Okay all plans break down. Between daughter's AP exams, a trip to MVA and getting ready for a craft show, I've been swamped. Which is why I anted to have all these meals planned out already! Sigh, sigh,long west of Ireland sigh.
Back to the drawing board!
I did go shopping yesterday , spending about $75 for 1 IL 96% fat free ground beef, 1/2 lb Ementhaler cheese, 12 oz Landis brand frozen sliced beef tips, a 1/2 lb top round steak, a Spaghetti squash, a yellow squash, cucumbers, 2 packs of baby tomatoes, 3 lbs oranges, bruised bananas,2 apples,2 lemons and 3 limes, gallon of milk, a small container of cream, parsley, frozen spinach, filo dough, chicken livers, a pepper, and carrots, a can of black beans and a can of chick peas., 2 frozen pie crusts.
A review of last weeks dinners yielded the following: a little too much chicken, a little to much rice, not enough dessert. Yeah right!
As usual, I don't need to buy butter or eggs, and I have some romaine lettuce and herbs already in the garden. I still have a lot of tomato sauce in the pantry and meat in the freezer. I'm rotating through some more of the meat this week. Oh, I also have 4 cups of chicken stock from last week.
So for this week the plans are for
- 2 quiches: one plan cheese with the Ementhaler and and one with frozen spinach. One goes in the freezer for emergency dinner. Serve a salad with this.
- Roast Pork with potatoes and apples - Roast pork from freezer.
- Spanokopita- I have feta on hand as well as cream cheese and rice. Use the Filo dough
- Spaghetti squash with tomato meat sauce- tomato sauce on hand.
- Black Beans and Rice with tomatoes and Yellow squash - It was popular last week!
- Beef Pilaf with the 1/2 steak pepper, carrots, any leftover squash, lots of tomatoes, and small onions from the garden.
- Pork chops with lemon- I cu the chops off the pork roast before cooking it.
I'm working later tonight so I'm cooking now. I have the roast pork in the oven, since it is hot today and we like it cold as well. So I have today's dinner and tomorrows already done!
Quiche of Death
A very quickly made quiche that always turns out. Think about what you want to add to it- bacon, ham, spinach, tomatoes, crab. ALL these additional ingredients MUST be pre cooked so they are rather dry- if not, the juices running out spoil the texture of the quiche. Prep time 20 minutes- cooking 30 to 40 minutes. DO NOT use celery- it turns out awful.
- Pre cook 1/2 bacon or 1/2 pound crab meat or tomatoes or ham or fried onions or leftovers.
- Preheat oven to 400
- stab 2 frozen pie shells all over with a fork and bake in the oven for 7 minutes.
- While waiting, break 3 eggs into a bowl, add 2 cups of milk and whisk. You can substitute cream or cream cheese for some of the milk but the basic formula is 3 eggs to 2 cups of liquid. Add salt sparingly as the cheese is salty, but nutmeg and pepper are always good.
- In another bowl grate 1/2 to 1 lb cheese:Swiss and Ementhaler are traditional but cheddar. provolone and jack work fine- they are just kind of mild for this.
- Open the oven and slide out the rack with the pie shells. Add 1/2 the special ingredients in the bottom of each pie. Add 1/2 the cheese on top of the vegys, then pour the egg mix on top and slide rack back into oven.
- Lower the heat to 350 and bake about 25 minutes. Check if crust is browning too much, if so lower heat or add a foil strip to crust. Poke in center of pie and if knife comes out clean, the pie is done.
