Menu surprise

September 30, 2013

We've had a busy few days. We had a leftover night but to make it more fun we added in a movie. We worked really hard on yard work and I didn't feel like cooking so we ordered a pizza. I wanted a quick dinner yesterday. I grabbed some leftovers out of the fridge and got to work.

I wanted to make veggie and quinoa quesadillas. I cooked up onion, garlic, leeks, mushrooms, and green peppers. I stirred in some leftover quinoa, corn, garlic & wine seasoning, and salt. I added mexican cheese and cilantro. Then I toasted up our quesadillas. I thought they were pretty good. The kids were iffy about them so I also made them cheese quesadillas.

I was busy making a huge batch of jalapeno poppers this afternoon. I took a break half way through to grab some lunch. Hmmmm. There was a bunch of the quinoa quesadilla filling leftover. If it's good in a tortilla, it should be good on a bun. Right? I haven't been steered wrong with a melty sandwich yet. I warmed up some of the filling and put it on a club roll. I topped it with a few slices of provolone cheese and popped it under the broiler. Sure enough. It was tasty enough that I didn't want to stop long enough to go grab a fork! 

I felt kind of bad that the kids didn't really like a few of my dinners lately. So I had the kids help make a menu list this week. I asked my son what he wanted. He surprised me by saying he wanted the spinach and artichoke pasta I had made before. You know, the pasta sauce that I made out of TOFU. Wow. You got it. I went to the cupboard and checked out my pasta stash. I told him that I could make it with regular spaghetti noodles or spinach noodles. He asked for spinach. WHAT? I'm not really sure what's going on with my kiddo but I like it! 

Last time I made this sauce, I used silken tofu. Today all I had was firm. I decided not to press it. I figured that seeing as I want it to be a sauce, I wouldn't take out any water. I put half of the block of tofu in the food processor with about 1/4 cup milk. Meanwhile, I sauteed onion, garlic, and spinach/arugula mix. I added in a little white wine, garlic & wine seasoning, and salt. I added the spinach mix to the food processor along with half a can of artichoke hearts. I put the sauce into a pan and added some freshly grated parmesan. I didn't measure it (my guess is 3/4 cup) - it was just enough that my son's arm got tired. Ha. I stirred in some basil. It was pretty thick so I added more milk to thin it out (maybe about 1/2 cup). I served it with the spinach pasta and some steamed green beans. 

Both of the kids said it was good. I was surprised that we all liked the spinach pasta. It only had three ingredients: organic whole durham flour, spray dried spinach powder, and water. For a healthy pasta, it wasn't bad at all. The three of us all want to buy it again. Score!

Pie, pie, and more pie

September 26, 2013

Today's food was awesome! The best part is that there were two dishes that I thought I might be crazy for trying but they turned out so delicious.

I wanted to use up leftovers for lunch. I pulled some containers out of the fridge. I found grilled red onion and mushrooms, caramelized onions, and roasted butternut squash. I also grabbed the spinach and arugula mix, cilantro, muenster cheese, and provolone cheese. I warmed the veggies and piled them onto a club roll. I topped them with cheese and popped them under the broiler. Oh my gosh. I wasn't prepared for how delicious butternut squash and caramelized onion would be together on a melty sandwich! It makes me want to go buy another squash just to make sandwiches with. Yum!

I found a recipe today from Martha Stewart for tortilla and black bean pie. Hmmmm. Her recipe calls for 2 cans black beans, 1 pack frozen corn, 2 garlic cloves, 1 jalapeno, 1 onion, 4 scallions, salt, pepper, 1/2 teaspoon cumin, 4 flour tortillas, 8 oz cheddar cheese, and 12 oz beer. She cooks the beans in beer. Really? I've never tried to cook with beer before.  I altered the recipe some and this is what I came up with.

I sauteed half an onion, two garlic cloves, half a green pepper, and half a box of mushrooms in some olive oil. After about five minutes, I added in 2 cups of black beans. I thought the recipe sounded like way too much beans (even for vegetarians) so I just added one bag from my freezer. I added salt, pepper, and cumin. I added a few extra shakes of cumin. I also added in paprika and oregano. I let it simmer until the beer had cooked out. I stirred in a bag of corn (frozen from farmer's market: about 4 cobs worth) and a handful of green onion. I let it cook a few minutes until most of the corn's juices were absorbed. I greased the bottom of a springform pan. I put in a tortilla and topped it with about 1/4 of the bean mixture. I topped it with mexican cheese. Tortilla. 1/4 bean mixture. Mexican cheese. Tortilla. 1/4 bean mixture. Cheddar cheese (I wanted mexican on top for a better presentation). Tortilla. Rest of bean mixture. Mexican cheese. It baked at 400 just until the cheese was melted (maybe 15 minutes). Carefully remove the sides of the pan. The recipe called for green onions on top. I decided to use cilantro and sour cream instead. I wanted the entire meal to be "pie" because my daughter has a slight obsession with pie. Ha. I served our taco pie with some of my homemade pumpkin pie applesauce. I couldn't figure out how to make our veggies into pie. Then it hit me. I have these cute little single serve pie plates. I put some veggie dip in the bottom and added veggies around the sides. Pie veggies. Ha. For dessert, I made a pina colada cheesecake pie. It was a mix that we got at a local wine festival. I just had to add the mix to cream cheese and cool whip. Easy as pie!

