It's never a meal plan? Yes - it is!

There you are, you see .....

We have been planning our meals all through the Christmas and New Year period - it's just that the meal plans have very regularly gone to pot as we've been either too poorly to make the things we've planned for, or just didn't fancy what we'd planned to have.

As a result, I've not been posting up the meal plans as it would be too confusing to try and follow what happened to various dishes that never saw light of day.

I have got to admit, though, that this situation hasn't improved much.  I reckon that for the seven meals that we plan, probably between 4-5 have been made just recently.  Last week was one of the better ones, but even then we've only managed five out of the seven!

... we have been eating - and rather well, too!

We're setting off on this week's meal plan with determination to see it through.  Whether this determination lasts, depends on whether either of us parents go down with the sore throat that is currently keeping son & heir from his studies at school.  We whisked him down to the doctor this morning, just to make sure that it wasn't tonsillitis he'd got - which it wasn't, thank goodness.  He's now all sorted out with antiseptic gargle and penicillin, so fingers crossed it won't last long.

Hence, of necessity, the meals for the beginning of the week are non-confrontational and designed to be easily swallowed.  So what's on the agenda?

Tues : Bacon & leek pasta

Weds : 2 sausage paella

Thurs : Lamb & mozzarella stuffed aubergines with a side salad

Fri : Gammon steak, cheesey champ, courgettes, mushrooms & peas

Sat : Pork, aubergine & porcini ragu with pasta

Sun : Beef & beetroot curry with rice

Mon : Chicken pie and vegetables.

The bacon & leek pasta is there because it is one of son & heir's favourite dinners - and just in case he might need some tempting.  It is very easy to eat and just slips down with the minimum of bother, so shouldn't be too challenging for a boy with a sore throat.  Fingers crossed!  Of course the fact that it is one of our favourite "go to" quick dinners doesn't hurt either.

Wednesday's 2 sausage paella is an idea borne of having the remaining half of a very nice chorizo sitting in the fridge looking for a home.  Hubby is planning on putting it together with some good pork sausages, red pepper, mushrooms etc. into a paella type rice dish.  Sounds like it will be lovely - and again, easy to eat for son & heir.

The Lamb & Mozzarella Stuffed Aubergines is a Peter Gordon recipe from the Good Food channel.  We're going through a bit of an aubergine (hubby's favourite) patch at the moment and as soon as hubby clapped eyes on this recipe, he was as keen as mustard to try it.  It uses Sumac, which is a new spice for us - but we have liked the little we've tried of it so far.  The recipe also makes use of all our favourite spices along with lamb mince (my favourite) and mozzarella cheese (son & heir's favourite), so as you can see, it just had to be done.

Friday's gammon steaks with cheesy champ (mashed potato with spring onion) is entirely down to a certain Mr Rod Tucker of the Good Food Good People Facebook page.  He recently posted a couple of photographs of his gammon steak dinners that made my mouth water so much, I just had to include gammon in this week's list.  We've a few spring onions that needed using up, so mashed potato became Champ, then migrated into Cheesey Champ - the idea of which is making me very hungry.  I'll make my creamy courgette & mushrooms which will provide some lovely moisture to the combination, along with some peas for colour.

Saturday is another of hubby's recipes, where he's planning a rich minced pork ragu using smoky griddled aubergine and soaked porcini mushrooms.  The combinations sound delicious and this should be really good.

Sunday is a curry recipe that I found in the BBC Good Food Magazine.  The sheer idea of marrying up beef with beetroot and curry spices is intriguing me and I can't wait to find out how it will be.  I can imagine it will prove to be sweet, earthy and rather gorgeous.  I may very well do a small vegetable curry to go with it, along with the rice.

Monday's chicken pie and vegetables is a meal that has (so far) been moved along from the Monday spot for three weeks in a row.  You never know, we might even get to eat it this week!

I daren't even make the tiniest suggestion of other makes or bakes - probably best not to tempt fate, don't you think?

 

Winding the week up - from Tuna salad to Champ.

The final three days of this last week involved some delicious food worth talking about, but only one real recipe.

Tuna salad - the adult version

I had scheduled a tuna salad for Saturday, but this was a salad that involved more than just lettuce.  Indeed, it had to grow in the making as Son & heir's best friend stayed for tea, so I was glad we had a "stretchable" dish on the menu for that day!

It had come about because I'd been searching for something to use two tins of tuna in.  I'm not that keen on the old tuna pasta bake (which is the obvious choice) and anyway, we're talking Spring here - and a pasta bake isn't exactly in keeping with spring like weather.

Tuna salad : kids' version!

Another point was that hubby had very cleverly found a griddle pan in the local charity shop, which got me yearning for something to cook on it.  The tuna was out, as that was tinned.  Hmmn, asparagus - it's in season and if I'm going to use it, now would be a good moment, plus it would be lovely done on the griddle.  Bread, too - Ciabatta rubbed with garlic, drizzled with olive oil and griddled.  All that was left was to fill in the blanks.

The salad began with a large handful of lettuce and herb leaves, sprinkled with fine slices of red onion, quartered slices of cucumber, cold griddled asparagus, blanched fine green beans, warm new potatoes and quartered tomatoes.  The children didn't have the beetroots that we did, and we didn't have the soft boiled egg that they did.  They also had less Tuna than us.

