Menu for Week 5/31

Hi all,
Here’s my meal plan for this week. Two of the dishes from last week I scratched. So I am using them this week. This week the CSA farm starts, too. PSYCHED!

Sunday – Still deciding but leaning towards grilled pork chops. Maybe this – Lemon-Tarragon Grilled Pork Chops with grilled zucchini?

Monday - Chicken Breasts Stuffed with Artichokes, Lemon, and Goat Cheese

Tuesday – I’m meeting some friends for a dinner picnic. Maybe a sandwich from the local cafe?

Wednesday – Turkey-Jasmine Rice Meatballs with Baby Bok Choy - I’m glad I held off on this one since we’re getting bok choy in the farm share this week!

Thursday – Summer Pappardelle with Tomatoes, Arugula, and Parmesan – This is one of my all time FAVORITE recipes. It is such a clean, fresh and delicious dish. Plus, the fresh arugula from the farm share is timely. And I happen to have some lemon pappardelle in the cupboard. Whoohoo!

Friday – Not sure yet. Maybe go out or have some grilled – Chicken & Chorizo Burgers that we have in the freezer

Saturday – Whatever we don’t do for Friday.

Ciao for now everyone!

Menu for Week 5/25

I thought it would be interesting to post my weekly menu plans. Sometimes I get it together - sometimes I don't.

Last night I checked out Myrecipes.com and created a menu and shopping list through that site. The shopping list feature was very helpful, user friendly and saved me quite a bit of time creating a grocery list. Too bad I forgot my fancy grocery list when I went to the grocery store (ARGH!). Anywho….here’s my meal plan for the week (getting a late start of course).

BTW, I’m trying out some new recipes so my next blog entry might be a rating of how it all went.

Monday – BBQ at the in-laws – whohoo!
Tuesday – Lasagna-Chicken Florentine
Wednesday – Black bean, corn and zucchini enchiladas
Thursday - Turkey-Jasmine Rice Meatballs with Baby Bok Choy (I’m hoping to find the baby Bok Choys but if not I’m prepared to saute up some carrots, sugar snap peas and water chestnuts)
Friday - Chicken Breasts Stuffed with Artichokes, Lemon, and Goat Cheese
Saturday – Out
Sunday – Winging it – maybe leftover Cinncinati Chili or takeout.

Ciao for now.

The Garden is Here...and now we wait.

This year for Mother's Day, I asked my beloved for a raised garden bed. And behold - my wonderful hubby made me one!

I wanted to attempt my first vegetable, herb and mini flower garden this year with my oldest daughter. We mainly planted seeds but we also planted a few as plants. For vegetables we planted, carrots, peas, onions, broccoli, lettuce and arugula; for herbs, we planted basil, parsley, tarragon, cilantro, garlic chives, rosemary and chamomille; and for flowers (mainly to help keep bugs away), we planted dahlias, zinnia, sunflowers, petunias & nasturtums; and for fun we planted sugar baby watermelon. Fingers & toes crossed. And yes, I know you're suppose to plant things at certain times, etc and in nice little rows x amount of inches apart, blah, blah, blah. But I decided to do it the Nik way and toss seeds in some dirt and add some water. We'll see if anything actually makes it to fruition.

Oh, I did make a square foot grid though in order to utilize the space more efficiently!

Soooooooooo....this afternoon I discovered some green stuff sprouting up from the soil!!! It's the lettuce, arugula, and basil! WWWWAAAAAHHHOOOO!! I was so excited that I did a happy dance around the garden bed! Un-oh, I guess that means I need to get a gun and ammo ready for the "rabbit & deer prevention program"....kidding of course.

(aren't you impressed with my text-on-photo capability?)

Spring, Compost Bin & Pork Recipe

Happy Spring in New England! So glad it is finally here. Snow is done (I hope), the forsythia has bloomed and is now turning green again, and the daffodils and tulips are plentiful. Ahhhh, I love it! And I love it even more because it means that CSA season is right around the corner. I cannot wait - fresh veggies from the farm (can you see me doing the happy dance?).

In addition, our family has taken a serious step to having our first vegetable garden. We've purchased the wood for a raised bed. Now we just need to assemble it. I was also able to get my hands on some good rich soil from the CSA farm that we are a part of. The farmer was kind enough to let me take some of their extra. It's nice compost mixed soil. Lovely. Now I just need to get the bed done so the soil can go in it. Maybe we'll have it this year, maybe not. Stay tuned.

Last week I picked up our new compost bin! Who knew I would be so excited over it but I am. It's all set up and already about 1/3 of the way full. Whohoo!! Go compost, it's your birthday, gonna party like it's your birthday.... And I'm looking forward to feeding my veggies wonderful compost. Oh right, I need to get that bed made first - getting a little ahead of myself

I'm also excited about our rain barrel that is en route. I will get to pick it up next week. I'm excited about the idea of it but I have to be honest....the barrel is an ugly plastic, blue barrel. Guess where we get the most run off rain? Yep, right smack dab in the front of the house. Nice. I'm hoping it will really rain this week so I can find another spot to put it.

Oh I almost forget...recipe time. I made this awesome pork dish for dinner this evening. It was one of those recipes that I made once, loved it but then forgot about it. I'm glad I found it again because it was yummy. I got it from a Cooking Light magazine from a million years ago and it goes something like this:

Cuban-Style Picadillo Pork

Ingredients:

• 1 lb ground pork (i'm sure you could do ground turkey, chicken or even beef)


• 1 small/medium onion


• A big ass clove of garlic - or maybe 3 smaller ones


• 1 Tbl chili powder


• some salt


• 2 tsp of pumpkin spice


• 28 oz diced tomatoes (if you only have a 15oz one that's fine too...it just won't be as tomatoey - yes I made up that word).


• 1/2-1C raisins

Directions:
Saute the onions and garlic then add the ground pork and cook until it is browned. Add the rest of the ingredients and cook for another 5 minutes or so. Put over a bun and make it like a sloppy joe OR (and this is my preference) put it over some cooked rice. Another idea is to make it for empanada filling. Savor and enjoy.

Done....and yes, I took that photo.