My daughter renamed the meal taco pie. How did we like it? My hubby said it was delicious. My daughter loved it. I loved it. It is now one of my favorite meals. My son wasn't a big fan. He said he would like it if it didn't have black beans. I told him that next time I could make him a separate one minus the beans. Deal.

Pasta with leeks; grocery savings

September 25, 2013

I debated skipping grocery shopping this week. Well, for about two seconds. Then I wondered who was I kidding. I needed ice cream. Ha. There has been talk that the military may not get paid on October 15th. I'm really hoping it is just a scare tactic but I figured that I should plan our budget over the next few weeks a little more carefully just in case. I had gotten out of the habit of really meal planning. I sat down a few days ago and came up with meals. I tried to make most of the meals out of items that I already have at home. Once again, it seems that I have collected a bunch of random items that need to get eaten up soon. I kept all this in mind as I made my grocery list this week.

My pre-challenge weekly commissary average was $175. Today I spent $18.97 on toiletries/cleaners. I spent $5.09 on impulse items. I got a new yogurt. The coconut one comes with toasted almonds and dark chocolate chips. Key lime comes with graham crackers and white chocolate chips. I also got the kids each a pack of ramen noodles. I decided to grab a vegetarian ground sausage again this week. I spent $10.16 on gossip magazines. I spent $53.48 on food. WHAT?! That's awesome. After adding in their surcharge and taking out my coupons, I spent $86.39 out of pocket. This is a savings of $88.61. My pre-challenge weekly restaurant average was $80. This week we went out for Japanese and out to Ruby Tuesday. Japanese is always expensive for us. We spent $106.36 this week. Ouch. This is over by $26.36. The kids did great packing lunches. They saved $18.85. This brings our savings for the week to $81.10. Our grand total savings is $4,622.80 in 343 days!

I tried a new recipe tonight that I got from a friend. I altered it a bit. Heat a little oil and butter and saute some onion. The recipe then calls for ground beef but I used the vegetarian sausage. I let that brown up a bit. I decided to take the "sausage" out of the pan, set it to the side, and add it back later. Add 2 or 3 sliced leeks, a small can of tomato paste, and one cup of vegetable broth. We love garlic so I decided to add in a clove of fresh garlic. I used homemade broth. Let it cook for 15 minutes. Season it with 1 tablespoon of mustard, 1 tablespoon of paprika, salt, and pepper. I had to add extra broth as it cooked down. My guess is that I added almost an extra cup of broth. When done cooking, stir in one cup of sour cream. I stirred the sausage back in and added rotini pasta. I served it with freshly grated parmesan cheese. I needed to use up some of last week's farmer's market finds. I had a zucchini, yellow squash, garlic, red onions, and tomato. I sauteed them up with olive oil and butter. I added local white wine, salt, pepper, garlic & wine seasoning, and basil.

Our family had mixed reviews with dinner. The kids weren't too thrilled with it. I think that the reason my daughter didn't really like it was the mustard. She isn't much of a mustard girl and I always think that I can fool her and "hide" it and she won't taste it. She always does. Ha. I'll learn one day. My hubby said it was good but that we should add mushrooms to it. Mmmmm. Agreed.

Quinoa patties

September 24, 2013

The kids only had half a day of school today. My daughter's school got out before lunch. My son was able to pack his lunch though. I spent the day making a small batch of applesauce. Pumpkin pie flavor was a hit last time so that is what I went with today.

My daughter came home and we worked on her math. Wow. I can't believe how complicated they are making 5th grade math. We must've worked on it for two hours. I think we have it straightened out now though (hopefully!).

I decided to try out some new dishes for dinner. I saw on Fat Free Vegan Kitchen a recipe for homestyle green beans and potatoes. I tried it out. Basically, saute some onion and garlic. Add in chunked potatoes (I used red, purple, and yellow) and green beans. Add broth (homemade vegetable) until it just covers the potatoes. Season with salt and pepper. During the last few minutes of cooking, add 1/4 teaspoon of liquid smoke. I added an extra splash.

