We have reached another low point in the energy and cheer I have available to devote to meal planning. Sometimes I just viciously hate everything to do with meal planning and preparing food, and this is one of those times. Perhaps that has something to do with the fact that today is YET ANOTHER day off from school. We haven’t even had any snow days, just pre-planned days off. Eight, since the beginning of January. She’s had only three weeks of school with no days off. I don’t know why this is making me so cranky today. Usually, I kind of like a day off from school. We get to sleep in a bit, Carla and I get to chill together or run errands, sometimes there’s a playdate. Today she gets to accompany me to acupuncture though, which sounds like torture for everyone involved. And then we will go to the grocery store, which is agony for Carla. (At least, until we get there. She’s very cheerful about helping and asking to buy a million things; it’s just the anticipation of grocery shopping that makes her wail as though I threatened to incinerate all her toys.) Maybe, to balance out all the suffering, we will make brownies. (Yes, I am still trying to get protein into Carla at every turn – as well as calcium, but that is not going well – and also I am still trying to like baked oatmeal. We WILL be adding chocolate chips to this recipe.)
Anyway, day off or no, meal planning grumble or no, we must eat. I think I will do the thing where I pick maybe three meals and then make black bean tacos the other days. My husband will eat a ham sandwich on black bean taco days. Carla, as you know, eats a stunning variety of foods including and pretty much limited to chicken nuggets, salmon, ground beef tacos, steak, and two very specific types of lunch meat, so she will eat one of those things while my husband and I eat whatever it is I decide on.
For lunches, I can drum up slightly more enthusiasm. I have recently rediscovered how delicious artichokes are. They are currently plentiful and also a whopping $3.99 each, but they are enormous and I find them to be such a delicious and satisfying lunch. I will see if I can buy two this week, and then maybe make a batch of Hungarian mushroom soup to eat on the other days.
Dinners for the Week of February 20-26
- Chicken Tikka Masala with Cauliflower and Peas (inspired by Lisa): This sounds really tasty and warming. Probably my husband will require an added chicken breast, but I can certainly do that for him.
- Miso Ginger Soy Salmon Rice Bowls: For awhile, I felt like I kept coming across yummy sounding meals with miso as an ingredient, so when I saw some miso paste at Trader Joe’s I snapped it up. And then of course I couldn’t find any meals that featured miso. But this recipe does feature miso and it sounds really good.
- Chicken and Broccoli Stir Fry: This is technically called “skinny chicken and broccoli stir fry” but that makes me think of anorexic roosters, so I deleted the “skinny.” Despite the ridiculous name, this sounds really delicious and fuels my recent obsession with broccoli slaw. I think I will also throw in a handful of water chestnuts, which I LOVE. (My husband does not love them, so his portion will be water chestnut free.)
Wow, just deciding on those three recipes felt like removing my own fingernails with pliers. Hopefully I will feel more invigorated for meal planning next week.
Have you tried miso before? What about broccoli slaw? Does meal planning also currently feel like torture for you?
life of a doctor's wife 
My kids had a full day of school last Friday for the first time in SEVEN weeks. They had 2 delayed starts due to weather, 1 planned cancellation and 3 snow days on Friday’s. I have feelings about this. Today they’re off (Heritage/Family Day here in Canada).
I rarely make new-to-us meals. I love eating, but getting overly creative is beyond my energy stores right now. So we eat a lot of favourites on repeat! And one of those is baked oatmeal. We’ll often have that for a lunch-time meal if the kids are home. My husband doesn’t like it but the kids and I do. (This is the recipe I follow; sometimes I add a handful of chia seeds, my friend will dice up apple into it, or add shredded carrot; https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/baked-oatmeal/). I definitely cook it for a lot less time than the recipe calls for and often sub in oil for the melted butter.
Even with trying new things, I still feel like we rotate a lot of Tried and True Faves. But I do grow weary of them.
A full week for the first time in seven weeks!!!! Why are none of these children in school?!?!
ANOREXIC ROOSTERS.
Hungarian mushroom soup! I haven’t had that in decades. There was a little deli near a place I used to work – in 1997-98 – that made the best Hungarian mushroom soup and I would have that for lunches sometimes. I just looked at the recipe and wondered what it would be like if I made it dairy-free. Hmmm. You always link to the best things! Thanks babe!
