Meal Planning Monday: 13th June 2016

No meal plan from us last week - shocking, I know! And it definitely showed in my haphazard approach to the week. We ended up with fish and chips one night, and a pizza night too. Onwards and upwards this week, once Harry wakes up we're off to Aldi to do what will hopefully not be an expensive shop.

I'm doing some baking this week - jam tarts as prep for Brownie holiday which is heading fast towards us. We're Alice in Wonderland themed, and it's just so long since I made jam tarts that I thought I'd better have a trial run. Allergies mean they'll be raspberry jam and dairy free.

My slow cooker is out at the moment for a big batch of my Chorizo and butternut squash chilli - I've not used it for a couple of weeks and have definitely missed the ease of big batch cooks, I think it'll be out three times this week!

Breakfasts: oddly for me I've been really enjoying eggs for breakfast: soft boiled, mashed onto a slice of wholemeal toast with some salt and pepper. I have to eat it stood up in the kitchen so it's not around Harry, but that's what Bing bunny is for, yes?

Lunches: this week is Aldi smoked salmon with salad. And possibly some couscous.

Suppers:

Monday - Chorizo and butternut squash chilli (I'll be having with cauliflower rice)

Tuesday - leftover chilli

Wednesday - Tomato, veg and lentil pasta (I'll be having with courgetti)

Thursday - leftovers

Friday - Slow cooked beef brisket (unseasonal I know, but beef is on special at Aldi this week)

So that's our week, wonderful slow cooker to the rescue!

An InLinkz Link-up

Meal Planning Monday - late again!

I swear - first week of January and everyone else is all motivated and organised and I'm there flapping behind, trailing in a sleep deprived, teething baby haze of Calpol, concealer and coffee. But I'm here now. And almost organised. Ish.

Meal planning for the week actually happened at the end of last week as I did our online shop for Friday. It's been quite interesting planning as I've started doing Slimming World (I know it's a bit of a new mum, new year cliche but my default weightloss position of run isn't possible because of my hips) and combining that with being dairy free for Harry is a bit of a challenge. I suspect this first week won't be entirely successful as I'm struggling with balancing being dairy free, not eating artificial sweeteners, breastfeeding, Health Extra A's and also a lot of the things that seasoned slimmers rely on like low fat yoghurts are off the table for me. Overall I've been quite hungry and conscious that I'm probably not quite meeting the mark, but am hoping my food diary and notebook will help with that come Monday.

That said Harry's reflux is so much better and his weight gain (oh the irony) is off the charts with me off dairy (and soya) that even if it means that Slimming World isn't for me it's still worth it.

The weather here is freezing, so I've been having soup each day for lunch - a homemade carrot honey and chilli concoction that I really like. It's not quite syn free as it did have a couple of teaspoons of honey and a tablespoon of olive oil - but that was for the whole batch, which has done 10 portions thus far. Next week I'm doing a yellow split pea and veg soup - a variation on this Nigella one, but without the butter or frankfurters.

Breakfasts: I've been having porridge made with oat milk (but am going to try Almond milk next week) and mixed spices - aiming for a gingerbready flavour to compensate for a lack of sugar  with a chopped apple and banana in the bowl.

Lunches: It's strange that lunch is more important now as I've spent 7 months skipping it and compensating with large quantities of biscuits...  so I'm having either soup and a tuna sandwich, or a baked potato with prawns and a plateful of veggie sticks, or an omlette with mushrooms and ham.

Suppers: 

Sunday: Super slow cooked Brisket with extra veggies

Monday: Leftover roast beef with baked potatoes and veggies

Tuesday: Leftover beef turned into cottage pie with carrot, parsnip and potato mash on top and extra veggies. If I'm short on beef I'll be bulking it out with baked beans as randomly I've run out of lentils. 

Wednesday: Leftover cottage pie with frozen peas

Thursday: I've gone back to Brownies this term so will make a veggie pasta bake and leave it in the oven on low for M

Friday: Breakfast for tea

Saturday: I made a chilli con carne this week that I've frozen some portions of, so I think that would be a lovely warming supper

Sunday: Roast chicken (mainly to ensure an easy week next week!)

That's our week. Any of you out there doing slimming world with any suggestions for Slimming world friendly weeknight dinners that M would like and don't rely on heaps of dairy, please do leave your links below... I'd be super grateful for some inspiration.

