What's for Dinner? October!

We had:

Broiled salmon w/herb butter (it was yummy!)
rice
greenbeans
applesauce
biscuts (forgot to start rolls early enough!)

WW Penne w/shrimp in garlic-parmesan cream (HA! Milk! ) sauce
salad
garlic bread

Lenora

Really fabulously good dinner. Sausages with homemade sauerkraut, garlic mashed potatoes and homemade applesauce.

Lynn Siprelle, Editor

A friend came over. We had cajun beans and rice with sausage and hot dogs cut up, and spinach with onion relish. We had three desserts! Company, you know. All from Schwans (frozen food). Peanut butter-chocolate chip cookies, chocolate-chip cookies, and apple flautas.

I don't remember what we're having tomorrow. I have it written down somewhere.

Crockpot BBQ country style ribs
mashed potatoes
oven roasted brussels sprouts/carrots
green salad

Today: chicken and black bean burritos
rice
salad

curry tonight. Chickpeas are in the slow cooker, I'll add spinach and we can have rice and yoghurt with them

Tomorrow is some combination of stewing steak and tomatoes

Smoked eel, probably with potatoes and whatever looks good from the veg bag, on Wednesday.

Thursday I have to cook for various people coming to dinner. Their combined dietary requirements are. No dairy. No wheat. No meat. No fish. No lentils. No tomatoes. Aaagggghhhh. I'm thinking eggs - spanish omlette probably. And some salads.

Friday is DSIL's birthday (she and her DH are down from Edinburg) so we'll have a roast chicken. No pudding though, as she's pregnant and any sugar makes her sick as anything. We'll just have to help a lot with the birthday cake

Beyond that . . . who knows!

Zillah

Salmon fillet, probably lightly panfried, with rice and a large salad. Need to use up the last of last week's veg before our next box comes tomorrow.

Tomorrow I have the gardeners coming for soup; I just have to figure out what kind. Friday I made a potato-leek-celery that turned out ultra, ultra good--some of them ate three bowls. I have some cooked chicken thawed out, so I'll probably make some kind of chicken soup with rice. Last week Anhata couldn't eat it because it had potato in it, though I don't know if she's coming tomorrow. Better safe than sorry!

Lynn Siprelle, Editor

I dragged DS to the other office after school and we didn't get back till 6:30pm, so it was bacon, nasty little oven potato things (they never go brown these things - not getting those again!) and a mix of rocket and spinach by way of salad, with a sprinkling of a lemongrass-scented olive oil I bought at the nearby food festival at the weekend.

I felt so sick after the food festival (it was a hot, stuffy marquee as well as eating too much, especially cheese and sausages) that we didn't really eat anything much for the rest of the weekend. I finally warmed up some Heinz tomato soup on Sunday night, while DH found some sundried tomato bread and cheese.

Dinners have been very hit and miss for ages, but I have definitely felt the urge for more wintry dishes, and the weather has finally caught up in the last couple of days - lots of rain. Must be time to buy a crockpot and actually use it. I know Lenora's much more organised than me, so it doesn't surprise me that she can still turn out great sounding food even with the new time constraints. I try to avoid pasta most of the time because it's my emergency food, and I prefer not to overdose. Well, pasta and bacon both are, because we've invariably got some bacon in the fridge, and it's one of the few things that doesn't therefore need defrosting.

Kerri.

After breakfast, I left the house and didn't get home until 3, I then had a piece of baguette with tuna in and wasn't hungry for hours. It's now 8.20pm and I am only just starting to feel peckish so I'll probably have a sandwich. DS made himself some popcorn chicken earlier.

Not a good start really. Why didn't someone start this thread last week when I was cooking lots of great dinners from scratch?

Honey.

Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon
- The Dalai Llama

baked pork tenderloin with sauce
brown rice
salad
maybe a vegetable

Dinner tonight?

Whatever you fix for yourself...and don't even think about leaving dishes in the sink!

It's 6:40 pm and I'm just getting home. I had my monthly "Entry Year Teachers" meeting for professional development after school today. I'm whupped!

I do that too, and DS is not yet 8!

last night we had bru-rice: chicken, diced swede, diced potato, diced carrot, chicken stock, onions, rice. And some black pepper. Went down very nicely with DH especially, and me too. It's a good Autumn/Winter meal. Our returning farmer was less chuffed, but after an 8hr drive in a coach and 90mins of judo I think she was just tired and grouchy! I wasn't the one who made her got to judo - she chose to.

tomorrow is roast chicken... we're going to my parents' house. No idea what we'll have today, but we haven't yet gone shopping so we might eat out... again! It's horrible - we're eating out almost as much as we did in Singapore, except the cost is probably 5 times higher than a simple meal there.

