In other news, I also lost 12 pounds in January.  So I’m very happy with my progress, considering I don’t feel like I’ve started eating flavorless food or anything like that. Some small changes in the Kitchen make a big difference!

1. French dip subs and salad (using leftover roast beef)
2. School night:  FFY Buffet
3. Soup & Sammie night (Boo and I are both recovering from MD appts and will need some comfort food.)
4. Sloppy joes with homemade hamburger buns
5. SUPERBOWL-GO PATS!  meatball pitas, twice baked potato skins (from the Pioneer Woman’s cookbook), veggies and dip, and the ultimate splurge for the week: buffalo chicken dip. I saved up two weeks’ worth of splurge meals for today.
6. Crockpot Beef Stroganoff over egg noodles (adapted with fat free cream of mushroom and dip)
7. School night:  BFD: blueberry pancakes and a cheese frittata.  Yes, I know I’m making vegan pancakes with a very non vegan side.
8. FFY Buffet: I am studying like a boss.
9. School Night:  my first exam of the semester… Hot dogs and baked beans.
10.  pork with parsnips and grapes
11.  stuffed flatbreads (NEW!)
12.  Salisbury steak
13.  chana masala (NEW!)
14.  School Night:  FFY Buffet. Also, Happy Valentine’s Day!
15.  Pizza night: whole wheat margherita

15. Turkey club sandwiches
16. We are out to see Beauty and the Beast 3D over dinner. ☺
17. School night: rigatoni and meatballs.
18. arugula salad with grilled chicken
19. School night: grilled cheese & soup
20. broiled salmon
21. FFY- I am to Boston for my sister’s 16th birthday celebration.
22. beef stew with homemade bread
23. BFD: bacon & eggs with homefries and toast
24. School night: quick chicken soup
25. chicken tacos
26. School night: hamburgers
27. FFY: I am out with some friends at an ice bar.
28. N/A: suit and I are out for date night at the movies.
29. roast chicken
30. pulled chicken sandwiches
31. School night: hot dogs and macaroni and cheese

2012 has renewed my (forgotten!) commitment to eating healthier and being accountable for what I use to fuel my body. Simply by tracking what I ate, I lost 20 pounds last year…only to gain 17 back during my fall semester. Sigh.  I will try to supply nutritional information on the recipes that I have not already posted for, as they are eaten.

In any case, I am climbing back on the horse and the meal plan reflects that. Happy and Healthy 2012 to all!

PS- dear supermarkets: Please put fresh haddock or salmon on sale. Thanks.

1. Happy New Year!!!  FFY Buffet
2. Leftovers from our NYE dinner (off to a great start, right?!)
3. Quick Chicken Soup (based on this)
4. Salisbury Steak (I’m healthifying from here)
5. BFD:  Poached eggs on toast & fruit (I’ll scramble for kiddos)
6. Ground beef stew over mashed potatoes (healthifying from this)
7. Low fat corn & kielbasa chowder
8. FFY Buffet!
9. Baked chicken breasts
10. Loaded twice baked potatoes
11. chicken & grape skewers (NEW!)
12.  BFD:  breakfast tostada
13. grilled cheeses & soup
14. prosciutto, apple and blue cheese pitas (jumping point from here)
15. arugula salad with blue cheese and strip steak

16. Kerri’s Cottage Pie
17. n/a – suitNtie and I are going to go out to dinner for a belated birthday celebration
18. peanut butter pork tenderloin
19. pizza night: funky lime pizza
20. mini meatloaves
21. FFY Buffet
22. grilled cheeses & soup
23. BFD: cereal and fruit night – I’m prepping for the holidays!
24. Christmas Eve: Feast of Seven Fishes. I’m bringing Christmas Eve Haddock and strawberry-Grand Marnier cheesecakes.
25. Merry Christmas! We’ll be having beef wellington, caprese salad, roasted veggies and some sort of dessert. In the morning, though, we go as a family and deliver breakfast to our town’s police and fire stations. This year, we’re bringing the Pioneer Woman’s cinnamon rolls. Yum.
26. Christmas Part Two: we’ll be having spaghetti & meatballs with my family- and cheesecake for dessert.
27. FFY Buffet
28. baked chicken breasts
29. BFD: eggs and bacon and homefries
30. burgers and salad
31. New Year’s Eve! We are taking the kiddos out to a local restaurant for a NYE party and balloon drop.

Nothing new on this one.  No time for experimentation this month- with end of semester cramming and the holiday quickly approaching, I’ll be lucky to survive the month! We are again sticking to tried-and-trues and budget friendly meals to get us through.

