Meal Plans Week of 6-27-10

The start of a new week.  We made it through sickness...at least I hope we're done with it.  Rebecca still has a few sores/blisters that are healing, but other than that she's totally back to normal.  So far Justin and I are healthy too.  We're still keeping our distance from anyone since Rebecca could still be contagious, so it was a long week of not being able to do much.  But we should be ok by later this week...and we have some fun things planned (gotta make up for all of our cancelled plans last week :P).

Rebecca and I will be staying home from church again today.  No big plans today.  Looks like it might storm, so we'll probably be inside.  Monday is Meijer day, and Justin is going out for dinner with work.  Tuesday is the farmer's market.  We are planning to go to Michigan's Adventure this week.  We're planning on Wednesday, but if the weather doesn't look good we'll go Thursday instead.  So my plans for those two days will be interchangeable.  I'm also hoping to get to Forest Hills Foods.  It just depends what days we do other stuff.  I could go Wed., Thurs., or Fri.  And yesterday we were saying it would be fun to get out to Holland Beach.  So we might do that on Friday.  Rebecca and I would go out in the afternoon, and Justin would join us after work to relax and have a picnic dinner.  We just thought of the idea yesterday, so I don't have a picnic meal planned yet.  Our plans are tentative anyway.  That's about it.  I still can't believe we're heading into the holiday weekend already.  July?  June went by way too fast.

Last week was productive.  For some reason I was in a cleaning mood.  I guess that's good after someone's been sick.  I totally cleaned the whole laundry room/bathroom, including inside and outside the washer and dryer.  It looks so much better now.  And I feel much better about washing our clothes.  Who knew washing machines could get so dirty :p  I organized the pantry and got rid of a few things, figured out what needs to be used up.  I organized everything but the drawer in our upright freezer.  And I realized I have a lot of baked goods in there! :P  Plenty of good breakfast items to use up.  I still have to go through the drawer in that freezer and organize our chest freezer.  That one's tougher wtih all of our beef.  And I can't do it while Rebecca is napping (too loud/right under where she sleeps).  Hopefully I can make time for that some morning or evening this week.  Yesterday I went through all of Rebecca's toys and cleaned them/organized a bit.  And I wiped down a lot of stuff in the living room.  Feels good to get the germs out :)  I was busy in the kitchen too.  I made kefir, strawberry ice cream, strawberry fruit-roll ups, cherry crisp (actually made it the right way this time :), an updated version of barbeque, soaked and dried oats, almonds and cashews, made cashew butter, almond butter, granola, froze grapes, strawberries, cherries, dried strawberries and cherries, made strawberry topping, whey, cream cheese and sprouted/dried wheat berries.

I have a few extras planned this week, but some things will be tentative since I'm not sure exactly what's going on Wed. - Fri.  I'll be making more kefir.  I want to try making kishk and possibly making some granola with it.  As a side note, a little while back I made flour out of sprouted/dried wheat berries.  And then yesterday as I was looking up how to make kishk I realized the flour I made is called bulgur.  I''ve heard of bulgur plenty but never knew what it was.  Apparently I've already made it before :P  And I'll be making it again today.  My berries just finished drying, so I'l grind the flour today.  I'd like to make sourdough english muffins.  Justin has been asking for english muffins.  I want to give these a try.  If time allows I'll get the dough started today and bake them tomorrow.  I'm almost out of bean paste, so I'm planning to make a new batch.  I have my pinto beans soaking right now.  I bought carob powder last week, and I'm planning to make some carob chips with it.  I love having homemade chocolate chips on hand.  I hope they taste good with the carob powder.  It's supposed to be a lot healthier than cocoa.  I also want to make some vanilla ice cream...and add a few of the carob chips :)  Our basil is growing well, so I want to make a batch of pesto.  I'll have to soak/dry some pine nuts and/or walnuts for that.  Depends what looks good at the store.  Other than that it's the usual fresh produce preservation.  I'll probably stock up on some more strawberries and cherries this week.  And we are getting quite a few raspberries from our garden this year.  So I need to do something with those.  I think I'm going to try a berry sauce.  Not sure I'll have the time to haul out the canner yet this week.  We'll see what I feel like doing with all of the fruit.  Maybe more fruit roll-ups.  Maybe jam.  I think that's it...unless I feel up to attempting another mayo recipe.  And of course prepping picnic food for Wed. and possibly Fri.

Some exciting kitchen news...our oven is fixed!!!  Thanks to my handyman husband :)  Saved us over $100 for him to do it.  And it didn't take long at all.  So happy to have an oven I can trust again.
That's about it for this week.  Stay tuned for my monthly recap and new goals later this week.  Here's what we've got on the menu.
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S (make kefir, grind flour, soak bulgur for kishk, make english muffin dough, boil eggs, cook beans, make bean paste, make bone broth)
  B - yogurt/kefir, granola, fruit (me), sourdough pancakes w/ strawberry topping (Justin)
  L - round steak and veggies in crockpot (use bone from steak to make beef broth)
  D - egg salad on sourdough (me), hot taco rice (Justin)

M (make kefir, make english muffins, Meijer, Justin out to eat for work, dry kishk)
  B - breakfast cookies (from freezer), orange/broccoli and pinto beans
  D - egg salad on sourdough, veggies

T (make kefir, make carob chips, make whey, farmer's market, prep food for Wed., make granola?, organize freezers, make berry syrup, soak walnuts)
  B - sourdough english muffins w/ nut butter, butter or jam, fruit/veggies
  D - baked cod w/ basil pesto (from freezer), cheesy pasta, roasted cauliflower and beets

W (Michigan's Adventure, soak oats, dry oats, dry walnuts)
  B - yogurt/kefir, granola, veggies (me), banana bread (from freezer), fruit (Justin)
  L - snacks/picnic food - yogurt, chewy granola bars (from freezer), cherries, grapes and blueberries, chips, crispy nuts, homemade grahams and vanilla wafers, cucumber slices
  D - grilled hot dogs, corn, sugar snap peas w/ pinto bean paste, chips, fruit

Th (chop/cook beets, beet greens, cauliflower and broccoli, make kefir, cut up watermelon, prep granola, make popsicles, make ice cream)
  B - banana bread, fruit (Justin), apple slices w/ cashew butter, veggies (me)
  D - mexican breakfast casserole, toast, veggies, fruit

F (bake granola, pit/freeze cherries FHF, HH, clean, make whey, make pickles)
  B - leftover breakfast casserole, toast, fruit/veggies
  D - shrimp and avocado over brown rice w/ homemade thousand island dressing

S (clean, laundry, make pesto, season skillet, make mayo?, make ketchup, make ice cream, make popsicles)
  B - leftover breakfast casserole, veggies (me), french toast (from freezer) (Justin)
  D - pesto pizza, beans