Happy Friday! In haste! In haste! For today, like every day this week, is stuffed to the gills with appointments, phone calls, and driving. The good news is, I have gotten much better at writing down every last little thing on the calendar (including, as it turned out, some figments), so I knew it was gonna be that kind of week, and I planned the menu accordingly.
(To new readers, welcome! I do a weekly dinner round-up on Fridays, so that’s what this is about.)
Here’s what we had:
SATURDAY
Leftovers and mozzarella sticks
The new Saturday policy of leftovers from the previous week + a pot sweetener is going well. We had leftover hot dogs, leftover ham, leftover pulled pork, and frozen mozzarella sticks.
Maybe you are thinking, dang, that is a heavy meal, but surely Simcha served a vegetable on the side to lighten things up, because she loves her family and cares about their cholesterol and whatnot.
I appreciate the thought, but all I did was take a bag of salad out of the fridge and forget to put it on the table.
SUNDAY
Oven fried chicken, mashed potatoes, coleslaw, roast carrots
Sunday I figured it would be the last day for being home all day, and I got super cook-y and started some chicken soaking in milk and egg in the morning. Here is my recipe for oven fried chicken:
Jump to RecipeI made a few packages of instant mashed potatoes, even though I totally had time to make the from scratch.
And that’s it. I’ve crossed the line, and I’m now fully an instant mashed potatoes person. For a while I was in the “it’s a surprisingly decent substitute if you’re pressed for time” camp, and I dallied in the realms of “well, for some dishes, for some reason, it actually just hits better” for a while, but I’m fully converted now. I know all about using the right kind of potato and heaping on the butter and putting it all through a ricer. Sure, sure, that makes really good mashed potatoes. But have you considered that instant mashed potatoes make you feel like you’re six years old and just got in from sledding down the big hill all recess and there are hot instant mashed potatoes for lunch?
I also found a half cabbage in the fridge, and made some quick coleslaw (shredded cabbage and a few shredded carrots, and mayo with cider vinegar, a little sugar, and lots of pepper) that nobody ate, and then I tried a new recipe with carrots: This glazed carrot recipe from RecipeTinEats. It was undeniably easy, and I liked how they turned out and so did everybody else; but they definitely did not get that glossy, caramelized glaze like Nagi’s did. They were just roasted and faintly sweet. I dunno. I’ll probably make them again, because we always have carrots in the house, but it didn’t knock my socks off.
Joke’s on them: I was not wearing socks. Because I can’t find them.
For the chicken, I was very heavy handed with the seasoning (I used salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder, and garlic powder) and Damien really liked it, so I’ll probably do it that way from now on. I really love oven fried chicken. It’s dead simple and it turns out great every time, as long as you leave enough time.
So a very tasty meal overall.
While the kitchen was still wrecked up, I started some hunks of pork marinating for Monday’s dinner.
MONDAY
Char siu, rice, sesame broccoli
I again went to RecipeTinEats for her char siu recipe. The meat was marinating in a ziplock bag that looked absolutely ghastly, because I used an entire bottle of red food coloring in the marinade. You cook the meat at a low temp in the oven and save the marinade, add a little more honey and thicken it up a bit
and then use that to baste the meat a few times over the next hour and a half or so.
It was good! Looked great, flavor was perfect. It was, to my dismay, pretty dang dry, though.
(I will admit that I just grabbed some random hunk of pork, and it wasn’t one of the cuts she advised, so maybe that made a difference.) I loved the flavors, though, so I’ll probably make this again, but cover it with tinfoil when I cook it, and maybe fill the roasting pan with water.
I made a pot of rice in the Instant Pot and roasted some broccoli with soy sauce, sesame oil, and pepper
Jump to Recipebut not sesame seeds, because I can find my sesame seeds, but only when I don’t need them
and it was a tasty meal. If a little dry.
Who among us.
I was thinking I would use the leftover meat in fried rice or something later, but there was no leftover, so it can’t have been that bad.
TUESDAY
Spaghetti with sausage
Tuesday we had three appointments in three different towns at the same time, and only one car still (Damien ordered the parts long ago, but they got lost in New Jersey or something. Who among us), so I cancelled one, and then there was an insurance snafu with the other, and then the third one turned out to be . . . imaginary? I had written “S surgery 11” but this seems to have been a figment of my imagination, and no one actually needed to be surged upon. So the car parts did come, though, and he has been working at drilling out stripped, frozen old screws, and we had spaghetti with jarred sauce and Italian sausages, and that’s-a my story.
