Menu Plan 5/21-5/25

Hey guys, it's Alex again with the weekly menu plan. I'm doing it again this week, because now that it's the summer time I'm not bogged down with classes, so I have more time to spend cooking in the evenings. It's an unfortunate battle in our house that since Kelly and I both love cooking, we're always wrestling (literally, picture that) for kitchen time and each one of us wants to cook that night's dinner. However, with me having a lot more free time than she does during these summer months, it's sort of a nice thing for me to have dinner on the table for her when she gets home. I'd love to make this seem like some grand act of chivalry, but let's face it, she did the exact same thing for me a large majority of the time we've lived in this apartment, and it's the least I can do to pay her back.

This past week as you remember me saying was pretty crazy, and last night we decided to eat out, so we never did get to the Tortellini Primavera from last week. That one's popping back up on the menu, but first the big surprise for Kelly this weekend...

[Drum roll]



[I know you're getting excited]



[Keep getting those hopes up]



[Not that much, you're setting yourself up for disappointment]



Breakfast Casserole!




...what? That was the big surprise? Yeah, I know, it doesn't seem like much, but this was an overnight breakfast casserole! Still not sure what I mean, or more importantly why I gave it so much buildup? Again, using my new found resources of Stumble Upon and Pinterest, I found a recipe for a breakfast casserole that you assemble in your slow cooker and cook for eight hours (a.k.a the recommended amount of sleep you should be getting each night). Once we got done with our Friday night, I made the casserole, set my alarm and voila! When we woke up, we had a great breakfast casserole all ready to go! You can check out the recipe here. This would be a great one to have if you have guests spending the night at your place and you don't want to have to get up an hour before everyone to serve them a delicious breakfast.

Now onto the meal plan:

This week, with it getting all warm here in NYC, I decided this was a heavy veggies week, and thus all the recipes for the next five days are vegetarian. To be fair, I was planning on some awesome sounding turkey burgers that should be making an appearance next week, but then I was reminded that we didn't do the tortellini. One of the cool aspects about this week's menu plan is that Monday's dinner actually can get split in half and used for Thursday's dinner!

Monday: Stuffed Portobello Mushrooms with Farro (Not to be confused with the Roman emperor or British dubstep band Nero)
Tuesday: Tortellini Primavera
Wednesday: Roasted Sweet Potato Pizza with Spinach and Caramelized Onions
Thursday: Mushroom Calzones with Farro Salad
Friday: Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Gouda Cheese Sauce

The list:

Produce

6 4-inch portobello mushrooms

2 leeks

1.5 lb baby spinach

2 Tbs.Pine nuts

1 lemon

4 cups Arugula

Onions (white and red)

1.5 lbs sweet potatoes

sage

Deli

18 oz. whole wheat pizza dough

Dairy

6 oz. Gruyere Cheese

6 oz. goat cheese

4 oz. mozzerella

cream cheese

6 oz. ricotta cheese

8 oz. Gouda Cheeze

Grocery

10 oz. roasted red peppers

We have you may need

Olive Oil

Garlic Cloves

Farro

Red Pepper Flakes

Parmesan Cheese

Green Bell Pepper

salt

brown sugar

nutmeg

flour

butter

pepper

chives

Thyme

If you're wondering why we have farro on the we already have it list, it's because we bought it moments before I wrote this blog post, so we didn't want to include it on our list. We're not so snooty that we just have some Italian rice lying around our apartment. That brings me to a good final thought, if you don't want to try and find farro, grab some brown rice and you should be just fine.

Alex

Menu Plan 5/16-5/18

So we didn’t have a full week of meals this week because Kelly was out on a company retreat on the Jersey Shore, so I was flying solo and fixing nothing of any culinary note. That changes tonight, so I put together an abbreviated meal plan for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. I’ve also got a surprise for Kelly on Saturday morning, which she’ll actually find out about on Friday night.

Here are the recipes:

Stovetop Avocado Mac and Cheese

Crockpot Chicken Tacos

Tortellini Primavera

I’ll probably fix them in this order in an effort to split up the two pasta dishes. As you click on the links, you’ll notice that the recipes come from a couple of different sources than I usually use. This is because I made use of a couple of different ways to find recipes. The first is Pinterest, which Kelly has been a member of for a while now, and I just recently joined a few weeks ago. I probably won’t be using Pinterest to its full capabilities because I have little to no interest in most of the topics on there, but food and cooking is one I can really get into.

The second way I found some recipes is by using StumbleUpon, which is a site that filters through the web and gives you different sites that you probably have never seen based on your interests. You can customize it to only search for one of your many interests, which is what I do when I’m looking for recipes. This is how I found two of these three recipes and is a great way to find offbeat blogs and websites that you didn’t know about.

