Wednesday, May 2, 2018

I'm BORED!! HELP!

So, I have this new position (started in December) at work.  It means that several times a week (2-5), I end up working late with late night meetings/ phone calls.  This leaves spouse to pick up the kids and make dinner.

So...since I do the shopping, and his method of cooking is different, I've adjusted by... cooking up 2 big meals on the weekend.

Saturday's dinner feeds us Sat, Mon, Wed
Sunday's dinner feeds us Sun, Tue, Thu
Friday is frozen pizza night, and I just make grilled cheese on gluten free bread

I eat salad for lunch every day.
Hubs eats sandwiches or homemade burritos every day.

If we run out earlier, we have other emergency type foods - quesadillas, veggie burgers, curried lentils, grilled salmon, etc.

Our produce box runs out on Weds, so the rest of the week we eat frozen stir fry veg, and I go to Sprouts on Weds or Thurs and buy broccoli, cucumbers, and brussels sprouts.  Every. Single. Week.  I wander through all the produce and just stare...because it's my lunch break and I'm tired.

The kids are tired of eating the same two things every week.
I don't mind it so much.

But I'm running out of ideas of things to cook that will last a long time (aka, three full meals).

Here's what I've been making:
Vegetarian/ vegan:
- Lentil soup
- Mac and cheese
- Fried rice
- Curried lentils
- Beans and rice

With meat
- spaghetti and meatballs
- chicken soup
- chicken enchiladas
- chili

Each weekend I make one veg meal and one meat meal.

Umm...you'll see that the list has 9 meals.  And every month I need at least 8 of them.  I'm kind of stumped.  I really should go back into this blog's 10 year history and come up with "other things" to make.  I kind of miss being able to make something for one or two nights only ... but I never know when there's going to be TIME mid-week!  Things like Thai curry, roasted curry cauliflower and potatoes...??  For sure, the gluten free thing has thrown a wrench into things.  And the not buying much  meat is another issue.

Plus, ya know, I'm tired!  It's hard to come up with things to make.  When I sit and relax and look at cookbooks, it's not during meal planning.  When I grocery shop, I haven't meal planned yet.  I might find something that looks good but I'm missing an ingredient or it's not on sale.  I hate defrosting meat so I'd rather not bother with that.  I have this awesome Instant Pot that I use for great vegan meals but I haven't figured out any meat meals.

UGGGGHHH




1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hi there,

Lasagna also is easy to prepare, freezes well, and can be varied to use up leftovers. Another strategy might be to cook a larger batch of eg pasta, then use it as a base later, like, pasta and sauce, fried pasta ( again with leftover veggies nad meats), pasta based casserole with salad side; potatoes, veggies and meat, fried potatoes, mashed potatoes; rice as a side, fried rice, rice based casserole. Or dress up cheap food- make Ramen soup, add some frozen / leftover veggies, crack egg into it, call it dinner. Or pancakes - make pancake ( think of the crepe like variety) top with jam, or Nutella, or mushrooms, or cheese, or veggies, or taint customized meals.