Monday Menu and Recipe Review

We hung the bicycles back on the garage ceiling (except for Miss Eight’s–as long as it isn’t snowing, she’s riding her bike), mowed the lawn for maybe the last time, stowed the patio furniture in the shed, and put soup on the menu three times in one week.

In many countries, a soup course is an everyday part of dinner, but here in middle America, it’s a little weird. Not that fear of a little weirdness ever got in the way of dinner at our house, but I am cold and the mere thought of soup warms me up. Soup is ideal for making ahead and reheating later, and can be incredibly frugal. That bread and garlic soup on this week’s menu? Didn’t have to buy a thing. The ingredients are bread, garlic, olive oil, paprika and chicken stock. I made chicken stock (in the crock pot) from a frozen chicken carcass. There are always bags of slightly stale good bread in our freezer, and garlic and olive oil in the pantry. Making something delicious out of scraps always gives me a little thrill. That’s probably weird, too.

This week

Spaghetti al Tonno (quick uncooked tuna sauce in the food processor)
Tex-Mex Meatloaf, oven fries, salad
Potato soup, kale salad
Pork tacos (pulled pork from the freezer)
BBQ Pulled Pork Pizza
Green Bean, rice and almond salad, Bread and Garlic Soup (from The Family Meal by Ferran Adrià) (swap with Jen)
Chorizo Sweet Potato Chili (from Jen)

Last week

Black Bean and Chicken Quesadillas. I like using the giant burrito size flour tortillas to make a couple large quesadillas that I can slice and serve to everyone at once.)
Spaghetti and Meatballs (from the freezer), Wilted Escarole Salad. This might be the first time I’ve bought escarole. It’s perfect for a hot dressing because the sturdy leaves don’t wilt too quickly.
Lentil Salad, Roasted Eggplant and Olive Spread, pita, green salad (swap with Jen). I also dug a small container of falafel out of the freezer. I didn’t follow the recipe above, but just made Baba Ganouj from the Moosewood Cookbook.
Stromboli, kale salad. A giant pizza roll, according to Mr. Ten. I used this pizza dough with a little bit of whole wheat flour. It worked great, but would have been easier to work with if I’d chilled the dough before rolling up the stromboli. I baked it at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes. A fun twist on pizza night!