As for school, this is a five-day weekend for J, what with Teacher’s Conventions and Family Day. Before that he had almost all of January off for exam break – he had two exams in that time, and I think three days of school in all of January. Then he was back Jan 30, and had Feb 3 off for PD Day. What. Even. We have a trip planned in March (to Maui!) for spring break and I just saw that the week before spring break he has a Friday off? WHAT. We do not get snow days here, this is just scheduled days off.
WHAT EVEN INDEED, NICOLE. I think that Hungarian Mushroom Soup would be fabulous dairy-free. Let me know if you try it!
Yes torture! I think that the secret is planning some but not ALL of your meals. As in 3 planned dinners = a complete meal plan so congratulations on doing it for another week!!!
I’ve never gotten miso but I’m curious and it’s just a matter of time.
Hahaha – thanks, Birchie. And yes, I think you need to jump into the miso pool and see what it’s like.
Meal planning isn’t too bad here; I have a list of tried and true meals that *most* of the family likes. For the one young holdout, who dislikes any form of stew or soup, we make a burger or a grilled cheese. I send that list via Google to the family and they get to vote on five things for Mon-Friday. Then my husband and I decide who is making dinner what nights, and each kid has their specialty, so we plan it around their schedules. It usually works out. Saturday and Sunday nights are always homemade personal pizza nights, we cook enough beef and sausage and shred enough cheese to last us those nights so nobody is cooking on Sunday.
Our meals are very plebian and simple; tonight we’re going for deli chicken from the grocery store, so my husband isn’t cooking; Tuesday will be hamburger stew (Kid #1), Wednesday will be burgers and tater tots (Kid #2), Thursday will be taco night (Kid #3)–he just cooks beef, heats up refried beans, cooks some rice, puts out all the fixings and people make their own–Friday will be ham and bean soup, which I haven’t made in a while but people remember fondly. I may make cornbread to go with it.
This sounds like a great system! And I love your personal pizza nights. Very fun.
First, my daughter and I just had a discussion how getting her to go or do anything is awful but she absolutely loves being places and doing things. It’s the anticipation that causes, in her words, “the sassiest of sassiness”….
We use broccoli slaw as a stir fry accelerator; it’s a game changer on nights when chopping or vegetables seem like stop signs. We also use miso a lot (soup, chicken marinade – even once in brownies) – but my guy and I like food dares to keep meal planning from being a slog, haha!
This is school vacation week for us, so meal planning definitely feels like torture, as does the feeling that we feel more busy even though half our activities are on pause (I took every other day off, which isn’t a good flow for me)….
Love the term “stir fry accelerator”! That is exactly what it is, isn’t it? Good luck with the week (semi) off!
I’m even less enthusiastic about meal planning that usual since we all just recovered from a stomach virus. I know we need to eat, but I literally can’t think of anything I want (that I’m willing to go to the trouble of cooking.) We also, annoyingly, have a bunch of leftovers in the fridge which probably aren’t good anymore since we didn’t eat for a few days, and now SOMEONE has to go through and throw those away. Sigh. It’s going to be a sad dinnertime.
Yes, my daughter is off of school today! But I have to work. Luckily she’s 14 so can stay home by herself, which she doesn’t mind at all. Good luck with the acupuncture and grocery shopping!
Oh yes, cooking after a stomach virus is rough. I hope you find something soothing and simple for everyone.
I hate menu planning, too, though I usually enjoy cooking, once the decisions are made.
I am printing that Hungarian mushroom soup recipe. I made the quinoa-black bean enchilada bake and I think it turned out well. Beth liked it, but North wasn’t at dinner that night, so it didn’t go in my folder of recipes all three of us ate. Worth trying again, though.
Oh I’m glad you liked the enchilada bake! And let me know what you think of the soup.
Meal planning is the worst. My almost 12 year old daughter has recently decided she is going to be vegetarian. Her list of acceptable vegetarian foods includes eggs, grilled cheese, Mac and cheese, pizza, and veggie burgers. She has tried tofu, but has not enjoyed it much so far. Other than occasionally baked beans, she will not eat beans. To top it off, my husband is very much against making her a separate meal – she can make herself something, but it has to be healthy. I am totally struggling!!
