Friday
Short version: Chili, tortillas with cheese
Long version: I cooked a pot of pinto beans in the morning and then used those, plus ground beef, to make chili. I also added the bag of pureed squash I had thawed a few days before and never used, plus the drippings from cooking hamburgers the day before, and the turkey stock that had been hanging out in the refrigerator.
The tomato product used in the chili was some of a food-service-sized can of concentrated crushed tomatoes that my sister brought when she visited. She and her friend were on their way home from volunteering at a camp, and they brought me all the giant cans of things from the kitchen that would otherwise have been thrown away.
People think of me when they see food in this quantity. I have a reputation.
I used a few cups of that in the chili, put a couple of quart bags of it in the freezer, and saved the rest in the refrigerator for the next day.
I had just enough homemade corn tortillas left from the night before for everyone to have one with melted cheese to dip in their chili.
Saturday
Short version: Spaghetti with sausage meat sauce, peppers and onions, green salad with vinaigrette
Long version: I used the rest of the tomato sauce to make a meat sauce with a couple of pounds of loose Italian sausage, plus roasted garlic from the freezer and dried herbs. The best thing about sausage is that it pretty much is the seasoning, so you don't have to add a lot more to the sauce.
My mom had left a bag of mini bell peppers, which I used with some of the 36 pounds of onions I've been working through.
No, I did not add a digit there. I have 36 pounds of onions because the commodities delivery last month apparently included more onions than anyone in our community can use. Except me! There was a big cardboard bin with many bags of onions on Main Street when we were there for church. They had been there for four days already, it was starting to freeze at night, and I decided anyone who was going to take any probably already had. So I took a dozen bags (leaving like ten still in the bin).
I've been working on cooking them down and putting them in the freezer since then. I've gotten through maybe half the bags so far. That's where the onions came from that I cooked with the peppers.
Sunday
Short version: Asian-ish pork roast, porky rice, roasted green beans, chocolate pudding
Long version: Last time A. went to the store, he came home with a truly absurd quantity of pork. This store sells what they call "Wow! packs" of meat for a lower price, which in this case was two pork butts packaged together at $1.49/pound. So you're talking about 25 pounds of meat per package.
A. bought four of those. In case you don't want to do the math, that's a hundred pounds of pork butt.
So, I cooked one.
My typical method for pork butts or picnic roasts is to put them in my very large and deep casserole with nothing with salt and water, cook covered in the oven until I can pull the meat apart, and then season it when I fry it or broil it or otherwise get it crispy. This then results in unseasoned rendered lard, plus the juices.
This time, I re-heated the shredded meat with soy sauce, maple syrup, and vinegar on the pan with the green beans I was roasting.
Green beans courtesy of my mother the produce bearer.
I used the mostly-de-fatted juices to cook the rice that went with it.
Monday
Short version: Leftover pork, leftover rice with curried split peas, cucumbers
Long version: We had Mass in the village at 5 p.m. for the Immaculate Conception, and I'm mayordoma this month. Our church and school are in the same village, so I just let my kids play on the playground for about half an hour after school before we went to church.
We got home just after six p.m. I had already made the curried split peas, except for adding the cream. The pork just needed to be fried to re-heat it. I had to get dinner on the table quickly because A., who had been driving the bus, and the basketball player were leaving at 6:45 to go to the other village for Mass, as they had missed the one at our church earlier.
Somewhat hectic, but everyone was fed.
Tuesday
Short version: Leftover chili, tortillas with cheese
Long version: I went straight to First Communion class with Poppy after subbing at the school, so leftovers were definitely the order of the day. Good thing we had chili on hand. An excellent leftover.
Wednesday
Short version: Sausage, mashed potatoes, leftover pork and split peas, green salad with vinaigrette
Long version: I had some leftover pork and curried split peas, but not enough for everyone. That's why I cooked one package of cheddar-jalapeno sausages. And I made mashed potatoes.
Everyone had the potatoes and split peas. A. and eldest son had the sausage. The others had the pork.
Short version: Roasted chickens, potatoes and onions, roasted or raw broccoli
Long version: I thawed two of the roosters we butchered awhile ago and then just cooked them with salt, pepper, thyme, and olive oil.
I don't know if they were actually roasted because I cooked them at 325 degrees. Does it have to be high heat to be considered roasting? Maybe they were just baked. Anyway, I did that because these were pretty small and the home-raised ones don't have a lot of fat on them, so I didn't want to dry them out. They came out well.
I really dislike carving chickens, though, and especially home-raised chickens. They're much harder to cut apart because their joints are stronger.
Taking a break partway through carving the second chicken.
I had my big stainless steel skillet still on the stove from cooking down some of the many onions earlier in the day, so I just put some sliced potatoes in there with another sliced onion, plus olive oil, and stuck that in the oven with the chicken.
Ditto the broccoli. It went in the cast iron skillet I had cooked eggs in, with olive oil. I did turn the heat up after the chicken was out, though, to get that a bit more browned.
Refrigerator check:
I bought a LOT of cream in advance of Christmas. Walmart always runs out if I wait too long.
1 comment:
Fri- beef stew, buttermilk rolls, carrots, mashed potatoes.
Sat- grilled cheese and miscellaneous
Sun- chicken stew, rice, dinner rolls, cauliflower.
Mon- basketball game far away, so bball boy ate nuggets and fries after school to fill him up, teens at hone made chicken strips fries, fruit, I had popcorn at the game.
Tues- husband had leftover chicken and rice, kids had grilled cheese, fries, fruit.
Wed- Mac and cheese, broccoli, cinnamon rolls.
Thur- pasta, Italian sausage, broccoli, garlic bread. I let it prove enough this time, so it came out as good as store bought.
The baked/roasted chicken looks great
I hate cutting up chicken, so I rarely buy a whole bird. It's also one reason I dislike turkey at Thanksgiving; I'm terrible at carving.
Kids have a snow day today due to road conditions, so I'll have a quiet morning. I'll make them shovel later as there's no rush. I took care of most the driveway. They will do the back and then the neighbors ( if needed). It turns out the neighbor is a deacon in our parish ( he usually does hone visits only) so I think they can do that driveway as an act of service.
( The in town roads are fine, but rural roads can be quite bad. And during the last snow, when the kids got out an hour early, a Jr high teacher got killed in a car accident on the way home on rural roads. I think this caused the district to be extra cautious this time.)
Did you do flowers for the Immaculate Conception Mass?
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