I have to confess that I spent today for the most part in the recliner in GF's living room. With the hot water tank not working at home (we are giving the thermocouple a couple of days to dry out and see if the tank will stay lit) youngest son and I are temporarily staying with the GF. College age daughter preferred to stay home and shower at her GF's house (as per her invitation to do so offered by his mom) and of course adult son stayed home with her as well (he told me quick cold showers don't bother him a bit..nice to know) to take care of the pets and guard both the house and his sister. While GF went off to work I did a couple of loads of laundry here and picked up around the house to earn my keep. LOL. Other than that I indulged in my favorite activity of reading. I finished up an excellent murder mystery, caught up with my favorite blog (CT on a Budget),and did a bit of blogging myself. I also put together our dinner menus for the month of January. Anticipating having two very small paychecks due to the two week holiday break plus college age daughter's tuition bill coming due for second semester I am trying to use up what we have on hand and do very little shopping. As a matter of fact I am setting myself a goal of no more than $175 for the entire month including health&beauty/cleaning/paper products. I did a mental inventory of the freezers at home and then sat down and came up with the menus. At the end of the month youngest son will have his 18th birthday and we will take him out to dinner and then celebrate jointly with his soon to be 10 year old cousin whose birthday is the day before son's is. I will get together with my niece to plan the party menu for that. This month I decided to make every Tuesday soup night utilizing my crockpot. Sundays are for large cuts of meat. I have planned a meatless meal one night each week and on work nights I am alternating between quick cooking and crockpot meals. Two Fridays GF has volunteered to take on dinner duty. I am going with tried and true recipes this month and not taking on anything new.
New Years' Day dinner is the only one designated for a specific day. Recipes using planned overs are indicated with an *, meatless meals are in bold, meals using items already on hand are underlined.
New Years Day: Baked country style spareribs with sauerkraut, mashed potatoes, carrots
Honey glazed chicken, steamed rice, Brussels sprouts
Mom's Chicken paprikash, Mom's kniffles, beets
Spaghetti & Meatballs, salad, garlic toast
Herb crusted eye of round, mashed potatoes, corn
Beef and Noodle soup*, fly off the plate rolls
Skillet Lasagna, salad
Mediterranean Lentil soup, crescent rolls
Balsamic glazed chicken breasts, basmati rice, peas
Crockpot New England style dinner using cottage ham
Chicken parmesan, penne with sauce, salad
Stuffed pork tenderloin, au gratin potatoes, beets
Ham & Swiss Panini*, garlic roast potatoes
Coffee rubbed eye of round steaks, parsley potatoes, herbed broccoli
Crockpot macaroni and cheese, salad
Pineapple Rum pork chops, rice mix, green beans
Tuna and sun dried tomato penne, salad
Baked Ham, scalloped potatoes, candied carrots
BBQ baked chicken, mashed potatoes, coleslaw
Ham and bean soup*, corn muffins
Creamed chipped beef on toast, salad
Pork adobo, rice, green beans
Welsh rarebit over English muffins, peas
Broccoli-Cheese soup, Hawaiian rolls
Horseradish encrusted tilapia, hash browns, coleslaw
Crockpot Ham and cheese bowtie bake*, peas
Nancy, my TNT method for keeping away from convenience foods, take out windows and restaurants, is to prep on the weekends. Big meat Sunday dinner=planned overs for the upcoming week. I also do a theme for the days of the week which helps me to plan. Mon and Fri are fish, Wed is Pasta, Tues/Th quick and easy with Th leaning towards a meatless meal. Sat is soup night. Crockpots are a real saver in my opinion, as well. Menus look great!
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