Anyhow, now that I'm back, I thought I'd share with you something that me and my boyfriend do every week. We sit down, surrounded by cookbooks, and pick out that week's menu, writing the shopping list at the same time. It's a lot of fun, and it gives us a chance to balance new techniques with things we already know how to do (which is nice).
Here's our menu for this week (we used to start on Tuesdays, and now we start on Thursdays, for no particular reason):
Thursday: Rice Dinner-- Rice dinner is our easiest meal that we do at least once a week because it produces tons of leftovers. It's the typical college student meal: two cups of rice, sausage, a couple eggs, veggies, and beans...and then we look in the fridge to see if there's anything else we can throw in. I eat mine wrapped in a tortilla with some cheese: Nick tops his with cheese and eats it with a fork. It's anything but classy, but it's fast and filling, and we tend to like it!
Friday: Chicken Roast-- This recipe comes from More than a Cookbook, which my Mom gave to me when I moved here. The point of the cookbook is to use their weekly recipes, but Nick and I just pick one to do a week. The "chicken" roast we picked is actually called a "pork" roast, but we tend to prefer chicken to pork.
Saturday: Colorful Frittata-- From The Taste of Home Cookbook. My grandmother (on my Father's side) gave me this cookbook just yesterday, and I love it. It's huge and I doubt we'll ever get tired of it. This recipe is an egg dish with tons of colorful (and yummy) veggies inside. I tend to forget to cook vegetables separately from the main dish, so I prefer dishes that have vegetables in them.
Sunday: Zucchini Creole: From Mama Trude's Special Cook Book which I am quite sure is a family friend of some sort. This book is written on a type writer with no publication information. The recipe calls for a pound of hamburger (we'll probably use ground turkey), 3 cups of zucchini (chopped), 2 large tomatoes (chopped), 1 large onion (chopped-- we'll used minced out of a shaker), 2 cloves of garlic (chopped-- we'll used powdered), 1 large bell pepper (chopped-- I'm thinking red would be pretty), 2 ribs of celery (chopped-- which we will skip because neither of us likes celery), 1/4 tsp nutmeg, 2 T Worcestershire (we're going to use bbq sauce), 1 t sage, 3 bay leaves: Cook the meat, put all ingredients into a large pan, add water to cover, cook all together like a thick stew. Eat over rice or noodles. Suffice it to say, we rarely follow a recipe to the T.
Monday: Macaroni au Gratin-- From the Rumford Complete Cook Book. This cookbook is from 1931, and an inscription on the inside cover declares that it belongs to my Great-Grandmother. She has filled it with other recipes and comments, and I am so in love with it. Hopefully the binding holds up-- I'd like to pass this one along.
Tuesday: Tempting Tacos-- From Good Cookin' from Good Friends: A Collection of recipes from family and friends around the country. This one is done by some friends of my Grandmother's, and while it does have some publication information, there's no copyright so I feel ok sharing :) 1 cup chopped onions (we'll use minced), 1 1/2 lbs ground beef (we'll use turkey), 1 T cooking oil, 1 15oz can tomato sauce (I have paste, we'll see), 1 cup beef bouillon (I have cubes-- we'll see how that works), 2 t chili powder, 1/2 t cumin, 1/2 t salt, 1/4 t pepper: Brown onion and meat. Stir in tomato sauce, bouillon, chili powder, cumin, salt. Simmer uncovered for 1 hour, stirring occasionally. Fry tortillas in deep oil (which we will skip). Spoon beef mixture into shell, garnishing with shredded cheese, chopped lettuce and tomato. Salt and pepper to taste (salt and pepper on tacos?).
Wednesday: Easy Pasta Skillet-- From No More than Five Ingredients, a cook book I bought as a fundraiser from my cousin. I can't find anything about it online, but it is a handy little book, and the recipes are quick and pretty good. This recipe is a one-pot meal (my favorite kind!) and has the meat, pasta, and sauce all cooked together. It's pretty crazy, but it looks pretty good!
So anyway, there's this week's menu. I'll share these from time to time!
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