What We Ate: June 9-13

Monday

This is the first day we can't remember what we had--we know it had something to do with plain sausage and spicy sausage... PE ate the plain

Tuesday 
Another power outage... dinner started on the stove and then left unfinished as we scrambled to find a restaurant with power

Wednesday
pasta primavera with leftover, cut-up chicken breast (and any vegetable hanging out in the fridge, including broccoli) -- this was going to be dinner on Tuesday

What PE ate:
noodles with cheese, chicken, green peas

Thursday

foccacia - one pie with shredded mozzarella (half with sausage and fresh tomato, other half plain); one pie with goat cheese, tomato, dried basil; tomato-vegetable soup with sour cream; green beans.

What PE ate:

part of half-pie without tomato, carrots

Friday

frozen/thawed out/frozen spaghetti sauce with black olives, on thin spaghetti; leftover foccacia; leftover green beans

What PE ate:

foccacia

2-Minute Ranch Dressing

[I mentioned making ranch dressing in one of my "What We Ate" posts but now I can't find it. Someone asked me for it the other day, so I'll give it its own post. As I said in that post, if you make your own yogurt and always have it on hand, making your own ranch dressing is a logical step since you already have half of the main ingredients.]

Note: equal measure here means one-half cup, one cup, etc.

• equal measure of yogurt (any kind) or buttermilk or sour cream (if you only have it and don't mind it being rich)
• equal measure of mayonnaise (any kind)
• few sprinkles of dried garlic powder (you can use fresh garlic, but it will have to be used right away)
• squeeze of lemon juice or a little vinegar, to taste (you'll need more vinegar if you use sour cream)

Other possible additions:
dried onion powder
dried or fresh chives
herbs, like fresh or dried oregano or basil

Make it in a measuring cup so you can measure, stir and pour from the same container.

When you've used what you want right away, put in a glass jar for the fridge. Depending on how much vinegar you added, it will stay fresh for a couple of days, sometimes longer, but it's best to use up within 5 days--so don't make much more than you can use quickly. One-half cup portions usually works for us.

Once you see how easy this is to make, you'll wonder why you were spending $3 for a bottle for store-bought--and this way, you avoid the MSG.

Tip: This is an easy thing for kids to make and they like to experiment adding new flavors each time.

What We Ate: June 2-6 (Power outage dinners)

This was an unusual week for us. D. went out of town on Wed. and that evening we had massive storms and the power went out, leaving us to hightail it to a restaurant with electricity. When the power came back 19 hours later, we had to throw food out and started to eat whatever was semi-thawed in the freezer. So, we didn't make a lot of fresh food this week.

Monday
leftover chicken pot pie from Sunday night (which D. had made), salad

Tuesday
bay scallops with potatoes (adapted from "Scallops Oreganata" in Lidia's Italian-American Kitchen), no time to make a vegetable, orange juice

Why this didn't work:
This is not a dish to make when it is nearly 6:30, everyone is hungry and you've got scallops that can be easily sauteed in 5 min. Even with microwaving the potatoes in water to speed up their boiling, it took nearly an hour (labor-intensive hour) from start to table and no one was wild about it. Far happier were they with scallops sauteed with cream, sherry and mushrooms, which I made a few weeks ago, but alas, I had no cream or mushrooms on hand and thought this would be a good way to use up some potatoes. I also didn't have all the ingredients Lidia had listed, such as onions and tomatoes and the chives I substituted for onions just didn't do the trick.

Moral of the story: When you've splurged on scallops, part of the cost is convenience, so it's silly to waste them on labor-intensive cooking.

Wednesday
dinner at Panera, during the storm

Thursday
a half-thawed frozen pizza with melted-ice cream shakes

Friday
omelets with goat cheese, chives and ham (TA and D gone), garlic toast (from thawed out bread), fresh carrots and peas or salad
(PE actually ate this without adaptation)

What We Ate: May 26-30

Monday
big old roasted chicken, sweet potatoes, steamed broccoli, bread

What PE ate: 

chicken and sweet potatoes

Tuesday

leftover chicken, cranberry sauce, rice, leftover broccoli sauteed with celery and zucchini; pumpkin pie (with homemade crust--made two, froze one*)

Wednesday

spaghetti sauce with meat, linguine, salad

What PE ate:

linguine with melted shredded cheese, sweet potato, bread

Thursday

leftover spaghetti with meat sauce and black olive meatless tomato sauce

Friday

quiche (bacon, goat cheese, fresh tomatoes, fresh herbs, chives) with homemade crust*, green beans, bread

(PE was at a sleepover...)