The Ciabatta was just gorgeous - we all had some of that - and everyone except Son & heir ate it all up.  He declared that the asparagus was "horrid" and is going through a phase of not eating anything green, most especially anything leaf-like.  I served it with a dressing from Asda, made with Balsamic vinegar and sweet peppers.  It gave a welcome almost chutney-like feel to the salad that went exceptionally well with the tuna.  Definitely a "do-again" salad!

On Sunday, Son & heir was due to be cooking his bacon-wrapped, garlic butter stuffed chicken breast dinner.  As it turned out, I made the garlic butter while Son & heir finished a battle on the X-Box.  He then asked if he could go to watch a football match and could I cook his dinner for him, except he returned in time to prepare the vegetables and see the dinner through to serving.  So, it turned into a joint effort - and was very tasty.

Monday's dinner was a cracker.  Unfortunately, I didn't catch a photograph of it, as we were all far too keen to get tucked in.  I had seen "Perfect" on the Good Food Channel on t.v., where Paul Merrett made a cheesy Champ.  It got my mouth watering then and I resolved to try and reproduce it very soon.

Flipping heck, but it was good.  I mashed some Maris Piper potatoes with a splosh of milk, some salt & pepper and a large knob of butter, then mixed in a bunch of finely chopped Spring Onions and around 150g of grated Mature Cheddar.  Served with some of Spring Fields' Cumberland sausages (pan fried), baked beans and plain old boiled peas, it was simple but absolutely delicious.

One thing, though - I can remember thinking, as the sausages refused to lay down and cook, the potatoes threatened to overcook, the baked beans threatened to weld themselves to the pan and the peas shrieked about being forgotten from the freezer, that I got less stressed cooking a roast dinner!

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Meal planning ahoy!

After a cunningly placed two days without a recipe worth blogging (in the hope that I'd catch up a little bit! Still got a book review to do though), here I am on Wednesday all ready to talk about this coming week's menu list.

Which is a bit better than last week, when it was very nearly all over by the time I got to it!

Here's what we're having :

Pizza and doughballs

Spicy lamb mince and Kosheri

Spring time prawn pasta

Parmesan chicken with Polenta and peas

Tuna & Asparagus salad with Ciabatta

Chicken a la Son & Heir with Jersey Royals, carrots & tenderstem broccoli

Sausages, cheesy champ mash & peas (or baked beans).

Tuesday starts the week with a special request from hubby for Pizza and doughballs.  Yes, I know I should have had some virtuous salad or something, but there we are.

Tonight is a lovely combination, being my recipe for Spicy Lamb Mince and Ottolenghi's recipe for Kosheri.  It's been a while since we've had Kosheri and I am remembering it as being a bit of a trek - but having read the recipe it seems easy-peasy, so either it's harder than it looks, or my memory has gone to pot - which is quite possible!

Thursday demands an easier recipe as it's a working day.  I discovered a recipe for Spicy Shrimp & Mushroom pasta, which I've used as a base and developed what I'm euphemistically calling "Spring time prawn pasta".  It's basically what it says it is - pasta with prawns, plus sugar snap peas and baby corn.  It has a cream cheese (low fat) sauce which binds it all together.  I've never done this one before but hopefully it'll be tasty.

Friday is another case of "face the scary recipe", where I'll be having a go at cooking wet polenta for the first time.  I've taken Willie's advice (and who better, considering he's been making it for years) and I'll let you know how I get on!  The chicken is a simple chicken dunked in grated parmesan recipe, so that I can give the polenta my attention!

Saturday (pray for fine weather!) will be a Tuna & Asparagus salad, with Ciabatta.  The tuna is only tinned - but then I've two tins lurking in the cupboard needing using - and hopefully I'll be able to get some Asparagus, even though we're at the end of the season now.  I have a fall-back position just in case I can't find Asparagus - which is to get some fine green beans, but Asparagus would be so much better!  The Ciabatta will be rubbed with garlic, drizzled with olive oil and cooked on our new griddle pan.  Hubby found the griddle pan in a charity shop for £1.50!  Bargain!

Now Sunday is a special day, as that's when Son & heir will be trotting out his recipe for Sunday dinner, involving a chicken breast wrapped in bacon, with Jersey Royals, carrots and tenderstem broccoli.  The last time he cooked this for us, it came out beautifully.  He's keen to do it again - and I'm certainly not going to stop him!

Which brings us back to Monday, which being a working day, demands an easy dinner.  We'll be having sausages from the butcher, with the cheesey champ mash that I saw Paul Merrett making on "Perfect" the other night - except with somewhat less butter!  The combination of raw spring onions with the melted cheese and mashed potato has been making my mouth water ever since - so it just has to be done!  I'll be having some peas with it and I expect the boys will be wanting baked beans.

So that brings us to the end of another week.  I'll have to buy just the Pizzas, prawns, chicken and sausages, as the lamb mince and tuna are in the kitchen already.  The Kosheri doesn't require shopping for, as I bought everything for it last week.  The Polenta is already here, as is the parmesan and the peas.  I did have to buy some blue cheese to use with it though, and hopefully Willie will forgive the fact that it's French blue cheese instead of Gorgonzola - as there was a difference of £1 inbetween the two!  I think it's a nice variety of styles of cooking and meat products, with plenty of opportunity to get those all important veggies into us.

Now, if only I'd remembered to get the Lamb mince out of the freezer this morning ....

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