Things I Love #1

This week is going to be interesting... It looks like Tuesday night we are expecting the latest in the litany of snow storms this winter which has been dubbed #SnowofDOOM on Twitter. I'm not too worried at this point, I work early on Tuesday so I should be home before it really gets bad and then mid-day on Wednesday where I can depend on the bus system here in town to do the icky driving for me. As a result the food this week defiantly skewed towards cold weather comfort food.

Monday: Split Pea Soup
Tuesday: Risotto with Sun-dried Tomatoes & Smoked Mozzarella
Wednesday: Crockpot Gumbo with Cornbread
Thursday: No Dinner Planned (no one will be home this night)
Friday: Falafel w/ fixings
Saturday: Ash or Donald to decide (I won't be home)
Sunday: Leftovers

Previous to this I have been just writing out the week's menu on a divided sheet of white paper. But this past Saturday I got a chance to hang out with Donald downtown for a bit and visited the new(ish) kitchen and home section of Hollander's in the Kerrytown Shops. When I was there I found this awesome Weekly Menu Notepad that I just couldn't say no to! If you follow that link you'll get to the website of Knock Knock, a company that I have just fallen in love with. Their paper products are fun and functional and do it all with a charmingly dry wit. I already loved doing a weekly menu, but this makes it even better!

Still going..

So far this is going pretty well. And the dinners have been pretty darn delicious too! I haven't gotten a whole lot of knitting done this week, but I did get all of my laundry taken care of and got to some spinning! I have 4oz of superwash merino singles from The Ranches on Etsy. Unfortunately it looks like they may not be on Etsy anymore, sad as I liked their eye for color. Not sure how I'm going to ply the singles but they'll tell me what they want to be eventually. On the menu this week:

Monday: Polenta with Tomato Sauce & Sunny-side Up Eggs
Tuesday: Chickpea and Lentil Stew
Wednesday: Chicken Curry
Thursday: Roasted Vegetable Couscous
Friday: Kielbasa with Sauerkraut
Saturday: Falafel
Sunday: Leftovers

The Polenta tonight went over fantastically well. It only took about 20 minutes from start to finish and was incredibly delicious. I think it helps that the eggs that we used were less then 24 hours old and out of my backyard. Yum!

Busy Weekend

This last weekend was a busy one! We hosted a party and did some great chocolate and whiskey pairings. Then it was back to work for MLK weekend and a Monday that was un-characteristically busy too. But I got to do some fun things so it was all worth it. I used my new rice cooker for the first time last night and I am totally in LOVE! I have had a rice cooker for a while now, but over the holidays my brother mentioned that he was looking a buying one and was kind of excited. I seized the opportunity to gift (and then upgrade) the rice cooker that I had, as it was a bit too small for 3 adults who really like rice. So I went to the local Asian grocery in Ann Arbor and got a fab 10 cup cooker. Last night's dinner was my first chance to test it out and I am very much in love - there's sooo much room! So, with out further babbling the week's menu:

Monday: Spanish spiced rice, steamed salmon fillet, roasted asparagus
Tuesday: Shepherd's pie w/ leftover colcannon
Wednesday: Sloppy Joes
Thursday: Brisket with horseradish cream, rutabaga and mushrooms
Friday: Chili
Saturday: Going out to a friend's Burn's Night celebration
Sunday: Leftovers

I also suspect that Sunday is going to become leftovers day for a while. Between mine and Donald's work schedules we aren't home at the same times and trying to plan a dinner either requires a crock pot (which I happily will do - it's just a pain some days and I like my sunday morning beauty sleep) or someone else stepping up to do the cooking and trying to get them to commit is sometimes like herding cats! Well, it's really early in the morning and I need to get to work, so until next week!

Congratulations

After being out of work for around a year, my husband just got the news that he was hired for what might be his dream job. So excited!

What's For Dinner?

So week two of my endeavor to record my menu every week and so far so good. Our weeks start on Monday around here at the Rose & Thistle and so tonight was the first night of a new week. We had a lovely dinner tonight of potato pancakes with a green salad. Last week overall was pretty good but the menu broke down over the weekend when I was at work during dinner time. Anyone who is paying attention will note that the potato pancakes were originally on the menu for last night (Sunday), but were indeed made and consumed today. Such is life, but it's ok - they were still delicious! So this week's menu is as follows:

Monday: Potato Pancakes (from the America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook
Tuesday: Ham & Bean Soup (from Low-Carb Slow Cooker Recipes
Wednesday: Rotini with Home-made Pasta Sauce
Thursday: Falafel with Lavash and Tabbouli Salad
Friday: Hosting a Party so Dinner will be Party Food!
Saturday: Split-Pea Soup
Sunday: Sloppy Joes (from Low-Carb Slow Cooker Recipes

In knitting, I got a pair of mittens done for my brother's girlfriend. They turned out pretty fab and she really loved them. I posted about them on Ravelry, with pictures. I am almost done with my brother's sweater but I broke a needle and I'm currently waiting on the superglue to dry so that I can finish. In an effort to be calm about the broken needle I started a pair of kilt hose for Donald. I'm almost through the calf shaping on the first one and it's going along swimmingly. In general I'm fighting a huge case of startitist (I blame the Yarn Harlot for spreading this pernicious disease via the internet!) I have all sorts of things that I want to start for myself, now that I'm not needing to knit for others for the holidays, but I am trying to limit myself to a reasonable number of projects.

I'm still here

The last quarter of last year was a doozy. There wasn't much time for me to take for myself and the little that was, was spent recharging for the next day or the next event. But I made it to the other side of the year and it's a brand spanking new year. For now I'm going to try and post each week's menu that I write here on the blog and I'll pepper in some knitting and such when I get the chance. So in the spirit of starting as I mean to go on here's the menu for the first full week of the year:

Monday: Lamb and Lentil Soup (adapted from the Better Homes and Gardens Low-Carb Slow Cooker book)
Tuesday: Pasta with Tuna & Tomato Sauce (sauce from the summer canning and ortiz tinned tuna)
Wednesday: Lasagna with Chard & Eggplant (from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison)
Thursday: Leftovers from the Fridge
Friday: 7 Bean & Barley Soup with Beef (mix from our local co-op)
Saturday: Falafel with Hummus
Sunday: Latkes with sour cream (from the America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook)

My New Year's "resolution" is to take advantage of my prodigious cookbook library and to cook at least one recipe out of a cookbook that I own at least once a week. So here is where I hope to keep track of my progress on that goal.