Kerri.

swede=rutabaga

They didn't go out and kill some Swedish people and dice them up.

We're having cottage pie. (Shepherd's pie with ground beef instead of lamb.) The vegetables are leftover and the mashed potatoes are instant so it should be quick and easy.

Tonight:
cider-rosemary roast pork
mashed potatoes
cider gravy
green beans

Monday:
grilled marinated flank steak
zuchini and summer squash
fettucini alfredo

Tuesday:
orange chicken stir-fry
jasmine rice

Wednesday:
BBQ ribs from the crock pot
warm soudough bread
cesar salad

Thursday:
turkey mignon (from Schwan's Becky!)
steamed snow peas
whole grain pilaf

Friday:
Take Out!

well ok, it's a bit late for that advice now, but that's what I would probably have done.

Our intended roast chicken went up the swanny when Dad called on Saturday night to warn me that Mum was feeling bad - another kidney infection. So when I spoke to them today I offered her the choice of us keeping completely out of the way or bringing food over and feeding at least Dad... so we had chili. I cooked the rice over there and Mum was feeling well enough to have a little. Dad grumbled throughout about my cooking skills and the use of white cannelini beans instead of red kidney beans he's used to, so I threw the concept of white chili at him, and may as well have saved my breath. Small wonder my grandmother thinks I still can't cook at my age if she listens to her her son's rantings!

but guess what - we had leftovers and he might get it for dinner when he gets back on Tuesday night, and I bet he won't be fussing much then!

swede - we have regional disagreements even within the UK, and I couldn't be bothered to work out the translation, not that I'd have ever realised it was a rutabaga! Sweet potatoes are the other things that trip me up, and yams... especially since I converse and eat and buy food on three continents and each one is slightly different! So thanks Becky - I figure you'll always pick up on anything you know nobody else will understand. Things would be far more confusing without you around!

Kerri.

There are too many regional differences on those names within the US for me to say anything about those!

Last night we were watching our video of the most recent episode of Lost when it was close to suppertime, and that grilled cheese sandwich looked awfully good. So we had grilled cheese sandwiches instead of cottage pie. I'll have cottage pie tonight though. DH won't be home-- more for me!

It's too beautiful an afternoon NOT to grill something!

I'll be eating very lightly, if at all...but I'll take those details to another thread

Lenora

I couldn't think of a single thing to cook that sounded more appetising than canned tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches, so that's what we had last night. I'd better think quick for tonight. I need to feed the kids late today, after their judo, so usually we eat around 8pm on a Friday. Maybe they'll be happy with cheesy scrambled eggs on toast - DH is away and anything containing cheese is usually a winner with my two.

I have visitors tomorrow, so I found some nice sounding potatoes and a few leeks for soup at lunchtime (must remember the bread when I go out later during judo!), then we've got a half leg of lamb with Anya potatoes and salad for dinner unless we decide to go out, in which case that's what we'll have for Sunday dinner!

Kerri.

Let's see:

tonight: roast pork with sauerkraut, apple, raisin combo (new recipe)
warmed applesauce
roasted potatoes
green salad

Mon: leftovers
Tue: Thai chicken
Wed: meatloaf
Thu: rotisserie chicken or cheeseburgers

Can you tell I don't have much time to cook during the week?! Sides dishes are usually pasta, some kind of rice, or salt potatoes. Then I add a salad or green veggie or both.

Andrea

Hamsteaks last night

Tonight:
Crockpot BBQ porkribs
broccoli
fettucini Alfredo

Tomorrow:
Chicken Nachos

...for us tonight....not really, we're eating at Bob Evans before the Circus but that still translates into no cooking for me!

Love that circus Lenora - hope everyone enjoyed it!

We are making things easy lately too:

Wed: out for Chinese (DH's bday)
Thu: rotisserie chicken - I made sweet potatoes and brussels sprouts, bought sourdough bread
Fri: probably take out pizza and/or subs

last night we had pasta with a sauce made up of a store-bought fresh cheese sauce (2 for 1!), frozen spinach and bacon - it was lovely!

today we're having roast pork with ummm.... well actually I have't got that far yet, but definitely roast pork. AND, since DD has discovered a fetish for rice pudding, and I've been getting an itch for comfort foods recently, I went out and bought some extra special Jersey milk and whole nutmeg with the intention of making a proper rice pudding. Now all I need to do is find a recipe!! DH is catching a train down to London in the late afternoon so it will be earlier than I'd otherwise do or he'd still be too full for moving!

we've eaten out too much recently, what with our London trip on Friday and working extra late on Thursday while my parents had the kids.

anybody got any great ideas of what condiments, other than the obvious horseradish, go nicely with roast beef for Christmas?? My mother said cranberry sauce, but she said that she could eat it with anything so I'm not entirely convinced!

Kerri.