Now, if someone could just poke me to remind me to link up with At home with Mrs M I'd be very grateful.

Meal Planning Monday: A thrifty Advent

Hello there, we've had a few weeks hiatus on the meal planning front. Since we went dairy free to help Harry's reflux, I've stuck to the same few recipes as I realised quite quickly just how much I relied on dairy products in my cooking. Whilst I wouldn't change how I'm eating for all the world as Harry's just so much better, I've kind of lost much in the way of impetus for cooking.

This week the run up to Christmas has hit home - we've scaled back our Christmas plans this year as I'm on Mat leave still, but even so we're still watching the pennies. This has meant that once again, we're having a week of freezer surprises. Albeit planned freezer surprises.

Harry's now having two meals a day - his breakfast tends to be a little bit of porridge or toast, with some fruit. and his lunch is either steamed veggies, fruit, or most excitingly... plaice fish cakes.

Breakfasts - I'm having porridge with oat milk which is surprisingly neutral in taste.

Lunches - tend to be whatever's hanging around. Eggs feature quite heavily.

Suppers -

Monday: Baked potatoes with leftover ham in coca-cola, cheese, bacon, beans (fridge surprise basically)

Tuesday: Chicken and mushroom risotto (freezer)

Wednesday: Cottage pie/ lasagne (freezer)

Thursday: Parsnip and pancetta pasta

Friday: There are two unlabelled tupperwares of red mystery leftovers in the freezer. I'm tempted but not sure how brave I actually am.

Saturday: I've got a portion of brisket frozen to slow cook, and I think I'll put that on when we get back from swimming to have as a roast dinner that evening

Sunday: Leftover brisket with baked potatoes

That's our week - a thrifty run up to Christmas in a bid to spend a very little money and also make some space in the freezer for my much loved and looked forward to turkey soup!

Meal Planning Monday: Preparing for festivties

I've started - amongst thinking about weaning, going dairy free, trying to keep the baby things scooped up together - I made the stuffing for Christmas day last week. The fruit for the cake is soaking in it's usual brandy, and the Christmas pudding is maturing nicely in a cupboard. This week I'm going to make the gravy which will then go in the freezer and next weekend I'll bake the cake so it's got a few weeks of feeding before I marzipan and ice it.

In other news, I'm still dairy free, and missing cheese wildly. However that pales into insignificance when I look at how much less Harry is sick. He's like a different baby. Obviously this gives us lots to think about in case this is a long term allergy, but for now we're embracing the weight gain (26oz in 3 weeks) and just going with it!

Meal wise this week, we're fully into our slow cooked winter warmers. Next weekend I'll make another batch of casserole both for our meals and the freezer, as our homemade ready meals are the saving grace of days when Harry isn't quite himself.

Breakfasts for me are porridge made with rice milk, either with chopped up banana or sultanas and brown sugar.

Lunches are falafel, houmous and pitta bread with carrot sticks and cherry tomatoes. Not particularly wintery I know, but easy to eat while I'm feeding.

Suppers:

Monday - freezer surprise (casserole I think)

Tuesday - Parsnip and bacon pasta but with pecorino instead of parmesan

Wednesday - Lentil ragu

Thursday - Leftover lentils

Friday - Breakfast for tea

Saturday - Chicken casserole with dumplings

Sunday - Super slow cooked brisket - which will take us into next week with leftovers for a cottage pie and hopefully some more pasties


That's our week - festivity preparation is gaining pace and other things are ticking along quite nicely *fingers crossed*

Leftover brisket pasties

Whereas I'm a complete pro at One chicken many ways - leftover roast beef poses more problems for me - once I've made cottage pie of course. The last time I made my super slow cooked brisket I didn't have quite enough leftovers to make a cottage pie, and had lots of the veggies leftover too. That's when my brisket pasties were invented (I say that somewhat tongue in cheek).

I simply shredded the leftover meat with two forks, and put it to one side - the veggies were already cooked, and covered in the thick gravy/ sauce that the casserole makes. I found some puff pastry in the freezer and quickly assembled what were to be the basis of that week's packed lunches and suppers.

One egg wash and 20 minutes later we had some gloriously golden pastry filled to the brim (slightly overfilled in some cases - don't look too closely) with tender veggies and the shredded beef. M had them cold in his packed lunch, I had them warm for mine and both were a definite hit.