Just a side note, the second recipe (Chicken Tacos) is somewhat of a lie. The blogger goes on and on and on (yeah that long) about how amazing it is to do a recipe like this with just three ingredients. In case you've never eaten a taco in your life, once you have a tortilla and any two toppings (let's say cheese and sour cream), that's your three ingredients. She's just referring to the number of ingredients that actually need to be cooked in the slow cooker for the tacos, which is nice, but after reading her entire post titled Slow Cooker Chicken Tacos and then getting to the end where she says, "now if you want to make tacos out of this", I feel a little duped. I'm over it and this mini rant.

Grocery List

Produce
3 avacados
1/3 cup fresh cilantro
shredded lettuce

Meat
Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts

Dairy
2 cups shredded Pepper Jack
Shredded Cheddar or Mexican Blend
Milk
Greek Yogurt

Freezer
16 oz mixed vegetables
16 oz tortellini

Grocery
10 ounces dry elbow macaroni
1 envelope taco seasoning
16 oz Salsa
whole wheat tortillas

We have, you may need:
14 oz vegetable or chicken broth
Garlic Cloves
Lime
Salt
Pepper
Butter
Flour
Dried Tarragon
Olive Oil
Parmesan Cheese

Menu Plan: 4/30-5/4 and Wedding Update

Holy guacamole, it's almost May. When did that happen!? The end of this week will mark 1 month since the engagement, which means I'm already about 6 months behind most of the brides over on TheKnot.

Just to give a very general update, we're reconsidering our big plans to get married in the NY/NJ/PA area due to travel constraints (a little too far to drive, a little too close to fly for almost our entire families). At the moment, we're looking into NC, but I'm not committing that to the interwebz until I have venues locked down. We're hoping to go to NC sometime in June to visit places.

Now, onto the menu plan. It's very, very short this week since one or both of us have evening plans a couple nights.
Salmon with Warm Lentil Salad (a repeat I loved; I'll be making a half recipe of salmon, but full lentils.)
Tomato Pasta Stoup
Slow-Cooker Chicken Curry

Produce
1 red onion
1 bunch fresh parsley
1 bunch arugula
1 lemon
2 yellow onions
1 ginger root

Meat
10 oz. salmon fillets
1 1/2 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs

Grocery
10 oz. frozen green peas
1 cup unsweetened coconut milk

We Have/You May Need
3-4 stalks celery
3 large carrots
1 cup lentils
Salt & pepper
Olive oil
Red wine vinegar
Dijon mustard
2 cups short pasta (calls for ditalini, I'm subbing orzo)
15 oz. can tomato paste
Parmesan cheese
Garlic
Curry powder
Ground coriander
Ground cumin
Rice (i.e. Basmati)

Menu Plan 4/23-4/27

No Friday meal this week, because Alex is traveling for work. A couple of our all-time favorites here along with a few new recipes.

Buffalo-Style Turkey Chili
Sun-Dried Tomato and Goat Cheese Risotto
Skillet Chicken Parm
Chili and Cheddar Bow Tie Casserole

Produce
3-4 stalks celery
Scallions
1/4 cup shallots
3 pt. Grape Tomatoes
1 Red Bell Pepper


Meat
1.5 lb. ground turkey
1 lb boneless/skinless chicken breasts


Dairy
2 oz. Goat Cheese
2.5 oz. part-skim mozzarella
Milk
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese


Grocery
Chipotle chiles in adobo
15 oz. can tomato sauce
32 oz. chicken broth (in place of the vegetable stock for the risotto)
1 box bow tie pasta

We Have/You May Need
2 carrots
1 onion
Garlic
Salt & pepper
2 cups chicken stock
Water
Sun-Dried Tomatoes
Olive Oil
Arborio Rice
Flour
Italian Seasoning
Butter
Chili Powder
Cumin
Cilantro

Menu Plan 4/16-4/20

The next week is pretty crazy for me with a combination of freelance deadlines and evening events, so the major focus for this week is recipes that are as quick as possible. Also, I think we'll keep it at four homemade meals this week.

Warm Pasta Salad with Shrimp
Curried Broccoli Couscous
Pan-Fried Chicken Cutlets (no recipe, just: flour, salt, pepper, olive oil, and chicken cutlets) and Parmesan Roasted Broccoli and Onions
Goat Cheese and Sun-Dried Tomato Pasta (if I have left-over spinach from the warm pasta salad I plan to use it here)

Produce:
1 lemon
1 bunch fresh spinach
2 red onions
1 large bunch broccoli
1 bunch parsley


Meat:
1 lb. chicken cutlets


Dairy:
5 oz. soft goat cheese


Grocery:
1 can cannellini beans
1 can chick peas
1/3 cup raisins
3/4 cup couscous
1 cup sun-dried tomatos not packed in oil
1/4 cup slivered almonds


I Have/You May Need:
3 cups uncooked short pasta (i.e. Farfalle)
12 oz. uncooked short, tubular pasta (i.e. Rigatoni)
Dijon mustard
Garlic
Olive oil
Salt
Pepper
Red pepper flakes
12 oz. shrimp
Capers (I plan to substitute green olives)
Curry powder
Parmesan
Flour

We're Engaged!