I think it was Tuesday that Damien finished fixing my car. Very exciting. I’ve been driving his car, which not only complicates our schedule since we have to take turns leaving the house, but also it is held together with duct tape, the windows don’t open, and you have to park very strategically, because you may randomly find yourself turning the wheels without any mechanical assistance except the power of your flabby little arms, and the car weighs [quickly googles it] ah yes, 7,000 pounds. So it was pretty neat to be back in my nimble, sporty little 2010 Honda Odyssey.
He also changed my oil and reset my radio, because he loves me.
WEDNESDAY
Chicken caprese burgers, vegetables and dip, random bags of snacks
Wednesday, there was another phantom medical appointment on the calendar, which caused some passing consternation. But Corrie started Catechesis of the Good shepherd, and that was real! Such good stuff.
We had frozen chicken burgers on rolls with tomatoes, basil, and some fairly nice mozzarella, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper, and I cut up a ton of vegetables, and then proceeded to render them invisible to the family by also putting out a bunch of bags of old chips and onion rings and stuff.
I myself did not eat any of the vegetables. I just put them in the picture to show off. I ate vegetables for lunch! Get off my case!
THURSDAY
Pizza
Thursday it would be hard for me to describe, except that Damien handled the big, complex, out-of-town appointment, and I was still so tired by 7:00, I lost a game of tic tac toe to Corrie. She had put two X’s in a line, but I just didn’t see it coming. She also had her second den meeting for Cub Scouts, and when I went to pick her up, the kids were playing hide and seek in the pitch dark with flashlights, and I think it was the most fun I have ever seen six kids have.
I made three pizzas very quickly indeed: One plain, one pepperoni, and one with black olive and leftover tomatoes and basil.
The sauce was leftover from the spaghetti, and I was intending to use the leftover sausages on the pizza, but there weren’t any! They complained about the sausages when I served them, but then they ate them all. I guess that’s better than complimenting them and then not eating them.
FRIDAY
Tuna boats, cheezy weezies
The kids requested tuna sandwiches, but I think Damien may pick up some supermarket sushi for the two of us. We have an absolute action-packed weekend coming up (sleepover, Pumpkin Festival, apple picking, grave visiting, possible reliquary pick-up) and I think fortifying ourselves with cheap sushi is warranted.
Oh, I forgot, after Katie in the comments identified the cookbook I vaguely remembered from my childhood,
I tracked down and ordered a copy, and turned it over to Corrie. Some of the recipes are truly appalling, but a few of them are solid, and it should keep her busy for a while. Remind me to update on that! Something really lovely about kids excited to cook.
I will sign off with this comment that I included in my folder of food photos, not sure why.
Tag yourself! I’m mostly chagrined skeleton, but occasionally cat who has to eat on the bathroom counter because the freaking dog isn’t satisfied with his own food. I would also like to note that I treated myself to a new shower curtain, and I had some reservations because it’s see-through, and I wasn’t sure if some children of a certain tween persuasion mightn’t find that too revealing; but I had forgotten that intense modesty often hits right when you’re also still pretty scared of monsters creeping up on you when you’re taking a shower.
Who among us.
Oven-fried chicken
so much easier than pan frying, and you still get that crisp skin and juicy meat
Ingredients
- chicken parts (wings, drumsticks, thighs)
- milk (enough to cover the chicken at least halfway up)
- eggs (two eggs per cup of milk)
- flour
- your choice of seasonings (I usually use salt, pepper, garlic powder, cumin, paprika, and chili powder)
- oil and butter for cooking
Instructions
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At least three hours before you start to cook, make an egg and milk mixture and salt it heavily, using two eggs per cup of milk, so there's enough to soak the chicken at least halfway up. Beat the eggs, add the milk, stir in salt, and let the chicken soak in this. This helps to make the chicken moist and tender.
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About 40 minutes before dinner, turn the oven to 425, and put a pan with sides into the oven. I use a 15"x21" sheet pan and I put about a cup of oil and one or two sticks of butter. Let the pan and the butter and oil heat up.
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While it is heating up, put a lot of flour in a bowl and add all your seasonings. Use more than you think is reasonable! Take the chicken parts out of the milk mixture and roll them around in the flour until they are coated on all sides.
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Lay the floured chicken in the hot pan, skin side down. Let it cook for 25 minutes.
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Flip the chicken over and cook for another 20 minutes.
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Check for doneness and serve immediately. It's also great cold.
Sesame broccoli
Ingredients
- broccoli spears
- sesame seeds
- sesame oil
- soy sauce
Instructions
-
Preheat broiler to high.
Toss broccoli spears with sesame oil.
Spread in shallow pan. Drizzle with soy sauce and sprinkle with sesame seeds
Broil for six minutes or longer, until broccoli is slightly charred.
