Making Do Without Missing a Thing---6 weeks of meal plans in 6 posts--week five

 


*Vrrrrrrrrrrooooooooooooooom Vrrrrrrrooooooooooooommmm!!!!!!!!!!"

   This is what I am thinking about as I am sitting down to write the third meal plan in the fifth week of our series on Making Do Without Missing a Thing? Remember my adorable, and sometimes (oftentimes) overwhelming twins? Yes. I was thinking today that they will be two in just under a month, and the time has flown by so fast with them.
   I waited ten years for God to bring me those two precious little bundles of dark eyes and crazy dark spiral hair. And every time I get a kiss, a hug, a pat, a smile, I want to tear up and cry. God has been so good to me.

   Last week their favorite game was "Choo choo". It was cute. One would hang on to the other, and they would run through the house, chugging away and collapsing with laughter when one would suddenly decide to shout "TOOT TOOOT!!!".
   Very very cute.
   And very entertaining.
   And anyone could join in.


   Not this week. NO, this week the game is very very fast, it is every toddler for herself, and goodness help the cat or the dog if they get in the way of chubby toddler legs careening around corners or through doorways in a race to some imaginary finish line.
   Its cute. I get it.
   But its also borderline-driving this mamma to distraction.
   I cant even think when I hear that "vroooooooom", because all I am waiting for is the wail that will soon follow when someone wrecks their Maserati right into the piano bench, or wall of the living room.

   *sigh*

   Can someone get me some coffee? :)

   The reason I am thinking about that tonight is because, in some ways, that same sound relates to our whole series the last five weeks.
   I'll be honest. There was a point in time that I was thinking---"Sheesh! What was I thinking setting myself up for a six week series on anything????"  And the struggle was to reconcile myself to exerting personal discipline and setting myself up to write all this down, because I knew there were many others out there who needed it.
   But here we are, halfway through the posts on the next to last week, and we are almost done.

                                                    *Vrrrrroooooom, indeed*

   But what that sound makes me think of even more is how quickly these things I have written about will begin to really, seriously, change your grocery budget as you begin to apply them one by one. Forget the eight years of hard knocks for you. You, reader, are one lucky person, because I already made those mistakes for you! Doesnt that make you happy, even just a little bit?
   I am doing my  best to figure out not only how to pull all this stuff together for the last week, but to make the whole series end with a bang. I am talking pull out the party hats and kazooos, because we are going to party that I made it through in writing this whole thing, and to reward you for being with me through it all! I am thinking a giveaway of one of my favorite books that got me to where I am today, and an opportunity for you to share these posts with those you love. Whadda ya think? Is anybody up for that? :) If there is not enough interest, I will just end on a nice, sweet note and plan on another series very soon. I'd like to hear if there is something you are interested in learning about. :)
   Week three is a great meal week. The fam loves it, and I love it, because there are some seriously good meals, and because some of those meals are really easy for Moi, who does most of the cooking.
   If you have any questions, please ask and I will answer as soon as I can
.
   *in reading through this I realized I wanted to say that we eat a lot of chicken, because for our family a single chicken can make four or five meals. Nothing is wasted. When we are done with all the meat on the carcass, it is boiled with seasonings for chicken stock. Also, it is rare that anything we eat uses over 3/4 of a lb of meat for five people. I just dont think we need to eat a lot of meat, and it is more for the texture of it being there. However, just like anything, I keep my meat-loving husband happy by occasionally adding in a meal that really has meat in it, such as the Meat lovers pizza or Hamburgers.  Our diet as Americans is way too focused on meat, rather than the veggies and fiber from whole grains that we really should be eating more of. :) Just my two cents. Once this series is over I am planning on showing you how to take a chicken and make it into four or five meals for your family. :)

 
Meal Plan---week Three

Monday:
   Breakfast: poached eggs with green onions, hashbrowns (from dehydrated store bought hashbrowns), and maple sausage links
   Lunch: Calzones and canned vanilla pears with nutmeg topping
   Snack orange slices, graham crackers with cream cheese
   Dinner: Stuffed porkchops with green beans, cheesy rice, and apple cake