1. School night – FFY buffet
2. Tacos from the box (!!!) and oven fries
3. Pizza night: margherita
4. Crockpot pot roast
5. Chicken pot pie
6. School night: FFY Buffet
7. Parmesan crusted turkey tenders
8. Happy Birthday to me! Last night of class for semester. FFY Buffet.
9. Hot dogs & French fries
10. I am out of town with the girls to celebrate my birthday. suitNtie will choose!
11. Out for a birthday party/dinner.
12. Sandwiches, as I am frantically studying for tomorrow’s exam
13. FFY- I am at my final exam.
14. BFD: bacon & eggs, homefries, toast. It’s a recovery day. Moo is having her tonsils and adenoids removed sometime today, and so she’ll be going liquid dinner…I’m guessing a smoothie, if she’s even up for that much.
15. Chicken quesadillas

16. zucchini quiche & salad
17. maple dijon pork tenderloin
18. pasta e fagioli
19. chicken fricassee
20. spaghetti & meatballs: family birthday party
21.  Happy Birthday, Moo!!! Moo’s Choice.
22. grilled cheese & soup
23. FFY –early Turkey Day prep
24. Happy Thanksgiving!!! Roast turkey (I’m going to try my hand at brining this year), mashed, butternut squash, green beans with shallots & bacon, homemade rolls, roasted pearl onions, stuffing… our table will be plentiful!
25.  FFY Buffet. Like you expected anything else? Happy Black Friday to all!
26. roast beef with garlic and tomatoes
27. french dip sammies
28. BFD: sausage & egg biscuits with homefries
29. hot dogs & French fries
30. chef salads

Mmm. Plethora. Now I need to go watch Three Amigos.   But seriously- in addition to the ground beef, I have stew beef, brisket, eye round, bottom round, strip steaks, a tenderloin roast destined for our Christmas Day dinner, short ribs, one brisket, shoulder roast and prime rib.  Hoo-wee.

Ways I plan on using the ground beef already:

• Spaghetti & Meatballs
• The Very Best Salisbury Steak Ever (aka the only one I’ve ever enjoyed)
• Ground Beef Stew over Garlic Mashed (this is a new one that I’ve been saving)
• Cottage Pie (recipe coming- my girlfriend who split the cow with me has a very handsome British husband who can cook. I begged her to get a good recipe for me. I have great friends.)
• Irish Beef Hand Pies
• Chili con Carne
• lower fat Hamburger & Sour Cream Casserole (another new one I’ve been saving)
• meatloaf (because I love Alton Brown, I’m gonna try his)
• tacos (yes, I totally use the box from the supermarket), nachos (this will be an on the fly night), and lasagna (using the sauce from spaghetti & meatballs recipe)

I’m sure all of you have heard of (if you weren’t involved in) the huge storm that hit the northeast this past weekend.  We got hit with a perfect storm of snow that caused more trouble with its weight than the actual snow itself. Trees down everywhere and so there were power outages all over the place. My kids haven’t had school all week.  Our generator died 34 hours into the outage. Our generator repair company was out of power too (ah, the irony), so it wasn’t repaired for a while afterwards.

Also, I lost the contents of my stand freezer in the garage and the entire freezer in my house. Thank goodness the pickup for my half a cow isn’t until this Saturday. I came home to a melt all over my kitchen floor from our ice dispenser on the fridge door.  Cleaned out most of the fridge, too.

Ladies and gents, you’re looking at a very interesting meal plan this month. Let’s list the reasons why.

1) I’m starting almost from scratch. I have no meat reserves and a big empty freezer and mostly empty fridge.

2) It’s November. My daughter’s birthday, Thanksgiving (we host), Christmas shopping and a wedding this month (both children are in the wedding and it’s out of state). Let’s call this BUDGET time. I’d been thinking about adding a tag for budget meals, but hadn’t gotten around to it.

So, the delayed but still very necessary meal plan for the first half of the month. Note the multiple meals that I’m making to start restocking my freezer stash. Not trying anything new to our plates, going with reliable meals we love to eat that can stretch. This trend will continue through the rest of the month, as you’ll see with the next meal plan.

5. hot turkey sandwiches & mashed potatoes
6. sweet potatoes & warm black bean salad
7. crockpot Mediterranean chicken (freezer restock)
8. school night: FFY Buffet
9. low fat corn & kielbasa chowder (freezer restock)
10.  school night:  BFD- pancakes & sausage
11. FFY Buffet– heading out for a wedding
12. crockpot beef stroganoff (freezer restock)
13. crockpot red beans & rice (freezer restock)
14. pulled pork sammies & fries (freezer restock)
15. school night:  FFY Buffet

————

So, you know what I hate? When you see a magazine or something when your out that advertises recipes that have “all the ingredients already in your pantry!” Inevitably, I am one of the 1% of people that don’t stock creme fraiche, or fresh tarragon, or something else. You know, I’m not going to go out and spend $40 to stock my pantry with things to make something that I’m not even sure will taste good. Grr.

Now, I saw one of those little 5×7 paper magazines at the checkout last week, you know the ones… “Thanksgiving,” “Best Loved Foods,” “One Pot Meals,” etc. Anyway, this one was for slow cookers. I pink puffy heart my Crockpot. Seriously. So I was intrigued. Having been bested far too many times by deceptive covers, I flipped through it before deciding to spend Matt’s hard earned $4 on it…but it actually looked good!

I came home and ripped out all the recipes that looked worth my time. So, tonight, I’m making Chicken Mediterranean. And (gasp), I really did have EVERYTHING in my kitchen already!

Chicken Mediterranean

• 3 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 c. white wine (optional. I optioned to include 2/3 c. pinot grigio, but that is just me)
• 1 1/2 c. fat free, low sodium chicken stock
• 1 tsp dried basil
• 1/2 c. chopped sun dried tomatoes

Cut the chicken breasts in half. Heat oil in skillet and brown chicken in skillet on all sides. Transfer chicken to slow cooker.

Add garlic, wine, chicken broth and basil to skillet and bring to a boil. Pour over chicken and scatter tomatoes on top. Cover and cook on low for 4-6 hours.