Pasties aren't something I normally think of when I'm thinking about leftovers, but they were an incredibly successful way of eeking out a tiny peice of beef into another 6 portions. Without hesitation I'd do these again. There's no recipe as such, as this is more of an assembly process. Hopefully the picture above gives you an idea of how they were made - and my inexpert crimping. I'm sure you can tell pastry is not my most comfortable place.

Meal Planning Monday: the dairy free edition

So far since June, our meal plans have focussed on foods that increase your breastmilk, food that should be gentle to digest, weaning, and now... now we're dairy free. It seems that the paediatrician suspects that Harry doesn't have reflux per se, but is in fact allergic to Cow's milk - probably the protein. As I'm keen to breastfeed him for as long as possible this has meant cutting dairy out of my diet. Which despite having done it in the dim and distant past is harder than I remember.

When I'm not bemoaning the loss of tea, going dairy free actually isn't too hard, I just need to be organised, which I wasn't last week so it was all a bit haphazard. M is out at a curry night tonight and the baby is asleep (for now *touch wood) so I'm doing our meal plan and online shop before turning in for an early night myself. My temptations are chocolate, tea or coffee with milk and cheese. I can do without all of them, if I have alternatives. Annoyingly from what I've been reading today, it looks as though soya could be linked as an allergen but I'm going to give dairy until the end of the month, and then if things haven't improved will take out soya too.

Breakfasts - I can have porridge made with water, or sourdough toast with peanut butter that's just peanuts and a banana.

Lunches - I've made some of Jamie Oliver's barbecue beans which I've been having either on toast or just as they come in a bowl. They would be amazing with cheese. Just saying.

Suppers -

Monday - Leftover chorizo and butternut squash chilli with rice/ or in burritos

Tuesday - Pasta and meatballs

Wednesday - Freezer surprise

Thursday - Pulled pork with baked sweet potatoes

Friday - Leftover pulled pork

Saturday - Baked potatoes with the aforementioned beans

Sunday - Slow roast brisket (and not just because of the leftovers. Ahem)

If anyone reading has any experinece of breastfeeding a baby with cows milk allergy, please do let me know what's been useful to you...

Meal Planning Monday: the heating's on

We caved last week - my summertime obsession about the baby overheating has switched (much like the weather) into an obsession about him being too cold. Which is hard when he wriggles his socks and hat off, and screams the house down if you try and shoehorn him into a cardi or jumper. Blankets and heating it is then.

Unsurprisingly there's another casserole in the oven as I type, and dumplings ready to be popped in before too much longer. This weather just seems to call for tender, slow cooked meat in rich winey gravies with lots of root veggies. Full marks to Aldi for their Super 6 this week being fantastic for said casserole.

The weaning is... shall we say interesting? Some days the baby rice stays down and seems to have the same effect on Harry's milk, on other days it doesn't seem to make a blind bit of difference. I'm keeping on, and just hoping for the best.

Breakfasts - we're back on porridge, with chopped up banana

Lunches - I'm randomly trying to use up some halloumi that's languishing in the fridge so - griddled halloumi and houmous in pitta bread with carrot and cucumber sticks

Dinners -

Monday: Leftover beef casserole with mashed potatoes and broccoli

Tuesday: Courgetti spaghetti

Wednesday: Chilli con carne (freezer) with rice

Thursday: Chicken casserole with baked potatoes

Friday: Pizza

Saturday: Pesto & pecorino salmon with sweet potato wedges and veggies

Sunday: Slow cooked beef brisket

Lots of comfy, cosy food for chillier evenings here. What goes on your menu when the weather changes?

Meal planning Monday

I have to say this week I'm writing this bathed in glorious sunshine, wearing pjs and drinking buckets of tea - this seems to make the whole process a bit more hopeful. We're on the final countdown to the wedding and although the logical part of my brain tells me we're really organised, the hormonal part tells me I should be in full blown panic mode.

A busyish week for us, although no Guides for me this week as I'm travelling back from a meeting on the South coast so don't think I'm going to make it in time. We're starting off with a roast today, although sadly it's not going to provide leftovers as the piece of beef I roasted yesterday is about a third of the size of normal. Just enough in fact to do 4 meals.

Breakfasts: I'm still firmly on the granola and knitted home made yoghurt bandwagon.

Lunches: Still no enthusiasm - so soup or a sarnie it is.

Dinners:

Sunday - leftover brisket with roast potatoes, cauliflower cheese, veggies, yorkshire puds and gravy. Yum. 

