This week's menu plan : Fun dinner week! From 7 - 13 June 11

Well goodness me!  Here we are on Wednesday and I'm writing the menu plan post.  You see, that's what making a fabulous strawberry & rhubarb pie does for you - the clamour for the recipe gives your typing fingers wings!

I think he's got the opposite problem!

It's been a funny old week, so far.  Hubby finished his short term work contract and so is home during the day again and Son & heir seems to have suddenly grown out of every item of clothing he possesses.  He went back to school on Monday, looking like he was wearing a much smaller boy's uniform.  So, Monday evening was spent letting down his Blazer's cuffs (which I'd had to take up, last September) and wonder-webbing his trousers which had similarly been let down again following on from having been taken up!

He's had a snazzy new haircut over the half term holiday and with his new glasses, is looking every inch the young man instead of the boy.  He's even a teensy bit taller than me, now!  All that in just short of 13 years.  Awesome.

How about one of these, Asda? lol

Because Hubby is at home during the day again, I've been able to give up ordering the shopping online and we are back to going to the supermarket at the crack of dawn on a Tuesday.  It's a lot preferable to buying online, even if it is more wearing!  I just wish that Bournemouth's Asda could get their disability buggies sorted out, as there was only one available - which died half-way around the shop, so I had to crawl it back to the beginning (beeping embarrassingly all the way - it was, not I was), leaving Hubby to do the rest of the shopping alone.  Unfortunately, he didn't take this as free rein to invest in a huge box of doughnuts.  *chuckle*


So, here's how this week is looking :

Tuesday : Pizza

Wednesday : Halloumi salad, salami & pitta bread

Thursday : Asparagus and Gorgonzola Risotto

Friday : Tave Me Presh (Baked mince & leeks) with mash

Saturday : BBQ Pork, baked sweet potatoes and salad

Sunday : Caribbean fruity chicken curry, rice & poppodums

Monday : Sausages, mash, baked beans & peas.

All of which looks lovely and extremely interesting, to me!

I think we can begin by skipping lightly over Tuesday's pizza, as it was a definite "night off" for me.  Mind you, although it was just frozen pizza it was enhanced by a bit of additional pepperoni and grated cheese, which turned it into a lush pizza.  Very yummy indeed!

Photo c/o BBC Good Food

I'm really quite quietly excited about tonight's dinner.  It's one of those I picked up from BBC Good Food's range of low GI recipes.  It's a warm salad of Puy lentils with red onion, cherry tomatoes and grilled halloumi cheese.  I'll be making it a little more man-suitable by putting it with some mixed salami and pitta bread which you can either heap it into, or scoop it up with.  It'll be my first go with halloumi cheese and the first time I've eaten it for more years than I care to mention.  Exciting, having new ingredients!

Moving on to Thursday, Hubby the Risotto maker is in action.  He's planning an asparagus and gorgonzola risotto, using one of Asda's £1 bunches of asparagus - which isn't a massive bunch, but should do a risotto without any trouble.  The gorgonzola is a lovely mild and creamy one which will complement the asparagus perfectly.  I absolutely love risotto and hubby is especially good at making them, so I'm very definitely looking forward to it.

Friday brings another recipe from the Recipe Queen's blog.  This one, Tave Me Presh or Baked Mince and Leeks, is apparently an Albanian recipe that looks extraordinarily simple with lovely results.  It uses lamb mince - and you all know how much I love lamb - and is a kind of soupy, stewy mix of buttery leeks with assorted vegetables that should go beautifully with some gorgeous mashed potato.  Goodness, I'm making my own mouth water, here.  LOL

As if that wasn't enough, we're back to Springfields Butchers for more of their pork steaks on Saturday morning.  I've got in mind a barbecue pork recipe, which we'll be having with baked sweet potatoes and salad.  The barbecue pork recipe has changed since I first booked it in on this day, as I've discovered on the Island Vittles blog what sounds like a cracking recipe for a Rhubarb Barbecue Sauce!  I reckon I'll be dousing those lovely pork steaks in some of that.

As for the baked sweet potatoes, I've had a recipe knocking around my "untried recipes" folder for a year or more, just waiting for something that would go nicely with it.  Now seems like a very good time to try them out.  I don't know why it's never occurred to me to bake sweet potatoes in their skins before, but it hasn't.  The photograph of the baked potatoes looks especially more-ish, with a dollop of sour cream and several rings of chilli adorning their top.  Oh dear, my mouth's watering again.

Hubby had a good idea for Sunday's dinner, which was to investigate down the "fruity, caribbean chicken curry" avenue.  I agreed and the thought of a lovely light but fruity and comforting curry sounded like the absolute ticket.  It'll probably rain on Sunday, but we can hope.  I've cobbled together a recipe from two random caribbean style curries and added touches that will suit our palates and requirements.  Do you think I can claim it as my own recipe, or should I state "inspired by ...".  Hmmmn, tricky one!

I'm also contemplating making a Key Lime Pie for Sunday - but don't shout too loudly about that one, because it may well turn into some Gooseberry & Elderflower Cream.  I'm undecided.  I should do them both, really - maybe the Gooseberry one on Saturday?  Although one thought does occur to me, which is that if I'm not careful doing both sweets will completely eradicate any good the "lighter" style of main course will have done us!

Thank goodness we're now at Monday, when some sanity invades the camp and we've got good old sausage, mashed potato, baked beans and peas.  I reckon we might be needing some "normality", after all these fun dinners!

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