Christina Shoup

First, thank you for all the kind words and feedback on the first WORDY post! I promise to never write such a long post. It was no surprise that from your comments, many of us get stuck in the same dinner rotation from week to week and everyone, including me, needs some fresh recipes every now and then.

We are just back from beautiful Lake Tahoe where we did a mix of cooking in (yes, I had a meal plan on a scrap of paper on vacation!) and eating out. As true with all vacations, we indulged on plenty of yummy snacks, meals and treats, not to mention an impressive amount of vodka/mint creations and wine. It’s always nice to be home and back on track with healthy meals and cutting back on those tasty beverages (until Friday, at least).

Below are the recipes for what I have on my meal calendar this week. You’ll notice that there are five recipes. One of the days this week is going to be leftovers and the other day is a date night that I’m quite looking forward to. Thanks Nano for watching the kids! Thankfully, I don’t have a very busy week ahead and happen to have extra time to cook, but on a normal busy school week, you’ll find a few nights utilizing recipes and others that simply say taco bar, egg scramble or “frozen Trader Joe’s something.” Not every week looks like this, but as I said above, I’m home from vacation and happy to be back in the kitchen! Let me know if any of you try any of these recipes. They are all printed out, have been in my binder of favorite recipes for quite awhile (a separate post in the near future) and are all a hit with Eric and kiddos. Thanks for reading and happy planning this week!

Curry Spiced Veggie Burgers

http://www.marthastewart.com/962982/curry-spiced-veggie-burgers

This is a tasty vegetarian recipe that my friend Lisa and I both saw on TV years ago and happen to both have all the ingredients on hand to make. I’m certain we both were sitting on the couch feeding a baby watching cooking shows, something we both used to do a lot of! It is simple to make and I recommend you watch the quick video that is available just above the recipe in the link. I serve it on top of or next to mixed greens dressed with vinaigrette. Nice and light dinner.

* I always double it and put half of the uncooked burgers in the freezer for another day.

Greek Chicken in Pita

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/14527/greek-chicken/

This is such a hit in our family that I put it on the meal calendar several times a month and nobody has yet to get sick of it. I use the marinade in the recipe above and use boneless, skinless chicken thighs (about 6 or so) instead of the whole chicken. I marinate the day before or the morning of and it’s the easiest yummiest grilled chicken. After cooking, slice the chicken into bite sized pieces. We either put it in/on warm pita bread or on top of a plate of romaine lettuce dressed with Greek vinaigrette. In either case, we put tomato and sliced cucumber, a dollop of hummus, and a drizzle of Sriracha on top and dive in. SO yummy.

Edited Aug. 10th, 2016: I made this last night and my kids enjoyed it but didn’t go back for seconds. Here’s why: I didn’t make the tzatzki sauce that I have made every single time except last night. No idea why I forgot, but they really missed the yogurt cucumber sauce. Easy to make: greek yogurt, grated or finely diced cucumber, little garlic, lemon zest and juice, dried dill, salt and pepper. Last night I just mixed yogurt and Sriracha and it was yummy too, but the cucumber yogurt sauce is key. ALSO, the marinade above doesn’t call for salt and pepper, but it’s necessary, as well as the zest from the lemon. Makes a much more flavorful marinade. Enjoy!

Grilled Salmon with Lime Butter

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/grilled-salmon-with-lime-butter-sauce-1222181

Dinner doesn’t get any easier! Grilled salmon is a staple in our house and four out of five people in my family love it and thankfully the other one tolerates it. I put the salmon on some foil (about a pound and a third for two adults and three kids), put a little olive oil, garlic salt and pepper on top and grill as directed. The lime butter is delicious and super simple, but sometimes I cannot handle one more step and skip it all together. I often serve with grilled asparagus and a salad, but this week I’m serving it with roasted sweet potatoes and couscous.

Aromatic Noodles with Lime Peanut Sauce

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ellie-krieger/aromatic-noodles-with-lime-peanut-sauce-recipe.html

Not much to say here because I make it as directed. It’s another hit in my family and we’ve been known to put it in a plastic bowl and eat on the way to an evening sport. Classy, right?! I’d just recommend adding the sauce as needed. Depending on the amount of veggies I have, the dish can be too saucy (and makes it harder to eat in the car!) J

Chinese Chicken Lettuce Wraps

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/rachael-ray/barbecued-chinese-chicken-lettuce-wraps-recipe.html

We love these lettuce wraps and one of my kids even requested it for their birthday dinner a few years ago. It’s a Rachael Ray recipe, and she’s known for quick and easy recipes, so give this one a try! I’m sure ground turkey or pork would be tasty as well. A few changes that I make… To make it less messy, I drain some of the chicken liquid after cooking but before I add seasonings, garlic and ginger. I also decrease the mushrooms or omit altogether (kids are not fans), increase the bell pepper, and add shredded carrot and diced zucchini. I add more hoisin sauce and reduced sodium soy sauce as well. I love to top the lettuce wrap with chopped cilantro, chopped peanuts or cashews and Sriracha. My mouth is watering…

This is the “I don’t have time/talent/energy to write a food blog” blog. With that said, here it goes!

Many years ago, before I had kids, I was an elementary school teacher who loved organizing my classroom and planning for 20 or so little people to walk through my classroom door each morning. Clear goals, good intentions and purposeful planning wasn’t a convenience, it was a necessity. Who would want to be caught off-guard with 20 sets of eyes staring at you each day?! I used to love filling my calendar with goals for each day and lessons to match. I began each day with a sense of calm as I posted the daily schedule on the board each morning and wrote down everything that I could possibly plan. And because unexpected events happened throughout the school day, such as a fire drill, last minute assembly, arrival of a new student, etc. I learned to always write in pencil, erasable pen or dry erase marker. Life’s plans shouldn’t be written in permanent ink.

