Weekly Menu 8/25+

Saturday		grilled pork chops corn on the cob watermelon
Sunday		grilled chicken rice green beans fruit & yogurt
Monday		cheesy spirals zucchini
Tuesday		crockpot beef potatoes cottage cheese fluff
Wednesday		chicken fried rice egg rolls cantaloupe
Thursday		chicken parmesan noodles w/pesto squash
Friday		dogs in a blanket carrot sticks watermelon

Saturday

--Put your pork chops in a Ziploc with a bottled marinade in the morning, just before breakfast.  They’ll be ready to go this evening when you go out and fire up the grill.   

Grilled Pork Chops

Corn on the Cob

Watermelon

Sunday

          --Grill extra chicken tonight for Wednesday night’s fried rice. 

Grilled Chicken

Rice

Green Beans

Fruit & Yogurt

Combine grapes and a chopped apple with vanilla yogurt for dessert or any combo of fruit you have on hand

Monday

--This makes a double recipe so you’ll have an extra for the freezer to share or to save sanity sometime down the line.

Cheesy Spirals

16 oz. package pasta spirals

4 cups cooked ground beef

2-28 oz. jar spaghetti sauce, any flavor

2 can condensed cheddar cheese soup, undiluted

2 tsp. black pepper

3 tsp. Italian seasoning

4 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

Cook pasta spirals according to package instructions. Drain and rinse; return half of noodles to pan. Place other half in a Ziploc bag.  Add 2 cups cooked beef, spaghetti sauce, 1 can cheddar cheese soup, pepper, and Italian seasoning and half of noodles to pan. Stir over low heat until well mixed and mixture is of uniform consistency. Remove from heat and stir in shredded mozzarella cheese. Spray 1- 9”x12” pan with non-stick cooking spray and pour mixture into pan. Bake at 350°F for 30-40 minutes or until bubbly. Place remaining ingredients in Ziploc bag bound for the freezer and label as "Cheesy Spirals: Thaw. Bake at 350°F for 40 minutes or until heated through."

Zucchini

Slice zucchini and sauté covered with 1-2T butter or olive oil.  To stir, swirl the pan around.  Be sure to hold onto the lid when you do that action, or else you will have a mess.  Top with

Tuesday

Crockpot Beef

1-2lb stew meat or roast cut up in medium sized pieces

1 can golden mushroom soup

1 sliced onion

1 tsp of minced garlic

1 bottle of beer (or 1 c wine)

Package of sliced mushrooms

2-3 potatoes in large cubes

2-3 carrots in large chunks

Salt and pepper

Put all ingredients into the slow cooker, mix and put crock in fridge for the night.  Add a note to your car keys to get crock pot started before you leave in the morning; trust me.  J

When you get home you can pour the beef into a sauce pan and mix in 1-2 T of corn starch to get it thickened up. 

Cottage Cheese Fluff

1 c cottage cheese (or sour cream)

1 small package of jello (sugar free will work)

11 oz mandarin oranges

1 c crushed pineapple

8 oz cool whip

In a bowl combine cottage cheese or sour cream with jello powder; mix well.  Stir in oranges, pineapple. Fold in cool whip. 

Wednesday

Chicken Fried Rice (Menus4Moms)

Calrose rice, cooked (about 2-3 cups)

1 egg

1 onion, chopped

frozen peas and carrots, thawed

corn if you like it

meat (optional, not on grocery list)

soy sauce or tamari

Cook calrose rice according to directions or reheat rice if you made extra last week. Heat some oil in wok or deep fry pan (I use about a tablespoon) and scramble one egg in it. Remove egg and add some more oil (I add about 3 tbsp) to the pan, heating. Add chopped onion, some thawed peas & carrots (and corn if you like), and anything else you like in your rice. We sometimes add leftover chicken or canned baby shrimp. When the onions are tender, add the rice and add soy sauce to taste and stir with a big flat wooden spoon or large cooking chopsticks, if you have them (mine are about 18" long). Add the cooked egg near the end of cooking time and stir well. When the rice is heated through and a bit crispy, it is ready to serve.

Egg Rolls (frozen)

Cantaloupe

Thursday

--You can make your own pesto or buy it in a jar.  I’ll include my recipe in case you want to make your own.  Store extras in small containers or add to ice cube tray and freeze any extra.  Pop them out so you can use the cubes in the winter. 

--If you like this chicken parm recipe, this is a good one to double up on for the freezer.  The recipe can easily be doubled and then you can freeze the chicken pieces individually on a wax lined cookie sheet until frozen.  Then drop them in a big Ziploc bag until you are ready to use them. 

Chicken Parmesan

4 boneless chicken breasts

2/3 c parmesan

2 t oregano

1 t paprika

2T butter

1T olive oil

Heat oven to 350 degrees.  Line a baking sheet with foil.  Melt butter and add olive oil.  I usually do this in a small omelet pan.  In a shallow bowl combine remaining ingredients.  Dredge chicken through butter, then into and through cheese mixture, and finally onto the pan.  Bake for 30 minutes or until cooked. 

Noodles with Pesto

1c fresh basil, washed

2 cloves garlic

¼ c olive oil

½ t salt

1/3 c parmesan

1/3 c toasted nuts (traditionally pine nuts, but you can also use pecans or walnuts too)

Combine all ingredients in food processor and pulse a few times.  Add a little extra olive oil if yours isn't looking moist enough.  If you have a nut allergy you can leave out the nuts, and pass them over to your friend who loves pine nuts. 

Sautéed squash

Butter, sliced squash, salt, pepper, sauté, yum. 

Friday

--This is a fun meal for kids to make, be sure to get them engaged early in cooking so you can know that they will be able to cook and feed themselves when they leave home; it will happen and boys need to learn to cook too. 

--You can make this a little more complicated if you want, or you can keep it really simple.  I’ll give the complicated version here and you can decide if you want to leave out any steps.

Dogs in a Blanket

Hotdogs

Crescent rolls or canned biscuits

Cheese slices

Mustard/ketchup

Partially slice hotdogs longwise.  Fold cheese into fourths so that you can ‘stuff’ the hotdog.  Wrap the dogs with the rolls/biscuits, leaving the ends of the hotdogs showing.  Bake 375 degrees for 10 minutes, or till golden

Carrot sticks

Watermelon