Tuesday:
   Breakfast: Blueberry waffles with mock whipped topping and blueberry syrup
   Lunch: Cowboy Macaroni with peaches
   Snack: apple slices with fruit dip, apple cake (yep, apple theme day)
   Dinner: Chicken Carbonara, garlic bread and Rich chocolate pudding

Wednesday:
   Breakfast:  Maple Walnut Oatmeal
   Lunch: Baked Potatoes with Creamed Peas and carrots, topped with bacon bits (the real stuff)
   Snack: ants on a log, and dried fruit and granola snack
   Dinner: Chicken and Dumplings with a large salad

Thursday:
   Breakfast: French Toast with bananas and butter/powdered sugar glaze
   Lunch: chicken, tomato and cheese Quesadillas
   Snack: carrot sticks with ranch, Zucchini bread
   Dinner: Pork ginger stir fry with fried rice (uses up leftovers from this week)

Friday:
   Breakfast: Cream of Wheat with fresh fruit
   Lunch: Homemade egg noodles with ground turkey and zucchini cheesy sauce
   Snack: fruit smoothie roll-ups from the dehydrator, Zucchini bread
   Dinner: curried chickpea mash with naan bread, jello salad

Saturday: 
   Breakfast: cold cereal or toast and cocoa,
   Lunch: Michael's Chicken Noodle soup with fresh breadsticks
   Snack: any fresh fruit, or vegetable in house, and orange almond muffins
   Dinner: Meat Lover's pizza: uses pepperoni, sausage, canadian ham,and venison burger on a marinara sauce. I sneak pureed carrots/onions into the red sauce and sprinkle the pizza with basil and spinach flakes.

Sunday:
   Breakfast: Caramel rolls with Caramel sauce
   Lunch: baked chicken with Parmesan couscous, Vegetable medley, and Farmer's rolls
   Snack: orange almond muffins, and fruit salad
   Dinner: leftovers or waffles

   Doesn't that sound good? I am telling you, this week is one of my favorites for a couple of reasons.I use up a lot of leftovers as I go along, which I try to do in other weeks, but kinda get a little lazy about, reasoning my family needs something to eat on Sunday night, right? :) But it also includes some of my favorite things: my brother's soup, caramel roll, anything with ginger, and my mother's farmer's roll recipe. It would be the very best week if it just didn't have jello salad in it. Sorry. Totally not a favorite of mine. But the rest of the family knows when this week comes around they actually get to eat Jello, and Mom wont gag while they do it. :) Small concessions, and everyone is happy on the home front.
    Hope you all enjoy this meal plan, and the recipes that follow.

Many Blessings to you and yours,

Heather                

Monday:
When I  make anything I am always pulling stuff out of my dehydrating cupboard in an effort to get more seasonings or veggies from what I put up each year. It is just a tall cupboard deep enough for one layer of quart jars all the way up the shelf from the floor. Love it. When I said green onions on the poached eggs, that means I take a small handful and crumble it over the top of the cooking eggs. The steam from poaching it rehydrates it and makes it so nummy. Hashbrowns or any other kind of potato from the frozen food section of your grocery are very easy and wonderful things to dehydrate as they put up easily, keep their color, and rehydrate without going to mush. I can put three to four large bags of hashbrowns into a single quart jar when dehydrated. You just have to watch how much you use so you don't make a huge amount by mistake! Put them in a frying pan with a little butter and some water or broth and they will be back to themselves in no time at all. Calzones are essentially sandwich pockets with whatever filling you choose to put in them, then folded over and sealed with water and a fork. I do this a lot with leftover meats and cheese. Vanilla Pears are home-canned pears that I make every year, just adding a touch of vanilla to the bottom of each jar before I put the pears in and add the syrup. It is easy and very good. My husband filets and then stuff his stuffed porkchops with stuffing that he mixes with apples and raisins. The stuffing is either bought on sale, or made from stale slices of home made bread. They bake in a foil covered 9X13 pan for up to one hour. He seasons them with Lawry's salt and rubbed sage from my garden. The Cheesy rice is brown rice cooked with onion salt, dried onions, and chicken stock. Then I shred 1 cup cheddar cheese into four cups brown rice. Be sure to reserve one porkchop and one cup of rice (before you add the cheese) in the fridge for another meal later this week! Apple Cake: 3 medium apples, washed and diced up (I leave skin on), 2 eggs, 1/2 c. oil, 1 1/3 cups dark brown sugar, 2 tsp apple pie spice, 2 cups of flour (I use whole wheat, but you can use all purpose if you need)---in last 1/4 cup of flour put 1/2 tsp salt and 2 tsp baking soda, mix well, then add into the batter. Batter will be really stiff, and you need to scrape the bowl a couple of times while mixing, even with a kitchen aid mixer. Fold into a greased 9X13 pan and top with walnut pieces if desired. Bake for 45 minutes at 350*. Can also top with a caramel sauce if you want to impress company.