It's true, we're gettin' hitched! It's totally, totally insane, I know.

Now, before I get too carried away, let me say, this is probably the most conceited post I'll ever write. But when you get engaged, everyone asks the same handful of questions. And even though I'm so, so grateful to all our friends and family who've been ultra-supportive, I am getting sick of hearing myself talk. So I figured I'd round up the questions everyone's been asking me and actually answer them all in full.

How'd he propose?
On one knee, of course! As every man should.

Oh, you wanted details? Well we'd both talked about it before and agreed that the whole big, public proposal thing wasn't us (not that there's anything wrong with it, just not us!). This past weekend we took a little two-night getaway to rural PA (Gettysburg, technically, but I think that draws to mind the wrong kind of atmosphere). On the first night, after a wonderful dinner, while we were in our room in a quaint and beautiful inn, he popped the question.

There was no grand speech or anything, though, there were of course some professions of love (I'll skip the mushy details — again, overtly public's not our thing). At first I actually thought he had to be joking, since he pulled out this teal cowboy hat-shaped jewelry box. Then he cracked it open and I realized — holy crap — it was the real deal. There was a bit of crying (not on my part) and I said yes.

Can I see the ring?

I really struggled to get a photo to do it justice because it is gor-ge-ous. It's an antique and very intricately designed with one large solitaire diamond flanked by two very small, almost indistinguishable diamonds that add just enough sparkle.

More importantly, it originally belonged to Alex's great-grandmother and has been passed down through each generation. Magically, it fit me like a glove without any sizing — and because the band is so thin, it'd actually be impossible to resize!

Are you so happy?
Ummmmm yeah. For some reason, people do keep asking me this, so let me make it clear. YES! Absolutely. So, so happy.

Did you know it was coming?
Generally speaking, yes. Alex and I have both planned to get married for some time now, but I 100% believed he didn't have a ring. I had actually thought to myself that this trip would be the perfect time to propose, but didn't let myself get my hopes that high.

How'd you tell your parents?
He told them actually. He formally asked their permission in person back in February. He was on a softball trip to Orlando and I had no idea. I'm suddenly learning that all my loved ones are remarkably skilled at keeping secrets from me.

When/where are you going to get married?
We'll probably wait until August/September 2013. We're not in a huge rush, but I'd like it to be warm. We're hoping to get married somewhere within a 1-2 hour drive of us so that we can easily and conveniently plan. If we don't find anything we love, though, we'll expand the search to Cape Cod, NC, and FL.

How'd you tell Goose?
Well, I showed her the ring, but she tried to eat. So that was the end of that.

Menu Plan 4/9-4/13 by Alex

It's now time for the most exciting part of your week, our menu plan! This one is an Alex creation, and I must say I did well. The last time I tried my hand at this, I had a lot of similar themes and flavors throughout the week and it worked, but I wanted to make sure each dish had its own character. This week has two vegetarian dishes, a chicken dish and a salmon dish. No Wednesday because I'll be working late, so Kelly and I will be feasting on leftovers.


Monday: Artichoke Pizzas with Lemony Green Bean Salad
Tuesday: Grilled Eggplant Provolone
Thursday: Mustard Broiled Salmon with New Potato Salad
Friday: Margarita Chicken


Just a note, on Thursday and Friday I'm only planning on doing half recipes since we won't have as much of a need for leftovers, so this shopping list factors that in. 

Produce

4 eggplants

.75 lbs new potatoes

2 lemons

1 lime

Small fennel bulb

Cilantro

1/8 cup Fresh Dill

Meat

2-6 oz salmon filets

2 Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts

Deli

½ lb thick cut provolone cheese

Dairy

2 cups of shredded cheddar cheese (using the last 1/2 cup in place of the pepper jack for the chicken)

Freezer

9 oz. of frozen French-cut green beans

Grocery

2 Pita Breads

12 oz. jar of roasted Red Peppers

6 oz. jar of artichokes

Salsa Verde

1 can black beans

We have, you may need:

Cumin

Canola Oil

Olive Oil

Almonds

Salt

Pepper

Sour Cream (using Greek Yogurt)

Dijon Mustard

Oregano

Balsamic Vinegar

Plates

Forks

Knives

Napkins