Sunday, November 4, 2012

November Menus

Despite losing power for five days to the recent storm I was extremely fortunate that the bags of ice I shoved in my deep freezer and refrigerator freezer kept almost all of my supplies from going bad. We lost a small bag of fish and two half gallons of ice cream. The milk, eggs, and sour cream in the fridge also went bad but the cheese and condiments all look fine. A small victory. Due to some recent financial changes this is really good news since it means I can spend about $100 for the entire month for groceries.
I based this month's menu plans on mostly items we have on hand already. We will be visiting family in Kansas for the Thanksgiving week so menus for meals while we are there are going to be discussed with my daughter later on. And because we will be incurring expenses from traveling we are doing Dinner Date Night at home this month. I have special recipes for each of these nights.
In the meantime I carried over a few dinner ideas from last month that I never used.
So far this month we have eaten : Roast beef, wild rice, green beans
Spaghetti with meatballs & salad
Pork goulash, kluski noodles, & corn.
Today's Sunday supper is going to be Pineapple Rum Pork Loin roast, roasted potatoes and candied carrots.
I am having two special weeks of menus this month, one week will be our "Victory Kitchen" week with menus based on meals from one of my favorite cookbooks: Grandma's Wartime Kitchen: WWII and the Way we CookedWorld War...  These meals consist of:
Shepherd's Pie & minted peas;
 Adirondack Chowder with homemade honey wheat rolls;
Creamed chipped beef on toast with mixed vegetables;
Salmon cakes, mashed potatoes, scalloped spinach and tomatoes;
Steaks, parsley potatoes, and coleslaw (dinner date night meal)
Chicken fricassee, white rice and carrots 
Salisbury steaks, buttered egg noodles and Harvard Beets.

Our other theme week is International Week and these menus are:
Mexican: Chicken Enchilladas, yellow rice, corn
Thai:Pad Thai, Thai cucumber salad
Filipino: Pork Adobo, white rice, asian green beans
Vietnamese:Pho Bo (Vietnamese beef soup) with homemade rolls
Italian: Chicken Parmesan, rissotto, salad
French: Beef Bourguignon, Belgian carrots

The final week of menus that I put together doesn't have a theme, just homestyle cooking.  
Battered pan fried whiting  ( a carryover from October)
oven fries
coleslaw

Beef veggie soup (using planned over roast beef)
homemade fly off the plate dinner rolls

Spinach Quiche
dinner rolls
salad

Balsamic glazed chicken breasts
twice baked potatoes
pomegranate and pear salad

Tacos
Spanish Rice
Corn

Pork Stir fry
Basmati rice
basmati rice

3 comments:

  1. Yummy menu offerings! Nice variety and great that you can complete the menus with little cash outlay. With power finally back, today's menu got scrapped, I served leftovers that needed to go. Like you, I relied heavily upon bags of ice I made ahead of Sandy's arrival, added fresh ice a few days later and Mother Nature helped by sending temps into the low 30's as the coolers sat on an uninsulated porch vestibule entry to my home. Freezer contents are OK, except for 2 tubs of ice cream. My grocery list for this month's menus requires only items for completing Thanksgiving menu ingredents, horseradish, flour, sugar, detergent, butter, stick margarine, OJ, eggs, milk, and now ice cream. I have $400 budgeted but would like to spend less.

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  2. My list looks very similar. Until payday next week I have exactly $45 to spend in groceries. I know I have to replace our milk, which is a big chunk of money for organic but the fact that it keeps way past the expiration date (which is way out to start with) makes it worth the extra even when money is tight. I'll be shopping after work today, it should be interesting to see what I can get for that small amount of money.

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  3. So how did you make out last week?

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