Tuesday: 

Blueberry waffles are simply waffle batter with blueberry jam added to it. If I have some extra canned blueberries sitting around from another recipe, I throw those in too. Mock Whipped Topping can be made by clicking on this link. You need unflavored gelatin, but that is really good for your bones, and for your kids as well, keeping their joints healthy. It tastes very similar but not quite as sugary as Cool Whip. You can make this for apple cake as well, and since the recipe makes three cups, just set it aside for the morning. Blueberry syrup is again, saved from canned blueberries, and just boiled on the stove with 1/2 cup white sugar and water, thickened with cornstarch, and then poured over the waffles. Cowboy Macaroni is the same macaroni recipe as the last meal plan's recipe, but I add a can of sweet and spicy salsa, as well as 1/2 lb of ground beef or venison to it after browning the meat and adding onion salt. I know with three girls I should call it Cowgirl Macaroni, but the name just keeps sticking. Chicken Carbonara is such a comfort food indulgence, but making it once every six weeks wont kill you. I dont use heavy cream, but 1 cup of water to two cups of instant full fat milk equals a very similar taste. Click here for the basic recipe, and be sure to save some bacon for a few more meals---we put about half what this recipe calls for. For Rich Chocolate Pudding just use some Magic Mix, powdered baking cocoa and sugar. If I am making enough for 4 cups of pudding, I will add one cup sugar, and 1/2 cup baking cocoa to the pudding that is cooking in the pan. Follow the directions on the link recipe to make up the 3 cups of cream pudding.

Wednesday:

Maple Walnut Oatmeal is basic oatmeal with 1/2 tsp of maple flavoring and 1/2 cup toasted walnuts added to it as a topping with brown sugar. For the Baked Potato Meal, you just need to make up a batch of the magic mix, season it with garlic and onion salt, and then mix in a bag of frozen peas and carrots (or rehydrate one cup of home dried in boiling water for about an hour--peas take a while). Crumble your reserved bacon from Monday's dinner, and serve to the fam. Dried Fruit Granola Snack is using home made granola with canned fruit that you have dried. Different people have their favorites, but one of ours is now the tropical fruit salad. I drained the jar, rinsed the fruit,and plopped it on the trays. Good good stuff. When you mix it with homemade granola----filling snack that is yummy and good for everyone too! Granola is made around here in large batches. Take 12 cups of oatmeal, 3 cups coconut, 2 cups sunflower seeds, 1 cup hulled sesame seeds, 1 cup wheat germ, and 1 cup ground flax seed and put into a turkey roaster. In a sauce pan combine 1 1/2 cups honey and 1 1/2 cups coconut oil. Heat until very runny and pourable. Pour over the ingredients in the roaster and stir well to combine. Use a spatula to keep scraping sides down. Place roaster in oven at 350*. Bake for a total of 20-25 minutes, but keep stirring about every 5 minutes. place on cookie sheets and let cool, break into small pieces for cereal, or larger pieces to make snacks with for the dried fruit/granola snack. Delicious. Chicken and dumplings is based off of this recipe, but I obviously make my own cream soup using chicken stock, add an extra quart of stock, and make my own biscuts rather than buying the cans in the store. We also add more carrots and corn from my dehydrated stores, about 1/4 cup each. This, combined with the biscuts, makes for very thick and comforting chicken and dumplings.
Thursday:
French Toast: using homemade bread, I make my egg dip with more milk and vanilla so the bread is really custardy. The homemade bread also soaks up more, but it is just so good! Afterwards I top with sliced bananas, butter pats, and then sprinkle with simple powdered sugar. Zucchini Bread uses shredded zucchini from my garden that I freeze in 2 cup portions. I am planning on dehydrating this in the coming garden season, because we eat a lot of zucchini, and have had such good success with the zucchini slices in other things that it would be much better for the freezer space.2 1/2 cups all purpose flour (or half and half with WW flour)/ 1 cup brown sugar/3 1/2 tsp baking powder/ 1 tsp sea salt/ 3 Tbs coconut oil or vegetable oil/ 1/2 cup milk powder/ 1 egg/ 2 cups shredded zucchini, drained but not squeezed dry/ 2 tsp pumpkin pie spice. Oven at 350*, mix dry, then wet, then combine, and  pour into two greased bread pans. Bake for 55-65 minutes until toothpick stuck in middle comes out clean. Let cool for five minutes then turn out of pans to cool completely.   Pork Ginger Stir Fry is one of my favorites. In a large fry pan, place 2 TBS of olive oil. Heat, adding the following seasonings: 1/2 tsp ground ginger, 1/2 tsp cumin, 1/2 tsp tarragon, 1/2 tsp ground coriander, and 1 tsp sea salt, also 1/2 cup onion slices, broken into pieces, not dices. Let this saute for a few minutes, stirring every few seconds. Then add two cups brown rice (already cooked). To this add one (or two if you like more meat) cooked, cubed porkchops, thin strips of peppers, a can of water chesnuts that have been drained, and thin strips of carrots. To this all add a couple Tsp of brown sugar to give it a warm sweet taste. If you like the veggies more cooked, add to the oil and seasonings along with the onion. We like them still crunchy, so add them in at the end. Cook for another couple minutes and then serve. You can also crack an egg into the rice before adding veggies if you like egg in your fried rice.
Friday:
Homemade egg Noodles can be found here on one of the posts from earlier int he series. To make the sauce, using a fry pan, fry one pound of ground turkey with the following spices: 1/2 tsp thyme, and 1/2 oregano, and garlic and onion. Into this same pan, put slices of dried zucchini, snipped into pieces, about 3/4 of a cup. Add 2 cups water, cover pan, and let simmer for about ten minutes. When time is up, remove cover, and add salt, and enough Magic Mix to make a cream sauce. Take off heat and add one cup mozzarella. When serving, place noodles on the plate, and top with sauce, then top with bread crumbs mixed with parmesan or toasted sesame seeds. (great way to use up stale bread). Smoothie rollups are easy and very popular with kids and adults. In a blender combine the following: one cup yogurt, one cup fruit, and two bananas, one Tbs of lemon juice, as well as one tsp of sweetener (honey, sugar, agave syrup). If you use canned fruit be sure to rinse it, drain it, and then you do not need sweetener. We love to make strawberry banana ones, but the lemon juice, which keeps the color bright and adds extra Vit C, can make it tart depending on the strawberries. I freeze or dry huge quantities of strawberries every year from a you-pick farm nearby so we have enough to get through the year and not have to pay outrageous prices here in MN in the winter. Sorry--take that blender full (if you can keep from drinking it) and pour onto nonstick sheets in your dehydrator. Dehydrate until the whole thing is leathery, with no wet spots, at around 135*. I make large squares and then cut into four or six strips for the roll-ups, and roll them into plastic wrap. Stored in a cool dark place, these