Fast forward five or so years when I was pregnant with our first child. Just like most expecting moms, I began thinking about and planning for those busy days that lay ahead and the possibility of holding a cranky baby while cooking with one free hand. I decided to try one of those meal preparation services, Dream Dinners, I think it was called. These businesses have the great idea of presenting a recipe, with all the ingredients ready and measured out, placed it in a plastic bag or foil container, with a premade label on it such that you could make it and pop it in your freezer for a rainy day. Brilliant! I came home with 4-5 semi-homemade, freezer ready meals with easy-to-follow directions and was so happy when I could pop one of those meals out of the freezer and cook it up like a boss.

I was pretty happy doing that off and on for a few months when I realized it wasn’t the cheapest meal around (diapers were expensive!) nor was it the healthiest with many premade sauces that seemed pretty high in sodium. The one thing that these pre-made dinners provided was a weekly dinner plan… frozen lemon chicken on Monday, pasta bake on Tuesday, leftovers on Wednesday, etc. Yes! Like a set of lesson plans and a daily schedule – just like how I ran my classroom! Being a new mom and now juggling a part-time teaching job, any chance to make life easier, more organized and a little less chaotic was exactly what I needed.

I printed off a basic blank calendar and wrote out my plans for dinner for the entire week using up those premade frozen meals. I continued the calendar long after I ended going to Dream Dinners to prepare our meals. And because you never know how your daily or weekly plans might change, I learned to always use a nice sharp number two pencil.

The meal planning idea became even more important when babies two and three arrived… While I stuck to a meal plan each week, I experimented with planning dinners for the next 2-3 days and as long as 2 weeks ahead of time. I cannot say that either of those was ever really great. Even today, it seems best for me to look at my weekly calendar on a Sunday, see what we had going on that week, then plan dinners accordingly. If my husband was traveling that week, was it really the best time to try that new recipe from Bon Appetit with three toddlers as my taste testers? Probably not! If we had a late afternoon pediatrician appointment where I could probably expect cranky babies wouldn’t it better just to plan for leftovers that night? And if planned out correctly, I might even have time to prep a dish during their morning nap and pop it in the oven after the doctor’s appointment. It was a weekly routine I enjoyed – and I have to believe it made us saner and healthier (not to mention saving a few pennies too!).

As crazy as it sounds, I have over ten years of these meal calendars in a file folder sitting right next to my favorite cookbooks. TEN YEARS! For quite some time, the calendar printed off the Internet was simple and worked perfectly fine. Then one day, I had a little fun using a clip art program and began printing off seasonal calendars that looked cute hanging on the refrigerator or sitting out on a cookbook stand in the kitchen. It wasn’t necessary by any means, but an October calendar with a picture of a big ‘ol pumpkin sure put me in the mood to put butternut squash soup and a fall salad with persimmons, goat cheese and candied pecans on the menu. Yum!

Anyone that has been to my house before is familiar with my posted schedules, chore charts, and calendars. Once a teacher, always a teacher! My meal-planning calendar is no different and is easy to spot in my kitchen. It gets a giggle or two every time someone asks, “Is that a calendar for food? Did you make all that? Do you do that for just dinner? How do you plan that far ahead? WHY do you do that? How many times a week do you go to the grocery store?” All good questions… I frequently giggle with them, show them how many times a month I “meal-planned” leftovers, pizza delivery or a reservation and we all instantly feel better. J

The truth is, I can look back on my many years of meal calendars and so much of our life is evident on those calendars. New babies, new houses, new jobs, birthdays, celebrations, houseguests, illnesses, vacations, etc. I love looking back on previous years to see how food at dinnertime shows what our life looked at that time. New baby in the house? You better believe there were plenty of easy to make meals, freezer ready meals, and thankfully plenty of delicious homemade dinners delivered to us by loving friends and family. New job or celebration? A tasty dinner and dessert to honor the special person that surely took longer than 30 minutes to prepare. Packing to move to a new home? Lots of outdoor grilling, paper plates and pizza delivery. Trying to lose those last 5 pounds before a Hawaiian vacation? Low carb meals! It’s all evident on our calendars and it’s my kind of scrapbooking.

Beyond the fun memories these past meal calendars provide, they are also a great resource of meal ideas when I’m planning out a new week. If I’m tired, have a busy week ahead or don’t feel like trying any new recipes, it’s fun to look at previous calendars for the current month and choose a few meals for the week, throw in a night or two of leftovers and a pizza delivery or date night and I’m done! That’s right, I try to plan for pizza delivery or leftovers so that we don’t have to scramble when everyone’s starving or coming in and out of the house from evening sports, school meetings, etc. Planning for these busy nights, even when it means delivery, has made dinner in our house that much easier.

This blog is lovingly created for my friends and family who over the years have asked for a copy of my meal calendar template, have been curious about what is in my dinner rotation, or just wanted a copy of the recipe from something I’ve made that they have enjoyed. I’m beyond flattered and humbled by the interest and I hope that together we can enjoy sharing those tried and trued recipes, meal planning tips, and all things related to Food, Family and Friends.

Attached is a calendar for the month of August. You can print it out and give it a go. It’s a new month so let’s get planning!

meal_calendar_template

Back from vacation and back on the wagon

Once a planner, always a planner!