Meal Planning Monday

This week I'm doing something different with our meal plan. Writing it on Sunday for starters! But also I'm using Danni Martin, of Hungry Healthy Happy's new book of the same name as inspiration for our week's dinners. This isn't a sponsored post and I bought the book myself, I just fancied planning our week using a different inspiration and thought that was a good way to start.

Breakfasts: I made a highly experimental carrot cake porridge last week. As you can see it's not up on the blog yet and still needs some tweaking. Hopefully it'll be here next week - if I improve it.

Lunches: I didn't make soup last week, and ended up eating lots of sandwiches, so this week I have a pot of butternut squash soup on the planner. I'll roast the BNS with some red onions and garlic tomorrow morning before blitzing with some chicken stock and chilli.

Suppers:

Monday - Leftover chickpea curry, with brown basmati rice and roti. This is my recipe, and the post has been half written since the first week of January - this makes a lovely supper dish and I will blog it soon.

Tuesday - Sausage casserole with roasted garlic mashed potato from Hungry Healthy Happy and veggies. I'll adapt the mashed potato to be dairy free, and will be using Heck sausages for the casserole as we know they're dairy free.

Wednesday - Leftovers of casserole with baked potatoes and veggies

Thursday - Spaghetti bolognaise from Hungry Healthy Happy - sadly not with courgetti as we don't have a spiraliser (I've been meaning to splash out on one but just not around to it) but with pasta, and over broccoli for me as a comprimise

Friday - Leftover bolognaise on baked potatoes

Saturday - Chicken Tikka masala from Hungry Healthy Happy - but adapted to be dairy free, instead of yoghurt using coconut milk with brown rice.

Sunday - Roast chicken - we haven't had a roast since Christmas, and I could do with an easier week next week with leftovers as the basis.

I've got no baking planned this week as I'm trying to keep my snacking to speed foods (Slimming world jargon for  fruit and veggies) and resist temptation to eat all the cake!

As always I'm linking up with At home with Mrs M and Organising Junkie so be sure to head on over and see what the other planners are up to.

Meal planning Monday: Week 1, 2016

Happy new year! I've had a lovely break over Christmas and the New Year - we had M at home and a lovely family time, with my sister as well as both sets of parents. It's back to business as usual today with weigh in at Slimming World for me and a bundled up trip to the swings for Harry.

I think it's safe to say I fell off the Slimming World wagon over Christmas - my mother-in-law is wonderful for finding allergy friendly treats for me, and she even went to the trouble to make me dairy free brandy butter which was amazing. It would have been rude not to heavily sample everything! This does mean a 2lb gain last week and so I'm back with my Food optimising as of this morning.

Breakfasts: I've been reading Oh She glows and am going to try being a bit more inventive with my porridge from now on. This morning we had her apple pie oatmeal which was lovely, although Harry reacted to something in it and Piriton has had to be located and administered. He's had nearly all the component parts before so I'm thinking it's either the chia seeds or a bigger amount of cinnamon. Truth be told I'm not sure. The irony being of course that he adored it.

Lunches: In a shocking turn of events, I've not made any soup this week. so that will need to happen. I think I'll do a carrot, chilli and red lentil concoction. Syn free with lots of goodness in there, and the lentils will make it lovely and filling.

Suppers:

Monday: Tomato, veg and red lentil pasta. It's a pack holiday favourite - I make it in massive quantities and our Brownies go loopy for it (heavily doused in cheese). I just really fancied it so will knock that up while Harry's napping this afternoon.

Tuesday: Leftover pasta

Wednesday: Chilli con carne with rice and kale for me. Just rice for M

Thursday: Leftovers in a burrito for M, with rice for me

Friday: Schnitzel, Slimming world chips and veggies

Saturday: Casserole of some description. Possibly beef

Sunday: Leftovers with baked potatoes and green veggies

That's our week - we'll use the slow cooker for the chilli, and casserole to make life easier. And there should be lots of leftovers to stock up the freezer with some quick and easy suppers.

Right, bubba is up from his nap and we need to get off to this weigh in. Wish me luck and enjoy your weeks.