Oh my gosh that does sound like a struggle! Especially with such a limited list of items. My kid occasionally says she wants to be a vegetarian, and I say, “Okay, but that means you have to eat XYZ and you can’t eat ABC” and so far she has never gotten past the initial wanting.
Originally she thought she would still eat bacon, but nope – even that is out. I do sneak in a bit of chicken broth when I make risotto, with her ok (for now)
I love miso. I love broccoli slaw. And I love artichokes.
If it weren’t for the cilantro and green pepper issues, we would be twins! Tell me what you use miso and broccoli slaw for please. I need inspiration.
Well I use them for nothing because I still live with the rest of my family. But if I didn’t, I would eat them all the time.
Oh hahahahaha! Families!
Carla and Cooper have the same diet. I have just given up including him in dinners and stock his weird assortment of acceptable foods. He is okay with chicken apple sausage right now, so that’s a win, I guess **eye roll**
YUP. It is calories and has a reasonable approximation of nutritional balance (usually).
Do you ever Great British Bake Off? There was a contestant named Crystelle who used miso in what seemed like every one of her bakes. I always think of her when I think of miso!
Meal planning around here is also three meals a week and then leftovers. We’re organized about it, but it is just an endless chore.
I love GBBO but didn’t know about Crystelle/miso! I will look into it.
Well, it’s weird – my son’s school was open today…on a Federal Holiday. I’m beginning to think that school district completely disregards any and all holidays, since it always seems like he’s working on whatever random holiday.
I do not meal plan, as you know – and I’m fairly certain I would hate it. The Husband doesn’t meal plan either; he just wings it usually.
That is weird! Honestly, winging it sounds pretty great right now.
I don’t know, Suzanne…it seems to me (as much as I’d hate it) that having some kind of plan would be better than nothing…
I do like meal planning, but my window for it is very small. If it isn’t done by Sunday morning, I kind of give up. But I don’t like *not* having a plan. So I try really hard. Plus, when I’m not home to make dinner most nights I feel like I owe it to the family to have put some thought into it.
I love miso! Though every recipe only uses a tablespoon at a time, so it takes a while for me to get through a bag of it. I mostly use it in soup or in a salad dressing/ sauce. When I make ramen, I use miso instead of the MSG ladened flavor packet.
Oh also I love these miso sweet potatoes from a restaurant here in DC: https://www.washingtonian.com/2009/10/07/recipe-sleuth-teaisms-miso-glazed-sweet-potatoes/
I made some vegan miso brownies once (From Meera Soha’s East https://www.theguardian.com/food/2019/jan/26/meera-sodha-recipe-vegan-salted-miso-brownies). I think I was the only one who like those.
Oooh those miso sweet potatoes sound so yummy!
I hope you liked the chicken tikka! That’s a favorite for us! Meal planning is so so for us. We do not factor our kids into meal planning since their diet is even more limited than Carla’s!! So they pretty much always eat something different than we do. I don’t love that but it’s what we need to do in this stage of life.
I didn’t make much this week since I am traveling. The boys will get pizza tonight. I hope and pray I get back on Thursday as planned. They are saying we might get as much as 20” of snow! I am feeling a lot of guilt knowing my husband will likely be snowed in with the boys on Thursday. I suggested he consider seeing if a 12yo on the block who expressed interest in babysitting would want to be a ‘mother’s helper’ and then he reminded me that kids don’t really get snow days anymore – they have an ‘e learning day’ instead. Womp Womp.
Oh gosh, twenty inches!! I hope you make it home seamlessly!
All of your recipes sound great, including the black bean tacos and ham sandwiches! I normally don’t “plan” meals, although I am really a planner in most things in life. I generally have staples and work around those in order to do the least amount of work possible! For example, I am happy to eat chicken every day, so I may cook up a batch of chicken thigh meat on Sunday and then have…chicken stir fry on Monday, chicken tacos on Tuesday, chicken and broccoli on Wednesday and so on.
I can often use most ingredients more than one day. I don’t know if you have ever seen Alone, but just like surviving in the wild, I don’t bring it unless it has more than one use! I also definitely make more than I need for dinner and that is my lunch for the next day or so. However, I know some people do not like leftovers or get bored eating the same thing more than once, but I am not one of them!
