This Week's Dinner Menu

Sunday - Butternut Squash Lasagna, salad, rolls (dessert with friends)
Monday - Bagel Dogs, salad, fruit
Tuesday - Roasted Tomato Soup with Grilled Cheese Crostinis
Wednesday - Chipotle Chicken Taco Salad, cheese quesadilla wedges, fruit
Thrusday - Quinoa Chili (except, I'm adding a ton more veggies), cornbread/fritos, fruit
Friday - "clean out the fridge" night (leftovers)
Saturday - (Husband's Birthday) White Chicken Chili, tortillas (maybe homemade), yummy dessert (still thinking on that, he said he's happy with cupcakes)

This Week's New Recipe Reviews

Rustic Spinach Salad
Well, It wasn't my favorite salad that I have ever had . . . But, with a few adjustments, it has potential. I didn't end up adding the chicken because we didn't do the BBQ chicken pizza I was thinking of, and didn't have chicken cooked. I did, however, add craisins to the salad. I think that with a different dressing it might work better.

White Enchiladas
This was a good recipe. We really liked the flavor of it. My husband's comment was, "Mama laced the enchiladas with zucchini." I informed him that the zucchini and corn were part of the originaly recipe. We still love "Dad's Birthday Enchiladas" the most, but for a white enchilada these were pretty high ranking.

Cracker Chronicles

Homemade Graham Crackers

That's right graham crackers of our own. I thought it would be fun to make our own, because we love the many healthy and organic options available at Trader Joe's, but we can't always get there to buy them right away. So, I searched online for a recipe to try. A couple different versions came up, but the most popular variation that I was seeing, is the one we tried today.

Original Recipe Here

I probably went a little heavier on the molasses, because I measured them into a 1/4 C together and I like molasses. I would recommend cut the dough in half prior to rolling 1/2" thick and chilling. It gets a little too big to roll to the 1/8" thickness all together. We cut out boys, squares, and Noah's Ark figures (boat and animals).

Super yummy! We'll be doing this one again.

This Week's Dinner Menu

Okay, I hate to say it, but TWDM posts are moving to Sunday night. With the toddler playing soccer on Saturdays now, I don't have the time to get the post up that night. I'm sure you all will forgive me. So, here it is!

Sunday - dinner at Mom's
Monday - Shepherd's Pie, salad, fruit
Tuesday - Chicken Pasta Salad, rolls, broccoli
Wednesday - Homemade Pizza, Rustic Spinach Salad
Thursday - Butternut Squash Lasagna, rolls, salad
Friday - White Enchiladas, black beans, fruit
Saturday - Roasted Tomato Soup, bread or grilled cheese crostinis (have I mentioned these before?), maybe some fruit

At the toddler's 3 year check up, the pediatrician recommended that I "hide the vegetables" in spaghetti sauce. His recommendation on how often my toddler need to eat red meat was WAY lower than what I assumed it would be, this is actually how the spaghetti-thing came up. The funny thing is, my toddler says, "I don't like sauce on my spaghetti." So for now, we'll hide the veggies in shepherd's pie!

This Week's New Recipe Reviews

Bean and Cornbread Pie
original recipe here
So, I tried this recipe while my husband was away and I really liked it. My toddler ate it too, with a few minor changes. My fire-roasted tomatoes did not have chilies in them and I omitted the sliced jalapeno. It reheated well for lunch leftovers also. A good recipe for when our daddy is out of town.

Zucchini Bread
original recipe here
I really liked this zucchini bread recipe. And, unless I find a better one, I'll keep using it. I was a little shy on the shredded zucchini I needed for the recipe, so I added shredded carrot (1/4 C) to make up the difference. I also used lime peel instead of lemon peel (it's what I had). and just as a little tip: If using eggs classified as "large", add the one egg the recipe calls for and see how it looks. When I made it, it was obvious that the 1 egg would not come near enough liquid to make a batter. I added an extra egg and it worked out great.

This Week's Dinner Menu

My husband is out of town on a business trip this week, so we'll see what our dinner menu develops into.

Sunday - Panang Curry, Pad Thai
Monday - Bean and Cornbread Pie (trying while the husband is away, he usually doesn't like this kind of thing), fruit
Tuesday - Dinner at Mom's
Wednesday - leftovers
Thursday - thinking . . .
Friday -
Saturday -

Also, going to try out this recipe, maybe it could be the preschool snack on Thursday. I've been looking for a great single-loaf zucchini bread recipe. If you've got one, send it my way!

Muffin Tin . . . Thursday?

Through the craziness of our week, I am just getting to our Muffin Tin Monday. The theme or challenge for this week was Children's Literature. I immediately thought of my amazing friend, Briawna, she would be great at this. I wanted to do a tin based off of Ferdinand (all Spanish food) or Little Rabbit Lost (you know, "rabbit food" - carrots, a cherry tomato "red balloon", and what else? birthday cake). However, at the suggestion of my mother-in-law, I did a book that people would actually recognize - The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

So, here it is our Very Hungry Caterpillar and his muffin tin of Monday through Friday's food.

Contents: "Sunshine" Sippy Cup (full of milk), 1 apple, 2 pears, 3 "plums" (or grapes), 4 strawberries, 5 oranges. There was also a caterpillar (in the picture above), but he was removed and eaten quickly.

This Week's Dinner Menu

Sunday - (Toddler's Birthday) BBQ hamburgers and hotdogs, salad, corn, cupcake and ice cream
Monday - Salmon, salad, rolls, fruit
Tuesday - Creamy Black Bean Salsa Chicken, tortillas, salad, fruit
Wednesday - Bagel Dogs, corn, fruit salad
Thursday - still thinking . . .
Friday - Going out for our Anniversary!
Saturday - Wedding reception for me, yo-yo dinner for everyone else.

Asian Food Night Recipes & Reviews

Gyoza (Makes 4 servings)
1/3 cup chopped cabbage (boiled)
2 tbsps chopped green onion
1/2 pound ground pork
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp sugar
2 tsps soysauce
1/2 tsp garlic salt
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
20 gyoza wrappers
1 tbsp vegetable oil

Combine all ingredients other than oil in a bowl and mix well by hands.

Place a teaspoonful of filling in a gyoza wrapper and put water along the edge of the wrapper by fingers. Make a semicircle, gathering the front side of the wrapper and sealing the top. Heat oil in a frying pan. Put gyoza in the pan and fry on high heat until the bottoms become brown. Turn down the heat to low. Add 1/4 cup water in the pan. Cover the pan and steam the gyoza on low heat until the water is gone.

We also had "Panang Chicken Curry" based upon this recipe. Only, I couldn't find panang curry paste so I used Roasted Red Chili Paste in the amount of 2 tsp vs the 2-3 Tbsp the recipe called for. And, I added about 1 tsp of peanut butter to the sauce.