will last you a while, and are as good as candy for the kids. :) Curried Chickpea mash is easy and a favorite around here. Curried Chickpea mash: 1 Lg Onion, sliced/ 1 can whole tomatoes / 3 garlic cloves, peeled/ 2 TBS ginger, grated/ 2 cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed (would be about 1 1/2 cups with store bought cans--we use one quart homemade)/ 2 Tbs olive oil/ 2-3 bay leaves/ 1 tsp ground cloves/ 1 tsp cardamom seeds/ 5-6 peppercorns/ 1/2 tsp Tumeric/ 2 TBs coriander/ 1 tsp cumin/ 1 cup milk or substitute like almond or coconut milk::::Directions::::*puree onions, tomatoes, garlic and ginger until smooth. Meanwhile, heat olive oil over Med high heat and add bay, cloves, cardamom and peppercorns to oil. Cook for one minute. *add puree and cook 5 minutes. Add remaining spices and cook for another 5 minutes. * add chickpeas. Stir until covered with sauce well. Add pinch of salt to taste and the milk or milk alternative. *simmer for 10 minutes. *Using a potato masher or fork, mash chickpeas until chunky (I like it with pieces of the chickpeas still obvious but I have a friend who completely purees it). Serve warm with either pita bread, pita chips or naan, which is basically fry bread that you cook on a skillet and is served warm with the meal as your utensils. Jello Salad is Orange Jello with a can of drained fruit cocktail, and 1/2 cup coconut shreds added, then topped with the same mock topping as earlier in the week.
Saturday is bread baking day:
Michael's chicken soup recipe can be found here in the comment section under the name Shamus (his "other name"). It is amazing and goes fast. Orange Almond Muffins are made using the basic Master Muffin Mix, and adding the following for ingredients: One small can drained mandarin oranges, 1/2 tsp orange Zest and 1/2 tsp almond flavoring. If you dont have mandarin oranges you can put in 1 TBS orange juice concentrate. If you are able to have picked some up on sale (any nuts are SO expensive), you can top them with sliced or ground almonds before baking. For Pizza that night, for pizza crust recipe click here, then puree up one small jar or can of carrots, and 1/2 onion, then add to the marinara sauce for the pizza (we just use spaghetti sauce). Top with whatever meats you have available in your house--I even use up little bits that are in the fridge waiting for another meal. Either way, your family gets a great dose of veggies and meat in a favorite meal without really knowing it. :)
Sunday:
Caramel rolls: using the same recipe  for dough and concept as in my cinnamon rolls, all you do is switch the ingredients up a little. Mix the filling with a touch of cinnamon, and butter flavoring, but add one cup of dark brown sugar and spread over dough. Roll up and proceed to cut as discussed in the link. While baking, in a sauce pan combine either one cup agave syrup, honey or corn syrup to one stick butter, and one cup brown sugar and bring to a slow boil, stirring constantly. Set aside and let cool a few minutes, then add 1 tsp vanilla for flavoring. Turn rolls out onto a plate, top with the sauce and let sit about ten minutes. If you make too much caramel sauce (is there such a thing??), then pour it into a jar and keep in the fridge for topping for icecream or apple cake. Keeps for a couple weeks with no issues as long as the jar has a lid. (and no-one tries to eat it with a spoon *ahem*)
Baked chicken is a whole chicken cut up, cleaned and patted dry. It is then dipped in an egg wash of one egg to one cup milk, then into a simple flour, cormeal, and Lawry's seasoning mix. (can you tell my husband is the one who does this? Lawry's seasoning always comes in). He bakes it at 350* until the juices run clear when poked, about 40 minutes to an hour for bone in chicken. Parmesan couscous is one of those things I pick up on sale, because I absolutely love it, and with everything I make, it is nice once in a while to have a mix made up that you got for a good deal. However, this year, with the cost of goods going up, and that I can buy couscous in bulk for much cheaper, I will be coming up with a recipe. Dont worry, I will post it for you when I am done. :) Farmer' Rolls are my mother's standard that we ate as kids at all holidays. I decided they are good enough to make them all the time, and my kids love them. Makes a double batch so halve stuff if you dont want a large amount. 5 tsp or 2 pkgs of dry yeast/ 2 1/2 c warm water/ 3/4 c soft or melted shortening (or coconut oil)/ 3/4 cup sugar (I use agave syrup)/ 2 eggs well beaten/ 8-81/2 cups bread flour (or use 6 cups wheat and 1 1/2 cups bread flour)/ 2 1/2 tsp sea salt......soften yeast in water for 5 minutes, add sugar, shortening, and eggs, blend well. Turn off mixer and add 4 cups flour, turn on with dough hook, once that is incorporated, add the remaining flour one cup at a time, then add salt last (it inhibits the rise of  the bread). This will be soft dough. I turn it out on counter, after flouring the surface and cover with a towel. This makes the equivalent of three loaves of bread, so I cut it in three pieces after it doubles in size about an hour and a half later, and then cut the three "loaves" into ten to twelve pieces. If you want beautiful rolls, and easy way is to shape them into balls and then place in a greased muffin tin.Let double, takes about 45 minutes, and bake at 350* for fifteen to twenty minutes. You can also refrigerate this dough in a container with a lid and pull of some as needed. The flavor gets even better over a couple of days. :)
   Hope you enjoy and let me know what you think!!! :)