Planning This Week's Meals

It's February!

One daughter picked up this Nordic Ware heart-shaped cake pan at
an estate sale, and the other daughter loaned us the Command Hook
to hang it above the stove for February.

I ordinarily don't plan the full week in advance. However, this week's schedule is peppered with appointments and obligations, most of which are midday to early afternoon. So I need to have a plan, and one that will be easier on some days more than others.

On Sunday, I pulled a large beef simmering roast and a whole chicken out from the freezer. The chicken will take 3 days to thaw in the fridge, so I don't plan on roasting it until Wednesday. I won't think too much about actually cooking that meat until then.

The beef roast was thawed enough by Sunday afternoon to slice off some for a beef and vegetable stir fry. The rest of the beef should cover two additional family dinners. Monday is my day at home. This afternoon I'll pot roast it with onions, garlic, thyme, and rosemary. Closer to its finish, I'll add 1 meals worth of carrots and mushrooms to the liquid. In addition to the carrots and mushrooms, I'll steam some frozen broccoli and roast some purple potatoes. While I am cooking in late afternoon, I make a pot of brown rice to use tomorrow. I will also bake a large plum cobbler, using frozen plums, for dessert Monday and Tuesday, and a batch of whole wheat sandwich bread.

On Tuesday, I'll reheat the remaining beef and season it with chili powder, cumin, and home-canned salsa, serving over quickly reheated brown rice. I'll make burrito bowls with the beef and rice, adding canned corn, a fresh tomato, and fresh avocado. We'll have some sort of cabbage slaw on the side and the remaining plum cobbler for dessert. A mostly easy dinner night.

Wednesday morning, I'll season the whole chicken and prepare it for the oven, but keep it in the fridge until the afternoon. When I return from my appointment, I'll roast the chicken, then make a gravy with the drippings and frozen chicken stock. I'll serve hot chicken and gravy sandwiches over slices of whole wheat bread along with frozen mixed vegetables, celery sticks, and a fresh fruit salad.

Thursday is another appointment day, but earlier in the day than the previous two days. As I know myself, I will likely be tired. I'll serve leftover chicken in gravy, a stove-cooked bread, celery, and sage stuffing, steamed fresh carrots, canned green beans, and sautéed spiced apples.

Friday is pizza night. I make a quickie pizza sauce with tomato paste, garlic powder, oregano, red pepper flakes, and salt. The dough is fairly easy and fast to make as well. We'll have whatever frozen vegetables are left in the freezer. and applesauce on the side.

Saturday I'll deal with any remaining chicken from the whole roast chicken and make chicken and dumplings.

So, Monday is my really busy cooking and baking day. But the rest of the week should require less of my hands-on time in the kitchen. I think I can do this.

I do need to get to the store to pick up milk. My appointment on Tuesday takes me in the opposite direction of Walmart. I may find another store nearby to get milk. Or, I may wait until Wednesday to get milk, as that appointment is near Walmart. I have a small amount of fresh and frozen milk remaining and some powdered milk in the pantry. We can go until Saturday without a proper grocery shopping for everything else.

Okay, so the above was all Monday morning's plan. It's now Monday mid-afternoon, after doing a bunch of cooking and baking already. I can see some real life changes I need to make. 

• Monday's pot roast -- I opted for a dried herb mixture instead of going outside and picking fresh thyme and rosemary, which would have required washing the herbs. I saved myself a little time there. I got the bread and cobbler baked, and a batch of rice is in process cooking right now.
• Tuesday's leftover beef turned into bowls -- the roast doesn't look nearly as big today after pot-roasting. There's really enough for 1 1/2 family meals and not 2, as far as beef protein goes. I don't want to cook beans. (Time) So, I boiled a bunch of eggs. It may sound weird, but chopped eggs added to the bowls will boost the protein and hopefully will taste just fine once salsa is on everything. Also, I found a green bell pepper in the fridge. I'll chop part of that and add to the bowls along with tomato chunks, brown rice, canned corn, and avocado chunks.
• Wednesday -- there's a good chance the celery will be all gone by Wednesday. So I need a back-up plan for this vegetable. I do have lots of cabbage still. So, if there's no celery, I will do another cabbage salad, changing up the dressing and any other fresh veggies I want to add.
• Thursday I'm good. Even if we're out of fresh celery, I still have frozen garden celery I can use in the stove-top stuffing. 
• No changes needed for Friday's pizza night or Saturday's chicken and dumplings.
• I still haven't determined when I'll pick up milk. We went through the last of the gallon jug this morning and are halfway through the frozen milk. I made a jar of powdered milk for those wanting to use milk in something. Tuesday, right after my midday appointment would be the best time. But that appt is a dental one. I'm having two older fillings drilled out and replaced. They're both falling apart. My problem with planning on stopping by a store after the appointment is I'm usually pretty frazzled after any dental appointment. Wednesday's appointment is more business, and I could easily pick up milk on my way home from that one. But I don't know if our milk supply will hold out until then. The problem with asking anyone else to pick up milk this week is everyone else is as busy as I am this week. It looks like I'll have to wait and see when is the right time to go out for milk.