Monday - I'm meeting one of my very best friends for an overdue catch up and squee over the upcoming nuptials. Food will be involved.

Tuesday - I've got some courgettes knocking around in the freezer so courgetti spaghetti is on the cards

Wednesday - Cottage pie with peas

Thursday - Leftover cottage pie

Friday - Homemade chicken kebabs - I use a variation on this recipe

Next weekend I think I'll do a roast chicken as I'm off in the run up to the wedding so it'll make for a nice straightforward week.

Have a good week - here's hoping this weather holds. What have you got on the meal plan?

Meal Planning Monday:

We're getting married in less than a month. Holy hell that's soon.

I made the wedding cakes last week - 2 fruit ones using my slightly amended version of The Pink Whisk's Christmas cake.

At this stage I thought I'd be headless chicken-ing as I tried to make sure my dress fitted by dietting and exercising. I suppose an advantage to being 21 weeks pregnant is that as long as I walk for 20 minutes a day I'm not too fussed about eating or exercising at the moment. Baby ness aside I'm as flappy as I thought I'd be. Once the cakes are sorted I need to make some flowery decisions so will be Pinterest bound this week.

All of this means that food is really taking a back seat at the moment. Not helped by the fact that I'm really not fussed about what I eat at all at the moment so am just trying to eat healthily. I say this without thinking too much about what I'm cooking this week so that may be a complete contradiction to reality!

Breakfasts: Last week I was stunned and most happy to win an Easiyo set from Lakeland, so am enjoying playing with that. I'm using their sachets at the moment, but considering trying some experimentation (hello Pinterest again)

Lunches: Fairly dull, I've been either having ham and cheese sandwiches or tomato soup. I'm just not feeling in the mood for wild and exciting.

Dinners - I'm going to try and use up odds and sods from the freezer

Monday:  Pasta bolognaise (sauce frozen last week) with additional cherry tomatoes and cucumber as I'm on a bit of a crudites bent at the moment.

Tuesday - (if there's some in the freezer) Leftover chicken and mushroom risotto

Wednesday - As I'll be doing Shrove Tuesday at Guides the night before - M and I will do pancakes together on Wednesday

Thursday - It's Brownie night so M is in charge of a pizza and more crudites

Friday - Chicken kiev, sweet potato chips and peas

Saturday - will have been a long day as I'm doing wedding dress 'stuff' so I think I'll pop a brisket into the slow cooker before we go

Sunday - leftover brisket with baked potatoes and possibly cauliflower cheese as I've been thinking about it a bit lately, and clearly the only way to stop that is to make it

So not an exciting week, but it should clear the freezer a bit.

Making your food go further: roast beef 2 ways

Roast beef isn't something we eat very often in this house. Don't get me wrong, I love it - but I'm not quite as good at it as my mum and it's just a bit too expensive to be overcooking. I mean really, who wants to eat grey, leathery meat? And then I cottoned on to pot roasting a joint. A brisket specifically.

Brisket is one of those cuts of beef that used to be really cheap. And then people started using it more widely and the price has risen. However, in good news it's amazing in leftovers - my cottage pie was labelled fantastic this week.

I pot roast my brisket using this recipe every time. It's infallible, quick to get on and in the slow cooker and really doesn't take any particular skill on my part (so it's ideal for a busy Sunday). Thinking about making your food go further, it doesn't just provide leftovers in the form of the meat, but also the stock and veggies - both of which made their way into the Cottage pie this week.

I take out a pint of stock from the slow cooker towards the end of cooking and bubble that up in a pan for a bit to make our gravy, so there's no need to do any separately.

As it's National Yorkshire pudding day this weekend I'll include my old faithful yorkshire recipe - I've only recently transcribed it to actual measurements as growing up we made it in a jug and just added milk to this line, flour to that one... This makes enough for 2 nights of yorkshires, or alternatively puds with your roast and pancakes/ fritters for lunch.

Yorkshire puddings

70g plain flour
100ml milk
2 eggs
Sunflower oil or fat for the pan

Preheat your oven as hot as it will go
Beat the flour, eggs and milk into a batter and leave to stand. I normally do this an hour or so ahead of when you want to cook them
Put your yorkshires pan (I say this like we have a dedicated pan - it's an ancient fairy cake tin) in the oven with a teaspoon of sunflower oil or fat in each dip. Allow to heat up for at least 5 minutes or until the oil is smoking
Fill each dint with batter, put on the top shelf in the oven and leave for 15 minutes (don't open the door!) Enjoy, with your roast beef.