We really liked the beet burgers that we made for our spooky dinner. I wanted to make a quinoa patty tonight and decided to base it off of that beet burger. We mixed cooked quinoa, red onion, garlic, leftover shredded beet, freshly grated parmesan cheese, egg, panko bread crumbs, and black beans. My hubby seasoned them with garlic & wine seasoning, pepper, and paprika. He cooked them up in a little olive oil. I served it with a side salad. My son had fun learning how to use a sharp knife. He cut the carrots, onion, and green beans tonight. We had carrots, red onion, green pepper, cucumber, and sunflower seeds on our salad. I had my patty with a little of Country Bob's all purpose sauce (like a steak sauce). My hubby decided to add cheese to his and have it like a burger. My kids saw him grab the burger bun and they wanted in on that deal too. Ha. For dessert, I made apple crisp.

How did dinner turn out? The potatoes and green beans were missing something. They didn't really have much flavor. The quinoa patties were really good. I just love the beet flavor. It really stands out. My son said it was ok. My hubby, daughter, and I all really liked it though. Crazy son. He just doesn't get it. :) On to dessert.... I made the apple crisp really thin. Let's face it. The best part of apple crisp is the topping and after all those math problems today, I needed it!

Riblets

September 23, 2013

I feel like a "real" vegetarian today. For lunch my hubby and I grilled up Morningstar Grillers soy burgers. This was the second time I had bought them. On purpose. So that tells you that they are a pretty decent substitute. We also grilled up red onion and mushrooms. I topped our burgers with american (and 3 pepper cheese for my hubby). I added lettuce, tomato, ketchup, and mustard. These burgers are pretty filling too.

Normally I plan a meal by starting at the entree. I felt all over the map tonight. I wanted to try butternut squash. I have never had it before. Our friends gave us one from their garden and tonight was the night to give it a try. I peeled and cubed the squash. I tossed them in olive oil and seasoned with salt, pepper, and a local maple sugar. I threw them into the oven at 415 degrees for 20 minutes. I then realized I still had no clue what else I was making. Ha. I looked in the freezer and saw vegetarian riblets. I grabbed those for my hubby and me. My daughter had mentioned chicken nuggets (vegetarian ones) so I grabbed those for the kiddos. I stirred the squash and then turned the oven down to 350 and added the "meat". Hmmmm. What else? I am a rice hoarder. I fully admit to it. On any given day, I have at least 5 types of rice.

*Side note: After writing the previous sentence, I had to go check. I have a brown/wild rice mixture. Arborio rice for risotto. Jasmine rice. Two kinds of sushi rice. I don't even make homemade sushi. Ha. Mahatma rice - I love that one for spanish rice. I also had a bag of brown rice. I didn't even bother checking the cupboards for rice a roni. Ha! I figured I would stop counting at 7.

Ok, back to dinner. I settled on trying the brown and wild rice mixture. I seasoned it with salt, pepper, thyme, and garlic & wine seasoning. I had never cooked it before and figured I should give it a try too. It's a little time intensive for my taste (ok, so it's not really that intensive, just more than simply stir and simmer). You bring it to a boil, simmer for 35 minutes and then let it rest for 15 minutes.  I'm too impatient for that which is why I have passed it up until now.

My hubby said the riblets were pretty good. My son took a bite and said they were good. I thought they were surprisingly a good substitute. Even the texture was good. The rice was good too. We were running a little late for cub scouts so it didn't have very long to rest. It would probably be better with more rest time in order to make it a little more fluffy. The butternut squash went over well too. My hubby said it tasted like sweet potato. My daughter cleaned her plate. As I was halfway through dinner, I realized that every item on my plate was new! Overall, a successful vegetarian day.

Spooky dinner

September 22, 2013

It's here. My favorite dinner of the year. Our 6th year of our family tradition: spooky dinner. This year we decided to have it on the night that we decorated for Halloween as a way to bring in the holiday season.

The kids helped to plan some of the items and even helped prepare some of them. It is such a fun time. Let me tell you about the giggles....

We feasted on bugs, eyeballs, flesh dip, a man eater, kitty litter, and dirty worms. We washed it all down with some pond punch that was filled with fish, fish eggs, and a worm. Sound delicious?! It was!

