2. Packed a smaller glass jar about half full of lemon thyme to make a honey infusion. I added honey (local, unpasteurized stuff from Dutchman's Gold) to cover the herbs completely, stirring it around a bit to mix. It's now sitting on my kitchen windowsill, where I'll let it brew for a couple of weeks before straining out the herbs. This infused honey will be saved for use as a cough syrup this winter (both honey and thyme are know to help calm a cough).

 
With only a few minutes of effort on my part, in a few weeks I'll have a Christmas gift (herbal vinegar) and a natural cough remedy all ready to go!

What are your favourite end-of-season uses for fresh herbs?

Local readers: If you're reading this in your email or feed reader, I'd like to make sure that you know about my next upcoming "Cheap Appétit" presentation. OPIRG McMaster has kindly sponsored me to speak on the university campus on Wednesday October 10th from 12:30-1:30 p.m. in MUSC 230. Once again I'll have books for sale for $15 each. Please join me if you can!

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Wednesday, October 3, 2012

A Month of ThanksGiving


Thanksgiving is this weekend here in Canada, and this year I've felt inspired to make the whole month a celebration!

2012 has been a rather challenging year for our family in many ways, and I know I'm not alone on this one. A lot of us have had difficult things to deal with in these past months. It can be hard not to get caught up in your own personal struggles and forget that other people have problems, too!

One thing I've learned over the years is that when my own life feels overwhelming, it can really help to take a look around and realize that other people are dealing with at least as much (if not more!) than I am. And that things are easier on all of us when we remember to be as caring and kind as we can be, even in the midst of chaos. We all have good intentions, but often we forget to do the little things we could easily do to make someone's day just a little brighter. Those small gestures can have more impact than we think, and they may just be the thing that brings a smile to someone's face and helps them get through a difficult day with a little more grace.

In that spirit, I wanted to challenge myself to make October an entire month of ThanksGiving. Each day this month, I will either send a "thank you" note to someone who's brightened up my life, or find something useful I can give to a person (or organization) and send it their way.

Seeing as how it's already October 3rd, that means I have already got three days of ThanksGiving to account for:

October 1st: I took a pile of clothes my boys had outgrown (the ones that managed to survive in good condition!) over to my neighbour who has two small boys to grow into them.

October 2nd: I signed up for regular Coffeecology deliveries. I just found out about this local business, which offers Fair Trade, organic coffee that has been locally roasted here in Hamilton, then delivered to your doorstep by bicycle (in reusable Mason jars, no less!) Depending on the variety of coffee you choose, it also supports other programs like Cafe Fem or "bird friendly" migratory habitat preservation. They even donate 50% of their profits to Coffee Kids. I just couldn't resist a project that combines so many aspects of sustainability and social justice, so I'm now signed up for a regular delivery every three weeks (and I will get to enjoy my morning coffee even more now that I know it's supporting so many good programs).

Oct 3rd (today): Last night, thanks to fellow blogger Andrea of Simple Organized Living, I found out about this family in need. Harold Barlow died suddenly of a brain infection, leaving his wife and 5 young children (ages 9 months to 11 years) behind. I can't even begin to imagine what this mom is going through right now! An online fundraiser has been set up for this family, for $5 you can purchase a bundle of e-books from a variety of mom bloggers worth $50. I'm doing this today, and I hope you will consider joining me. The bundle needs to be purchased by tomorrow, so please act quickly! Even if you can't purchase this yourself, please help spread the word by sharing on Facebook and Twitter.

I would love it if you would join me in a "Month of ThanksGiving", and if you do, I'd love to hear about your experience. I plan to post a couple of updates throughout the month, so you'll have plenty of opportunities to share your own ThanksGiving moments!

 Love what you read here? Find out how you can help support this blog. 

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Monday, October 1, 2012

Weekly Menu Retrospective #82

Welcome to my weekly roundup of the past week's eats. I prefer to report what we ate in the last week, rather than what we're planning to eat in the coming week. Why? The reason is pretty simple: although I usually have a general idea of what we're going to eat in the next week or so, life often unfolds a little differently than planned, and I adjust my menu plan on a near-daily basis to accommodate leftovers and other not-possible-to-plan-ahead circumstances. I find this is the easiest way to ensure that I minimize our family's food waste. I'm also willing to admit that I'm a rather spontaneous cook, given to preparing foods that strike me as the most appealing thing to eat right here and now!

If you'd like a whole book full of inexpensive, quick and kid-approved recipes,
check out my book, Cheap Appétit : The Complete Guide to Feeding Your Family for Less Than $400 a Month (While Eating Better Than You Ever Thought Possible) on Amazon (Amazon.com, Amazon.ca and Amazon UK) and Barnes and Noble.  It's gotten multiple 5 star reviews!! I've included page references to recipes that are in the book in my menu plans so you can locate them quickly. For more details about the book, go here.  

Breakfasts:
Granola (p. 92), Chocolate Zucchini Muffins (p. 114), cinnamon apple pancakes, scrambled eggs and toast, peanut butter toast

Lunches: 
leftovers, sandwiches  

Dinners:

Monday: Taco Platters

Tuesday: Indian-Spiced Honey Garlic Chicken (p. 188), Coconut Rice (p. 199), peas and carrots

Wednesday: Pork & Apple Stew (p. 156)

Thursday: Spicy Peanut and Tomato Soup (p. 163)

Friday: Apple and Bacon Baked Beans (p. 177), Cornbread (p. 212)

Saturday: Out at a family party

Sunday: Spinach, Sausage and Mozzarella Egg Puff (variation of recipe on p. 181)

In keeping with my local and organic challenge, I'd also like to note the local and/or organic items on this week's menu:

Organic: coconut (in granola), coconut oil (in granola), canola oil, raisins (in granola), sunflower and pumpkin seeds (in granola), coconut milk, tortilla chips

Local: potatoes, carrots, onions, apples, broccoli, zucchini, ground beef, chicken, pork and sausage (from VG Meats), honey (unpasteurized), milk, eggs, sour cream  

Local AND organic:
sesame seeds (used to top bread loaves), oats (in granola), cornmeal, red peppers, green onions, herbs and cherry tomatoes from our backyard garden

For more great meal ideas, check out Menu Plan Monday at orgjunkie.com.
  
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