It was hard to even type February 1. January ends this weekend. How time flies.
Here’s the menu or next week. There will not be daily updates. Except for the menus and the notes below, you’re on your own.
I will have extra Chicken, Broccoli, Rice Casserole, Beef Kalops and Shepherd’s Pie for the freezer.
Monday:
Roasted Chicken
Baked Potatoes
Spinach Salad with Hot Bacon Dressing
Not part of the menu plan but I always bake extra potatoes because I like potato salad made with baked potatoes and I love having cold baked potatoes to chop, toss with butter or olive oil, add seasonings and bake or air fry for either breakfast potatoes or a side dish.
Notes:
- Roast your own chicken or buy a rotisserie chicken.
- Cook/buy enough chicken to have two cup left over or Wednesday’s meal.
Tuesday:
Instant Pot Swedish Beef Kalops
Mashed Potatoes
Steamed Broccoli
Notes:
- For the allspice, instead of berries, I use just a dash of ground allspice. It isn’t a flavor I love added to meat but just a hint is good.
- Cook extra broccoli. You’ll need it for tomorrow’s casserole.
Wednesday:
Chicken, Rice, Broccoli & Cheese Casserole
Garlic Parmesan Roasted Carrots
Notes:
- For most of us, we should end up with leftovers of this caserole for the freezer. I divide mine before cooking and place one in the freezer.
- Cook extra carrots to add to Friday’s Soup.
Thursday:
Shepherd’s Pie
Salad of your choice
Notes:
- There’s corn, peas, carrot, mashed potatoes and meat. What else is needed?
- This makes enough for at least one freezer dish.
Friday:
Winter Squash Soup
Tuna Melt (or any sandwich you want)
Notes:
Winter squash soup is so creamy and thick! You can use any winter squash. I’ll use butternut that I grew in Texas and brought with me. If you’ve never had winter squash soup, please give it a try, even if you don’t consider yourself a squash fan.
Liz says
For the last week or so, I’ve been busy in my back yard trying to get ice storm damage down to the curb for the second pick up round. I thought I had until mid-February to get it down there, but the truck came by on Thursday. Oh well, I got the big pieces down to the street. I can relax and get the rest done over the next month or so. I might just rent a chipper to get rid of the small branches.
So, I finally went to the grocery store. The last time I was at Walmarts was Dec 20th! My meal plan for the week includes chicken breasts (one breast for one meal and chop the rest for a salad mix for lunches). I’ll freeze the thighs for soup later in the month.
My local store has been increasing their lamb selections. I bought three packs of a seasoned lamb leg. It’s vacuum sealed with seasoning so it is easy to freeze and then take out a pack for three meals for me. I bought lots of root veggies to roast to go with the lamb (potato, sweet potato, carrots, turnips, onion). This is the second time that the store did not have any rutabagas to roast. I also bought a larger boneless leg section and I plan to try a lamb stew – The meat is in a sealed package, so I’ll freeze it for now, especially since I need to get some Guinness to use a part of the liquid.
So, tomorrow will be some cooking as well as packaging stuff into smaller containers. I might try cooking a bunch of rice to use as sides for some of the meal. And, of course, I need to pressure cook some eggs for the week. Meal planning & bulk cooking is a good thing!
Judy Laquidara says
I can’t even remember the last time I was inside a store. I spent a good bit of time today picking up sticks in the yard too but I pile them for Vince to burn when he’s back since we have no debris pickup around here.
Yes, I love meal planning and bulk cooking too . . but you know that.
Your meals sound delicious!
Liz says
Re Walmart – I try to go early to avoid crowds and everyone is wearing their masks. I’m seeing a lot more employees filling orders. Their carts hold 8 collection boxes, but I don’t think they are doing 8 orders at a time since I’m sure some orders are large. But, the store is close to me so if there are a lot of cars in the lot, I can always not go in and continue on my other errands. I then just drive around to get the car charged.
Re debris pickup – right before Halloween, central OK had a very bad 2-3 day ice storm. I lost only one branch on the first day and then it just continued dropping branches. Then, we had high winds and more branches came down. I was almost clear in one area of my backyard when still another branch came down. I’ll get a tree service to take down the last remaining broken branches as well as take down some trees. I have 5 oaks in the front yard and 20 in the back and I have been thinning them out during the years!
The storm damage was so bad that OKC and Edmond had special debris pickups. Edmond does 2 rounds of pickup and the wood is chipped and available for free pickup.
You plan to get so many rows of knitting or cross-stitch done per day – I am currently planning to do so many bags of leaves & twig collection per day so I always have full trash bins. But not today, gusts are up to 30 mph and it’s hard to work when you worry about the next limb to fall.