That's my plan for this week's meals. I tend to prefer simple and basic meals for everyday evenings. I imagine I'll need to tweak small parts as the week progresses. But at least I have a plan, and I won't have to spend time each day trying to figure out what to make each evening.

I know many of us here don't make weekly meal plans on a regular basis. But do you plan meals a week at a time during busy periods? 

Cheap & Cheerful Suppers and End of Month Grocery Shopping

Friday
scratch pepperoni pizza on sourdough crust
tomato and avocado wedges
roasted broccoli and cauliflower

Saturday
vegetable fried rice topped with beef and broccoli

Sunday
burrito bowls -- beans, corn, rice, avocado, tomatoes, salsa

Monday
tuna-macaroni salad
steamed mixed vegetables
tangerines

Tuesday
beef and bean chili
scratch cornbread
carrot-raisin salad
stewed prunes

Wednesday
Mexican-ish salad -- shredded cabbage topped with shredded beef, pinto beans, cheese, tomato, avocado, with salsa, mayo, vinegar, avocado oil dressing
leftover cornbread
pumpkin pudding

Thursday
spinach and onion frittata
oven-roasted carrots, purple potatoes, mushrooms

apple and crabapple sauce

Shopping the week

I use a specific organic whole wheat flour that isn't carried in most of my local stores. And it can be pricey when bought at either of the two stores that do sell it. I ad found it on sale at one of the stores this past fall and bought several bags (5-lb bags). But now it's no longer on sale. Fortunately we have the internet to help us find good deals on specific products. I found this flour at an online store that I've used before with two stackable coupons. Because I bought 4 bags (plus some magnesium), I received free shipping. At the double coupon price, my flour was less than what I'd found locally on sale. Spent $26.02. 

I also went to WinCo for a big stock-up. I don't have a photo this time. It was too cold to take my time. I just wanted to get everything put away and grab a hot cup of tea as quickly as I could that day. Anyway, this is what I bought:

4 small bags frozen mixed vegetables (still on sale)

2 large bags frozen broccoli cuts (cuts are less expensive than florets, but you still get lots of chopped floret pieces)

2 heads of cabbage

5 lbs carrots (they were sold out of 10-lb bags today)

2 bundles celery

2 3-lb bags (that really weighed 3.5 lbs ea, so I got 7 lbs total) of onions

8 large oranges

2 lb bag mandarins

12 Fuji apples (still crisp and juicy)

4 large Roma tomatoes (so much more flavorful than the slicing tomatoes I bought in December)

4 avocados

several bananas, maybe 7 or 8

4 Bartlett pears (same price per pound as apples)

3 green peppers

1/2 lb mushrooms

1 gallon whole milk

2 lb block cheddar cheese

quart Greek whole milk yogurt

2 dozen eggs

1/2 lb pepperoni (for pizzas, enough for 3 large. I bag it up into 3 smaller bags and freeze until needed.)

1 large bag frozen pork breakfast sausage (my husband has these every day)

about 1.25 lbs bulk raisins

1/2 lb bulk chia seeds

1/2 lb bulk peanut butter powder (I put this in smoothies as well as mix with a little water to eat by spoon as a hi-protein snack)

3/4 lb bulk dried apricots

1/3 lb bulk almond flour

small bag bulk flax seed meal

2 pints fresh DIY grind peanut butter

1 lb yeast

5 lbs organic all-purpose flour (same brand as whole wheat, but easy to find in stores and a better price)

1 bottle mustard (on sale this month -- I'll buy a couple more next time to put away for summer cook-outs)

I spent $106.59 at WinCo. With the online shopping, I spent $132.61 this week. For the month of January (one other WinCo trip, one Walmart trip, plus pro-rated portion of quarterly beef deliveries), we spent $404.14. That's just over my upper grocery limit. Not horrible. I'll see how grocery spending goes next month.

My normal monthly range is $375 to $400. However, this does feel fairly typical for us now. We've made a few changes to our diet in the last few years. We're eating higher quality beef, more produce, and adding in a couple of individual items (like the full fat Greek yogurt, greens powder, beet powder, and organic flour). It all adds up. It was just 6 years ago that we were spending about $250 per month for the four of us. Hmph. So back to this month, spending about the same as November and December each, but no holiday to buy for. However, produce prices are also higher in winter, and we've run out of our own garden fresh produce by this point in the garden cycle. 

What was on your menu this past week? If you lost power this past week, I'd be interested in hearing how you managed meals. In fact for anyone who has lost power before at any time, how did you do meals? 

For my household, our power is usually restored with a few hours to overnight. Even so, we can cook here without electricity, as our stove-top is gas and can be lit with a match or lighter. Before our gas stovetop, I was able to heat water and soup in a power outage, using candles in a shallow pan in the oven on the bottom rack, then placing a pan of water or soup on the rack just above.