Our bugs were olives with clove heads and rosemary sprig legs. Our eyeballs were babybel cheese with olive and pizza sauce pupils. The flesh dip. Ha. We took a skull decoration and covered it with chive and onion cream cheese. My hubby added yellow and orange food coloring to the cream cheese to make it a fleshy color. He also added on mushroom and olive eyes along with eyebrows and some wounds. Our man eater was a beet burger. This was our first time making these. My hubby put together 1 cup of shredded beet, 1 cup of rice, 1/2 cup bread crumbs, a tablespoon of fennel, 3 tablespoons of onion, 1 tablespoon of garlic, 1 tablespoon of mustard, salt, pepper, and garlic & wine seasoning. He cooked them in a little olive oil. He made faces on the man and the man eating bun. Our kitty litter was a marble cake. We topped it with graham cracker crumbs that we mixed with coconut creme pudding. It was topped with some extra graham cracker crumbs. Tootsie rolls mold into perfect turds after being microwaved for 15 seconds. Everyone loves to shape turds. Ha! What better way to serve it up than with a kitty litter scooper! Dirty worms are smushed up black beans for the dirt. The worms are hotdogs that are sliced thin then cooked in boiling water for about 30 seconds or until they begin to curl. Pond punch was half sprite and half lemonade. We added a swedish fish candy and a gummy worm. We also needed fish eggs for it. I cooked small tapioca pearls for about 20 minutes. I split them into two bowls (along with the water they cooked in) and added food coloring. One bowl got 4 drops of blue. One bowl got 3 drops of yellow and one drop of green. Also, I stirred in 2 tablespoons of sugar into each bowl. They sit for 20 minutes. Next, you need to drain and rinse them in cold water. My new skimmer came in very handy. Voila. Pond punch.

I can't begin to tell you the amount of laughter that filled our house tonight. Or how many times I heard things such as "don't forget to eat your turd", "what species is that feces", and "you're gonna give him pink eye" (as my son used a pepper strip to "pick" the nose of the skull and then smear the flesh dip across the skull's mushroom eye). Ha! The fish eggs were unreal. The texture was perfect! Besides having a ton of fun, we also found a new recipe that we like: the beet burgers. They need something to help them hold together a little better but the flavor was incredible. There is some leftover shredded beet and I can't wait to figure out something else to make with them. Spooky dinner 2013 was spooktacular!

Sweet potato pizza

September 19, 20, & 21, 2013

Thursday was a busy day. I decided to pull everything out of my garden and finish it up for the year. I had a ton of green onions and carrots to take care of. I also cut my thyme and lettuce. After working on the garden food for 6 hours, I was in no mood to make dinner. I was beat. I was about to suggest that we could order dinner in when the kids spoke up. They wanted to cook for me. Yay! They put together cold subs for them and hot subs for my hubby and me. I assisted with chopping some veggies and putting our subs under the broiler. Our sandwiches were on our choice of a club or hawaiian sweet roll. Toppings were ham (for the kids), sauteed red onion/leek/green pepper/garlic/mushrooms (for my hubby and me), lettuce, spinach, green onion, cucumber, avocado, thyme, cilantro, and our choice of provolone/muenster/3 pepper cheese. They served it with chips, homemade pickles, and watermelon.

Friday we had a work function for my hubby. We decided to go out to eat Japanese on our way.

Tonight I decided to try my hand at surpassing my hubby's genius lunch from earlier this week. His pizza was so incredible. He had used my leftover cream of potato/leek/fennel soup as the sauce. Tonight I made a white pizza sauce.

Melt 2 tablespoons of butter. Stir in 3 tablespoons of flour. Slowly whisk in 1 cup of milk. Add 1/4 teaspoon of salt, 1/8 teaspoon pepper, 1 garlic clove, a few sprigs of thyme (leaves taken off the stems), and 1/2 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese. Just stir until the cheese is melted and then take off of the heat.

I topped the pizza with roasted sweet potato, caramelized onions, sauteed garlic/mushrooms/spinach/arugula, corn, and provolone/parmesan/mozzarella cheeses. I asked the kids what they wanted on their pieces. They both said just cheese.....until I had them taste the sweet potato. Then they added sweet potato. They munched on the extra slices while I grabbed the next ingredients. I had them try corn. Yep, add corn and then they finished the leftover corn. I couldn't change their minds about the mushroom saute or the caramelized onions though.

The pizza turned out great. It was well balanced between the salty and savory cheese and the sweetness from the onions, sweet potatoes, and corn. My daughter loved it. I think I still prefer the pizza my hubby made with my soup as the sauce. It just gave it a little bit extra flavor. However, had I not had that pizza earlier this week, I would have really loved tonight's pizza! I'd say our first attempt at sweet potato pizza was a success!