Meal Planning Monday

Do you ever do that thing where you think - "That's OK, we'll eat from the freezer tonight"? I did that this morning, only aside from some sloes, frozen overripe bananas, and the ubiquitous bags of peas and sweetcorn, nada, rien, not a sausage. Oh. So aside from the fact that we'll be off to Aldi tonight, I thought I'd better get my pinny on this week and do some batch cooking.

The autumn always says batch cooking to me anyway, so as far as I'm concerned it's a win win situation. I popped a loaf of my 50:50 wholemeal in the bread maker this morning so that's under my belt already. 

Breakfasts - have wildly overdone it on the French bread in France last week I am definitely back on porridge with almond milk and some fruit.

Lunches - Soup for me - I'm going to make a batch of my Slimming World minestrone either tonight or tomorrow morning as I love it and it's just what I fancy. I'm not sure how Harry (or my carpet) will cope with soup!

Suppers -

Monday: Tonight will be super quick and easy, so probably schnitzel, oven chips and those peas and sweetcorn. A throw it all in effort!

Tuesday: Chicken and sweet potato casserole (recipe to be written up)

Wednesday: Leftovers

Thursday: Tomato and butternut squash pasta (with lardons for the grown ups)

Friday: Sausages, baked potatoes and chard/ spinach from the veg patch.

We're seeing family this weekend so I'm leaving that flexible for now.

Baking wise I need to make some flapjacks as Harry's having a growth spurt and I think my milk supply is taking a little while to respond!

Weaning update #5 - A development in the world of porridge fingers

It's happened that my post on Porridge fingers is one of the most popular of late. It ticks over daily and is hopefully helping lots of other Mums and Dads with inspiration for breakfast.

Harry doesn't just have porridge for breakfast, but it is one of his favourites. However, he doesn't like to be (read refuses) spoon fed, so I tend to stick to said porridge fingers. I do have a consistency issue with them, I'm not sure if it's just me, but sometimes they set rock hard, others they're still squishy. Harry's not bothered - even when they're solid he happily rubs them on his gums and I try to suppress a flap and go to make some toast! Truth be told, I'm a bit funny about Harry's allergy - I'd rather go without and eat the same as him, so I've been making us both baked porridge for the last week or so as it sets nicely and can be sliced into fingers for him, while I happily eat (probably too much of) it.

Baked porridge

Half mug of porridge oats
1 Mug of almond/ oat milk (this is a recipe suitable for a CMPI and soya free, obviously use hwatever milk you can tolerate)
1 pear grated
Handful of sultanas
1/2 tsp ground ginger

The night before mix up the porridge oats, milk, grated pear, ginger and sultanas in an ovenware or pyrex type dish (basically it needs to go in the oven and not crack)

In the morning check your mix, you want it to be wet, but not lots of extra milk sloshing around in the dish.  Add more if you think it's a bit dry. 

Preheat the oven to about 180 degrees C, and pop the porridge in for 15-20 minutes. You want all the milk to be absorbed and the top to be light golden.

Serve, sliced into fingers for the baby - or in a bowl for a grown up. Non dairy and soya allergic people can add some milk, yoghurt etc...

Variations:

• Apple and cinammon
• Dates/ chopped figs instead of sultanas
• Nuts if you're not feeding a baby
• Spoonful of peanut butter and mashed/ sliced bananas
• If it's not sweet enough you could add sugar/ honey/ maple syrup or golden syrup. I think demerera sugar would be brilliant sprinkled on top before you bake it. Again, not idea if you're using it as a weaning recipe 
• Berries would be fantastic - I'm just waiting for them to come into season (and get cheaper) so I can make this with rasperries and blueberries. 

Meal planning Monday: New year new meal plan

Well, I'm sure the meal plan won't be that new, but it scanned nicely.

We're back in that period of the year that can only herald a frenzy of good intentions - no resolutions here but a commitment to being healthy.