The leftovers this week went into cottage pie, based on this recipe of mine - as I mentioned, I used the leftover stock from the slow cooker and topped up the carrot and onion with the leftover carrot, turnip and parsnip from the pot roast. Topped with mashed potato and grated cheese, this was definitely a hit.

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Meal Planning Monday: the quickfire edition

Quickfire mainly because I'm writing this on the train using the blogger app in a hitherto unheard of fit of last-minute organisation as despite the meal plan being written on Friday, there's just been no time to sit and compose a post.

I'm going to do a couple of posts this week about making your food go further with Sainsburys, so on Saturday we treated ourselves to a brisket and pot roasted that to this recipe This has meant that we had leftovers with baked potatoes last night, and tonight and tomorrow there's cottage pie on the menu - taking a 2lb joint of brisket that cost £8 down to a cost per serving of 66p. Score!

Monday: Cottage pie with beans or kale

Tuesday: Leftover cottage pie with beans or kale

Wednesday: Pizza

Thursday: Pasta bake - loosely based on Pantry pasta with added mushrooms

Friday: Leftovers of pasta bake if possible, or similar from the freezer

Saturday: We're out for my Christmas present of a trip to see Book of Mormon so we'll be treating ourselves to something lovely while we're out and about.

Sunday: Roast chicken I think, mainly to set us up for another week of leftovers.

As I said, a bit of a whistlestop one from me today, but be sure to pop on by At Home with Mrs M and see what the people not doing this on a train are up to.

Super slow cooked brisket

Each weekend I try to do a 'proper' meal. A sort of meat and 2 veg type affair. This feels so much more important in the autumn and winter, and sometimes it's nice for it not to be roast chicken or pork. I rarely cook roast beef because it's so expensive and because somewhere in my head it doesn't lend itself to leftovers in quite the same way. Of course this is twaddle, but when faced with the butcher or the meat counter in the supermarket I seem to always plump for chicken.

This week I had decided to try something different and slow cook a joint of brisket. Brisket is a cheaper cut of beef, one which requires a lot of slow cooking to break down the connective tissue. We bought ours from the local(ish) butcher and a 3lb joint which cost £12. I nearly fell over but M propped me up, whispering "think of the leftovers" as my shaking hands retrieved the cash from my purse.

Obviously the outlay meant that how I cooked the beef became more important. I had planned to slow cook it, in the crock pot for around 6 hours. I didn't however want to casserole it, as I wanted to retain the integrity of the whole joint of meat.

3lb joint of brisket
2tblsps English mustard
2 carrots roughly chopped
2 parsnips roughly chopped
2 turnips roughly chopped
2 leeks roughly chopped
1 clove of garlic, minced
Salt and pepper
500ml either red wine or beef stock

Start by searing the beef in a hot pan - there's a fair amount of fat on the top of the brisket joint and I didn't want to end with a flooby, flaccid peice of meat. This also gives it some colour, without which the end result will be grey. Still wonderfully tasty, but grey
Cover the seared brisket in the mustard
Line the bottom of your crock pot dish with the veggies, and pour the wine/ stock over. I wouldn't go out and buy wine for this - it's an ideal way to use up anything you've got lying around. In actual fact I used white as that's what I had.
Stir in the garlic, and season
Top with the beef
Put the lid on and turn your slow cooker onto High for 6ish hours. You could easily eat it after 4, but when you touch the joint at 6 hours, it just falls to peices.
At the end you can reduce down the cooking liquid to make a gravy - just do this in a pan and allow it to bubble down for a few minutes
Serve with roast potatoes, and the veggies from the pot. And of course yorkshires are mandatory.

Leftovers

There was a huge amount of leftovers. So much so, this joint did. 4 dinners from the slow cooker. 1 dinner of leftovers, plus a baked potato. A vast amount of curry and a cottage pie. Overall we got 14ish meals from the brisket which starts to make it much more affordable. However, I should just say that I completely understand that no matter how reasonable the per portion cost of the joint works out - the initial outlay might be prohibitive. there have certainly be times in the past when I wouldn't be able to afford the £12. That said, if you can afford it - or even afford a smaller piece, I would urge you to try it.