Meal Plan 1/11-1/17/2015

Dinner:

• Roasted Sweet potatoes with "Blanket sauce" and chicken sausage
• Turkey Chili
• Bertucci's Tortellini
• Eggplant Gratin and pan seared pork chops

Meal Plan 1/4- 1/10/2015

I have been cooking from meal plans for the past 3 years. I do all of the planning over the weekend and it makes grocery shopping simple and removes the "what's for dinner" and "what food do we have" questions during the week. It is nice to come home after work knowing that not too much thought is required to pull dinner together. 

I generally make 3-4 large meals a week and then we use up the leftovers as lunches and extra dinners throughout the week.

Here is what is in the works this week...

Dinner:

• Roasted whole chicken, roasted whole sweet potato, salad
• Skillet Lasagna
• Turkey Thai Cabbage Salad
• African Peanut Soup

Breakfast and lunch add ons:

• Tri-Color Rotini Pasta Salad
• Breakfast Casserole Bake
• Clementine Scones

Jiaozi (Chinese Dumplings)

Jiaozi was one of my favorite meals while I lived abroad in Shanghai. There was this great little shop just off campus that only made dumplings so the only decisions that needed to be made were what type and how many plates of them we wanted to devour.

This recipe does not capture the flavors perfectly, but they are still pretty darn good. My husband and I made them twice this week, once for a New Years Eve party and then again tonight for dinner. They can be pretty time consuming and a little tricky to master sealing the dumpling, but they are well worth it!

Ingredients:

• 1 large package dumpling or wonton wrappers (I found them in an asian market in their frozen section, but some grocery stores may carry them as well)
• 1/2 head green cabbage
• 1 bunch green onion
• 1 lb ground pork

• 1/2 t salt
• 1/4 t pepper
• 1 t ground (or fresh) ginger
• 1 1/2 t sesame oil (plus extra for coating your steamer basket)
• 1 1/2 t rice wine vinegar
• 1 T ground garlic
• 1 egg
• 1/4 c soy sauce

Makes about 75 dumplings, 10 per person is a good amount for a meal.

Set the dumpling wrappers out on the counter top to thaw while you prepare the filling. Roughly chop the cabbage and green onions. Pulse them together in a food processor until finely chopped. (or finely chop and mix together by hand).

Place pork in a large bowl. Whisk salt, pepper, ginger, sesame oil, rice wine vinegar, garlic, egg and soy sauce together in separate measuring cup. 

Pour cabbage/onion mixture over pork and mix together with your hands. It gets a bit messy! Pour the liquid mixture in next and keep mixing with your hands until everything is well combined. 

Heat a large pan over medium-high heat and add in the pork mixture. Cook stirring until all meat is no longer pink. You want it to be cooked, but just barely. It will cook again when you steam the dumplings. 

Meanwhile, set up a large pot with a steamer basket insert (metal is just fine) on the stove with water to boil. 

Once your pork mixture is cooked, you are ready to start creating the dumplings! Set out a small bowl of water and get a table spoon to scoop out the pork. You will also need a clean surface to prepare the dumplings and leave them while they are waiting to cook and another plate to hold them once each batch is cooked.

Peel off a single dumpling wrapper and scoop a small table spoon of the pork mixture onto the wrapper. There are lots of fancy ways to seal up dumplings, but here is what we found to be easiest: wet your finger with water from your bowl and run it around the dumpling wrapper. Fold the wrapper in half, then pinch the edges closed. And tada! you will have made a dumpling! (Now make 74 more...)

Once you have a few dumplings all sealed up and your water is boiling, using a basting brush, lightly coat the steamer basket with sesame oil to prevent the dumplings from sticking. Set the dumplings in the steamer basket to cook. I put in about 5-7 at a time so that there was still plenty of holes open to allow the steam to come over the dumplings. Cook them for about 6-7 minutes or until they are a bit translucent. Scoop them out with a large spoon or spatula and cover them on a plate while you make the rest of them!

My favorite way to eat them is dipped in black vinegar with a bit of chili pepper sauce mixed in. The black vinegar has a unique flavor and is not the same as balsamic. 

Note: If you don't want to eat them all at once, they can be frozen as and saved for later. Prepare the dumplings, but instead of cooking them lay them on a cookie sheet and pop them in the freezer until hardened, then toss them in a plastic bag in the freezer for later. You can still steam them to cook them, just add on a few minutes.

I hope you enjoy!