Breakfasts - I keep telling myself I'll eat porridge, but I'd really gone off it of late - I have found a vanilla porridge recipe that seems to be working for me now though. I have a vague memory of a Jamie Oliver recipe that came out of a Sainsbury's magazine for some spiced stewed that I'm going to try to recreate too. I also have some apple butter that I think will work well too.

Lunches - we're on a bit (understatment) of an economy drive at the moment so I'm mainly eating leftovers and the rice bowls I made up and froze towards the end of last year.

Snacks - Russett apples and mini Babybels have got me through many a day of late and will continue to do so. I'm guessing it's the balance of protein and carbs that help me not get hungry, but they're definitely my snack of choice

Suppers - always the interesting bit...

Monday: M is away with his parents so I'm going to make muttar paneer and relish every pea.

Tuesday: Chorizo, bean and butternut squash chilli (I'll pop it in the slow cooker)

Wednesday: Leftover chilli

Thursday: Fish and greens with brown basmati rice, cooked in soy, chilli and ginger for me. The same for M but with chicken.

Friday: I'll have been in Leicester, so something quick and easy - maybe my not-so-secret love for chicken kiev with homemade sweet potato chips (the easiest things to make ever)

Saturday: I'll probably pop something in the slow cooker, either a brisket or a casserole to have with mashed potatoes and steamed veggies. That way we can have leftovers on Sunday.

Sunday: Leftovers.

What's on your menu this week?

Meal Planning Monday: Are we nearly there yet?

It's that time of week again, I'm currently cwtched under my camp blanket, staring out at hammering rain and wishing that spring would, well, spring already. I want to want to eat the salady items that are starting to permeate my veg box, I want to be able to go out walking and running again, to enjoy the opportunity for a potter. But, what can you do - spring will spring when it's good and ready.

Over the las week or so, I've not done too well on the cooking/ eating front. It's nice to be flexible, but  just don't feel inspired. That said, I had a lovely pink day in the kitchen yesterday stewing some beautifully rosy early rhubarb that I picked up at the market, and then making some blood orange curd (I have another batch to do but have run out of eggs annoyingly).

I also finally got around to making the salted caramel & pecan brownies that I've been meaning to try for ages. The recipe came from Rachel at Baking Brownies for Mozart, as her brownie cups were one of my swaps at Let's make Christmas, which although in itself a distant memory - recreating those brownies has been playing on my mind ever since. A good friend of mine Kat (of the epic photography skills at my sister's Hen Party), taste tested them for me, and they were definitely a success.

So next week - what does this have in store?  Health wise, I'm still headachey on and off, but managing work well actually. I'm still going for easy food as my energy levels are still low. Ideally I'd be starting the week with the fridge slightly better prepared but I have a plate of picky bits ready for any dining emergencies.

Breakfasts: Porridge still (the only upside to the continuing weather) with the rhubarb I stewed.

Lunches: I wanted to make some soup yesterday, but the plastercast hindered my abilities to chop up the squash that was intended for said soup. I will be cornering M this afternoon and bribing him with brownies to do it for me. Hopefully then I can commandeer half of it for a lovely thick soup with ginger and chilli. If not, I've made a lovely batch of homemade houmous and randomly for me, am really enjoying seeded Ryvita thins, salad and crudites with it.

Dinner - I'm cooking a huge shoulder of pork today for dinner with M's parents and am hoping leftovers will be enough for Monday and Tuesday. I'll try to take the pictures as I'm using the same guidelines as I did here.

Monday: Leftover roast pork, with vegetables

Tuesday: Either leftover leftovers - maybe in a pitta bread or shredded into some steamed veggies.

Wednesday: Chicken, butternut squash and barley casserole (on the proviso that M chops up said squash)

Thursday: Fingers crossed for aforementioned soup and soda bread

Friday: I can't remember what or where we're up to next weekend so I think we'll have the leftovers from the minced meat hash I made this weekend - as if we've got no plans I'd like to pop and see my Mum I think. I think topped with a poached egg and a a good dollop of ketchup it should be better second time around.

Well that's the Pantry - what about you? What're you up to this week? Be sure to head over to At Home with Mrs M for more meal inspiration