Fish

Flounder filets, baked in an aluminum foil packet. Broccoli, bread, and tater tots for the boys. Chicken tenders for the pre-teen, fish portions for the mid-kid. Chocolate pie for dessert; yum.

TMOTH fixed the cookbookshelf this weekend and I've been slowly getting the cookbooks put back, hopefully in some sort of order. I've rediscovered some old favorites in the process, and a few duplicates. My very favorite favorites are the church-lady cookbooks (this includes the Junior League, Eastern Star, etc. cookbooks), which is where the chocolate pie recipe came from.

I also have a lot of pamphlets that were just stuck on the shelves that I'd like to organize in some way - but I haven't decided on what might work the best.

Quesadillas

This time we had some leftover taco meat to put in one of them. TMOTH made a pizza-dilla, which the kids like OK (not me), and a couple of plain cheese. Not the planned soup, but an easy dinner anyway.

I'd made an apple pie last night, so we could have that for dessert.

Ham and hash browns

Mid-kid suggested this one - TMOTH filled it out with home-made pita chips, baby carrots, and apple slices. I also made a big pot of hominy, but I'm the only one who eats it - I put 9 half-cup containers in the refrigerator and freezer.

TMOTH also got chicken to make garlic chicken in the crock-pot tomorrow, and the pre-teen suggested steak for Wednesday. I'll be ready for soup Thursday, and probably pizza Friday.

Grilled pork chops

With fried apples, broccoli, squash, and homemade bread. (A nice dinner after leftover pot pie on Thursday and leftover pot roast soup on Friday.)

The squash was a nice surprise. We got a vacuum sealer last Christmas, and I vacuumed a few bags of squash from the garden this summer. This was the first I'd had of the frozen squash, and it came out nearly like fresh, certainly good enough for me to freeze a lot more squash this summer.

The bread was a surprise too. I made the dough in the bread machine using 2/3 white flour and 1/3 spelt flour, then baked it in regular loaf pans. I'd predicted the kids wouldn't even taste it, since it was darker than white bread, but they all just gobbled it down. We have less than half a loaf left, so more bread baking is in the near future.

(Leftover) lasagna

With garlic bread made from commercial french bread. (Not nearly as good as the breadsticks, but easier on a worknight.)

TMOTH made a wonderful pot roast last night. He's much more creative than I am, and put celeriac in, which was a terrific addition. YUM. We've got enough for soup later this week.

Menu planning:

Wednesday: Boys are at daycare Wednesday night dinner. I do NOT want to eat out, but pre-teen does...I told her she could pick what we were having for dinner, but she's still not happy.

Thursday: Pre-teen has to be at the local high school at 7 for a concert, so dinner needs to be easy...either waffles or leftover pot pie.

Friday: Either waffles or leftover pot pie (depending on the Thursday decision) or leftover pot roast soup.

Saturday/Sunday: Depends on whether they fixed my payroll problems at work - the system ate me and I was hopefully restored in time to be paid on Friday. If not, we'll be scavenging the freezer.

Turkey pot pie

Found some turkey in the freezer (from last Thanksgiving, maybe?) that was fine when thawed and made into a pot pie. TMOTH made brownies for dessert.

I spent a good chunk of time today resurrecting some cast iron, a breakfast skillet TMOTH got from his mom when he finished graduate school and a tiny (6" or so) skillet that came from I don't know where. The breakfast skillet is in good shape; the jury is still out on the tiny skillet.

HOMEMADE lasagna

It was good! I hid vegetables in the sauce and no comments from either kids or TMOTH. Plenty of leftovers from the one I baked - and I made 3 since it's just as easy to make 3 as it is to make one. I also have a lot of lasagna noodles left over that I need to figure out something to do with. Also home-made breadsticks - both garlic and plain (mid-kid doesn't like garlic much - he tried the garlic ones, but preferred the plain ones).

Potato soup

It's been a grey rainy day here in the suburbs, so potato soup seemed like a good way to warm up for today - it's supposed to be in the 70s tomorrow, so a salad for dinner, or maybe grilling out, sounds pretty appetizing!

After a long break - Mexican

Tacos for me and TMOTH and quesadillas for the kids.

We had a good holiday, lots of cookie-baking and traveling and eating with family. Now it's back to the grind. I haven't planned ahead very well but will think about it over the weekend.

My brother and his significant other gave me a couple of new cookbooks - Rachael Ray and Paula Deen - that I haven't had a chance to really look at yet. Maybe they'll be inspiration.