Hahaha – love the comparison to Alone! I am TERRIBLE at buying multi-use items! I don’t know what my issue is because it makes a lot of sense!
I would LOVE to be a person who can just buy staples and work around those — and I think I definitely got better at that during 2020, when I had to buy two weeks’ of groceries at a time and really needed everything to stretch a lot. But often I feel like I just stare at the contents of the fridge and think, “chicken? what goes with chicken?” until we are all starving to death. So planning definitely works better with my brain, I guess. Sometimes.
The only reason I still plan meals — or, the one meal we can eat together as a family during the week, with our schedules lately — is so that I know what to buy at the grocery store on Sundays. I default wayyyy too often to the teenager’s whim, which is usually Chick Fil A or Chipotle after volleyball practice. I’ve never tried miso, and I love broccoli slaw. I used to make a salad with it, using mayo and dill pickles (YES) as a dressing. It was yummy. Oh, found it: https://www.wholelifechallenge.com/creamy-crunchy-vinegar-vegetable-slaw/
I think my husband would love that salad! Thanks for the recipe. 🙂
No school for the whole week over here in Massachusetts – it’s so everybody can go skiing, unless you have seven kids and that would cost you a mortgage payment 🙂 It’s a staycation for us! I’ve never cooked an artichoke, would love a photo and recipe post sometime. Happy almost birthday!
A ski week – I love it! And omg Colleen, the cost of skiing is RIDICULOUS.
Here is a post all about prepping an artichoke! Let me know if you try one — I love them so much. https://lifeofadoctorswife.wordpress.com/2019/03/01/treat-foods-how-to-cook-an-artichoke/
Why so many days off from school? Seems really weird to me too.
Anorexic roosters? Good lord, I hope that’s NOT a thing.
I was looking for miso at the grocery store last week and could not find it!
I’m kind of glad to know that you also hate meal planning. It’s the worst part of my day. I generally plan our meals an hour before I start them. LOL. Still, it’s not fun.
The other day, I saw a meme showing a couple getting married, and the man’s vows were: I vow to eat whatever you decide for the rest of my life.
Awww, that is hilarious. That is definitely my husband. He is not picky at all, and very kindly eats whatever I make, even when things are a big flop, and always says, “Thank you so much for making dinner.” Which is a really nice thing to hear after all the HOOPLA involved!
I am not much of a meal planner. But if all goes well I only need to do that four nights of the week. The rest I can just eat what I want.
I love miso. I just used up all my stash so I should probably replace. Good thing I am on the way to the grocery store…
I loathe and deplore anything called ‘Skinny’, especially now when it seems so last decade – like what, are you going to call stuff ‘fattening’ now too? Sorry, personal pet peeve. I also bought miso and then couldn’t remember what to use it for, then used it once and now can’t decide if it’s expired or not. I also bought some weird huge dried peppers and can’t remember what I bought them for. I really need to keep better track of this stuff. My daughter is home for study break and asked for salmon for tomorrow, and my husband sort of prides himself on his lemon garlic skillet salmon so whoo-hoo, I’m off the hook for that.
I, too, have some dried (hot) peppers clattering around in my kitchen somewhere. Why? What were they for?
All your planned meals sound really good! I have not quite acquired a taste for most Indian food except for tika masala. I may try this recipe you linked to. I love salmon — but have never cooked it cubed or with miso…something different! We do stirfry often here but have never used brocolli slaw; I may have to remedy that — and use it in place of the fresh soba noodles I use.
Have you tried miso before? Yes, and it didn’t charm me but I didn’t hate it.
What about broccoli slaw? I’ve had it and don’t understand why the recipe doesn’t call for cabbage, like a normal slaw. I like broccoli like, you know, as broccoli.
Does meal planning also currently feel like torture for you? No, but I don’t do it as detailed as you do. I just think of a few things we might like to eat, buy the some ingredients, then make them happen whenever.
Well Ally, you make it seem so easy!!!
I actually love meal planning (don’t hate me)… we do eat the same meals in rotation for a while and just sub 1-2 meals every week, but it totally works for us. We’re not picky eaters though, so it might be a bit easier to throw things together.