Meal Planning Monday: using what we have

It's a bit of a quiet one in the Pantry this week. Between one thing and another I realised I needed a quieter week cooking wise, so have hauled much of this week's meals, or the makings of those meals out of the freezer - the bonus of this being, most of our shop was veggies which made it lovely and cheap!

Harry's eating is going from strength to strength. He got to grips (quite literally) with pasta last week, eating fusili bolognaise from his tray with aplomb. We had our dietician appointment and his cows milk and soya allergy seems to have extended to eggs now. I'm hoping nothing else will come up, and the dietician was great, really helpful in terms of my calcium and iron levels. We've got a couple of suppliers for dairy and soya free yoghurts, cheese and cream to try, so I'll be reporting back on Harry's feelings about those. And mine.

I also baked bread this week - our normal bread now has soya flour in it and so M kindly hauled the breadmaker (I know, it's just easy) down from the loft for me, and a 50/50 wholemeal has already been made and heavily sampled.

I'm going to try and do an SP week as my weightloss needs a bit of a boost. My stumbling block will be the fruit I think, but the rest should be straightforward enough.

Breakfasts: Unsurprisingly mainly porridge for Harry and I - he's off eggs in their natural state, so the frittatas aren't going to be remade for now, but as he's OK with them in things I'll do a new lot of pancakes this week. There's always the new bread aswell.

Lunches: I made a split pea soup at the weekend, so that's me sorted. Harry likes it so we'll have it together (his favourite seems to be my Sweet potato and ginger soup) and he can have bread to dunk. Alternatively I've got some more tomato pasta in the freezer.

Suppers:

Monday - Meatballs in tomato sauce with pasta for M, and with Kale for me

Tuesday: Leftover pasta

Wednesday: Butternut squash dhaal with rice

Thursday: Leftover dhaal with roti if I can manage to make them

Friday: M's parents are visiting so a Shepherd's pie (with a swede topping for me) with veggies

Saturday: Sausages, baked potatoes and veggies

Sunday: Roast gammon with lots of veggies, roasties and cauliflower cheese.

That's our week - a straightforward one, with lots of meals based on things I already have in. What are your go-to meals? That you always have ingredients for to hand and don't need to think about much. Let me know in the comments below

As always, don't forget to hop on over to At Home with Mrs M and see what everyone else is up to.

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.

Meal planning Monday: the spring edition

I'm sure that should mean there should be pictures of lambs, and grass and things, but we're sadly lacking in those in Barnet, so the normal badge will have to do. 

Last week was a fantastic week (not so much in the Pantry, but what can you do) topped off by a visit to Leith's cookery school on Wednesday for an Extra Special Easter evening with Asda. Lots of fun first making our dinner, and then eating it. Look out for a post tomorrow with a giveaway of a hamper of Asda Extra Special goodies. 

The weekend went a bit haywire and plans down the drain, but in good news my Mum can now use her laptop which hopefully means she might pop by a bit more often, and in better news M really helped out cleaning the flat. I've still lost a knitting needle though. Just the one! So Mandy's baby blanket is on hold until I can get some new ones. 

This week is a quieter week  only one hospital trip is planned - for physio, and the Guides and Brownies break up for Easter. I'm re-starting my Couch to 5km programme (thank you NHS) and hopefully - headaches permitting - will get to the swimming pool for a splash. 

On the health front, my headaches have been really bad, both last week and over the weekend, which again has led to the dearth of posts. I've had my nerve blocker injections and hopefully they should kick in soon as I have lots of things I want to bake and blog. 

Anyway, this week's meal plan:

Breakfasts: I'm sticking with the 0% fat greek yoghurt, with either fresh or frozen fruit, and a sprinkle of flaxseeds

Lunches: Sainsbury's Moroccan houmous, with carrot sticks, celery, tomatoes and peppers. And some cheese if I'm still hungry

Baking: I've still not made the simnel cake, so that. And also maybe a satsuma and cardamom drizzle cake 

Dinners:

Monday: Roasted squash, peppers, fennel and leeks, with chorizo, garlic and olive oil. Served with rocket as a warm salad for me, and with pasta for M. If this is as nice as I hope, I'll blog it as a midweek dinner. 

Tuesday: Cauliflower cheese, with chorizo and tomatoes. I'll probably portion off M's and do it as a caulimacaroni affair.

Wednesday: Roast chicken with veggies and roast potatoes

Thursday: Leftover chicken with veg and baked potatoes

Friday: More leftover chicken, in a risotto

I'm actually not sure what we're up to this weekend, but I'll be making stock out of the chicken carcass as I'm out of homemade stock at the moment.

Be sure to pop over to At Home with Mrs M to see what everyone else is up to