Morning Glory Muffins

The recipe is pretty forgiving. I have modified it a lot from the original (The Culinary Institute of America Breakfast and Brunches) by adding in more fruit and veg and whole wheat and decreasing the sugar.Feel free to tweak it to what you like (nuts are good in this too.)

As long as you have a muffin-like batter you will be just fine. 

-makes 12 deliciously healthy breakfast muffins-

Heat oven to 375 and fill muffin tin with paper cups.

Flour mix: whisk  together in a large bowl

2/3 c wheat flour

2/3 c white flour

1/3 c oats

2 T wheat germ

3/4 t baking soda

1 t cinnamon

1/2 t salt

Fruit mix: stir together, medium bowl

1 cup (loose) grated carrot (about 2 med/large carrots)

1 apple, peeled and grated

1/3 c packed shredded coconut

1/2 c dark raisins

2/3 c crushed pineapple (drain some of the juice out first)

Add "fruit mix" to the 'flour mix" and stir until there is no loose flour. It should form at thick, chunky batter. 

Liquid mix: whisk together in measuring cup

1/2 c vegetable oil

2 eggs 

1/2 t vanilla extract

1 T honey

Pour "liquid mix" over the batter and stir well to combine. 

Plop batter into muffin tins- each cup will be full, its okay, it doesn't rise too much.

For added cuteness and crunch, top each muffin with a sprinkle of oats.

Bake for 25 minutes on the top rack.

Vegetable Pasta Bake

I have been trying to plan out a big meal at the start of the week to make lunches easier and prepare for those evenings that get to hectic to cook. This vegetable pasta bake has been my go-to dish for the past few weeks as there are so many ways to mix and match sauces and vegetables. This week I kept it simple with green beans and a creamy red sauce.

Creamy Tomato Sauce:

• Butter (2 T)
• Flour (2 T)
• Milk (1 1/2 cups)
• Tomato sauce (14 oz can)
• Diced tomatoes (14 oz can, mostly drained)
• Basil (2 T)
• Oregano (1 T)
• Garlic powder (2 t)
• onion powder (2 t)
• red pepper flakes (dash)
• salt (1/2- 1 t)
• pepper (to taste)

Pasta:

• Whole wheat penne pasta (1 box)
• Green beans (2 handfuls with ends picked and broken into pasta sized pieces)
• Cheese (1 cup, I had ricotta on hand, but mozzarella or Parmesan would be great too)

Tools:

• large pot/wok for sauce
• large pot for cooking pasta
• whisk/fork
• wooden spoon
• 9x13 baking dish
• Colander

Directions:
Fill a large pot with water to boil your pasta, season the water with 1 t salt. Once your pasta water is boiling, toss the pasta in and cook according to the directions. 2 minutes before the pasta is done, add the green beans to the boiling water to get them cooked a bit too. Once your pasta is ready, strain the pasta and beans in a colander.

The base of the sauce is a roux. Which is a fancy term for a butter and flour paste. Put the butter in the pan and wait for it to melt, add in the flour one tablespoon at a time whisking it together to remove all lumps. Slowly pour in the milk, whisking to keep out the clumps. Have the heat at med to med-high and keep stirring the mixture as you add all of the seasonings. Once the sauce thickens, pour in the can of sauce and tomatoes and stir to combine. Keep warm while pasta finishes cooking.

Dump the cooked pasta and beans into the sauce and stir it all up. Dump everything into a 9x13 glass dish and top with some cheese if you like. Cook at 350 for about 30 minutes.

summer panzanella

Ingredients:

• artichoke hearts (1 can, quartered)
• black olives (1 can)
• tomatoes (several large ones, cut into large chunks)
• red onion (1/4 of an onion, chopped)
• mozzarella cheese (8 oz cubed)
• crusty bread (1/2 large loaf, chopped)
• basil (10 or so leaved, cut into ribbons)

Dressing:

• dijon mustard (2 T)
• balsamic vinegar (2 T)
• olive oil (3 T)
• salt and pepper

Get out a large bowl. Measure out and whisk up the dressing, adding salt and pepper to taste- a few pinches of coarse salt and 3 twists of the pepper grinder should do the trick. Chop up all of the other ingredients and add everything but the bread (and a few spare bits of basil) to the bowl with the dressing, mix it together and pop it in the fridge. Let it marinate for a bit while you clean up (or for hours, what ever you have time for). When you are ready to eat, add in the bread, mix it all together and serve it up! Top each dish with a sprinkle of basil and an extra dash of salt and grind of fresh black pepper.

Time: 20 minutes
Serves: 4 light meals
Season: Summer