Basic Weekly Menu Plan

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Monday Recipes

Notes for Monday:

1. Tonight's dish can be as easy as you would like to make it. If you want fast prep, use broken lasagna noodles as your dumplings. If you prefer homemade noodles (you can use freshly ground whole wheat to make these), I am providing a recipe for those.
   
   
2. If you don't have chicken in your freezer, this would be a great time to cook extra. You could add a whole chicken fryer to your grocery list, cook it all day in a crockpot with seasonings of your choice, pick off all the meat and strain the broth. Use what you need for tonight and freeze everything that remains, including any remaining broth.
   
   
   
   

Chicken and Dumplings

• 2 cups shredded chicken (from freezer)
• 3 cans chicken broth* or 6 cups water with chicken soup base added
• Garlic salt or Adobo
• 1 can Cream of Chicken soup
• broken lasagna noodles or homemade* noodles

Noodles:

• 2 cups of flour
• 1 rounded tsp of baking powder
• 2 eggs

Mix ingredients for noodles. You want workable dough so if they are too dry add a few drops of water, too wet a bit more flour. Roll and cut; a pizza cutter is the best way. If you get too much baking powder they will have a salty 1/2 cooked taste. Cook noodles in broth. Your cooking time will depend on how thick the noodles are; you will just have to taste it. ;-)

Add soup and seasonings to taste. Add chicken in when the noodles are almost cooked. You may sprinkle with parsley for some color if you would like.

Thanks to Monica from TheHomeSchoolMom in the Kitchen Yahoo Group for the recipe for Homemade Noodles.

 

Peas and Carrots

 

Canned Pears

 

Tuesday Recipes

Notes for Tuesday:

1. If you have leftovers tonight, you may want to save them for tomorrow's Stir Fry. Instead of a Chicken or Vegetable Stir Fry tomorrow, you could have Pork Stir Fry for a nice change.
   
   
2. Tonight's dessert is a great opportunity to get your kids in the kitchen! . My kids are ages 9, 6 and 3. They have all helped with this recipe. Even my toddler likes to hit my food chopper to chop the apples and to stir up the apple mixture. My six year old likes to roll out the biscuits. Sometimes we make a mess but they feel such a sense of accomplishment when they can say they "made it all by myself!" Just put on your apron of patience and get out the camera! My kids each have their own apron and chef hat to make cooking "real".
   
   
   
   

  Tasty Pork Tenderloin

• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 2 pork tenderloins (about 1 lb. each)
• 2 tbsp butter
• 1/2 cup onion, chopped
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 2 cups applesauce, unsweetened
• 1/4 cup brown sugar, packed
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1/4 cup apple juice
• 1/2 tsp ginger, ground

Preheat oven to 350° F. Combine flour, salt and pepper in a small, shallow bowl. Cut tenderloins into six pieces and flatten each cut piece to about a 1 inch thickness. In a skillet, melt butter. dip each pork piece into the flour mixture and then brown in skillet, turning to brown on both sides. Place pork in an ungreased baking dish. In the same skillet, saute the onion and garlic until tender. Add remaining 5 ingredients and bring to a boil. Pour this mixture over the pork and cover and bake for 1 hour or until juices run clear and a meat thermometer reads 160°F.

  Baked Asparagus

• 1-2 lbs fresh* asparagus or frozen if your fresh asparagus selection is not very good
• 2 Tbsp. olive oil
• 1-2 Tbsp. soy sauce* or tamari
• Salt and pepper to taste

Line a baking pan with foil for easy clean up. Mix oil and soy sauce and pour onto foil-lined pan. Prepare fresh asparagus by washing and snapping the ends. Gently roll the asparagus in the oil and soy mixture. Sprinkle with salt and pepper (easy on the salt since soy is salty). Roast for 10-15 minutes at 350°F.

 

Couscous

 

  Apple Turnovers (Great for Kids in the Kitchen!)

• 1 medium tart apple, peeled and chopped (I like Granny Smith)
• 1/2 cup applesauce
• 3/4 tsp ground cinnamon, divided
• 1 tube refrigerated biscuits
• 1 tbsp butter/margarine, melted
• 2 tbsp sugar
• vanilla ice cream

Heat oven to 400°F. Combine apple, applesauce, and 1/4 tsp cinnamon in a bowl. Separate biscuits and roll out each into a 6-inch circle. Place biscuits onto greased baking sheet. Place a heaping teaspoonful of apple mixture in the center of each biscuit. Fold biscuit in half and pinch the edges to seal. Brush tops of each biscuit with melted butter. Combine sugar and the rest of the cinnamon; sprinkle over the tops. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until edges are golden brown. Serve warm with vanilla ice cream.

 

Wednesday Recipes

Notes for Wednesday:

1. Calrose rice is not the same as white rice. Look for it with the white rice in your grocery store.
   
   
2. Use leftover pork from last night if you want to try Pork Stir Fry.
   
   

Stir Fry

• 14 oz. bag stir-fry frozen vegetables
• 1 lb. raw boneless chicken*, shrimp, or beef
• 1 bottle Kikkoman Stir-fry sauce
• olive oil
• Calrose rice

Slice or chop meat if using chicken or beef. If using shrimp, peel it and take the tail off. You can use frozen tail-off shrimp if you want to make it easier.

In a wok or large fry pan, sauté meat or shrimp in oil until done. If using shrimp, remove shrimp from pan to prevent overcooking. Add frozen vegetables and cook until hot and water from frozen veggies cooks out. Add shrimp back to veggies. Pour 1/2 - 3/4 bottle of the stir fry sauce over everything and simmer until bubbly. Serve over rice (for children it may be better to serve rice with soy sauce and stir-fry separately).

 

 

Egg Drop Soup

• 3 cups chicken broth
• 1 green onion with top
• 1 sp. salt
• dash of pepper
• 2 eggs, slightly beaten

Heat chicken broth, salt and pepper to boiling in saucepan. Stir green onions into eggs. Pour egg mixture slowly into boiling broth, stirring constantly with fork to form shreds of egg.

 

 

Thursday Recipes

Notes for Thursday:

1. You can make your eggs to order however your family likes them best. If you are making scrambled eggs, you could add chopped chives or cheese for more flavor.
   
   
   

  Pancakes

• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups buttermilk
• 1 tsp. oil
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 2 tsp. sugar
• 1 1/2 cups flour

Blend wet ingredients in a measuring cup. In a medium bowl, mix dry ingredients. Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix until blended. Do not overbeat. Cook over medium heat until bubbles on unbaked side begin to break; turn once and cook on second side until golden.

 

Sausage

 

 

Eggs

 

Cantaloupe Slices

 

Friday Recipes

Notes for Friday:

1. I would love to tell you that I have a wonderful homemade chocolate pudding recipe, but I use the boxes of Food Lion brand instant pudding. Choose your favorite brand or recipe and make it according to directions. Be sure to make it early enough that it has time to set up.
   
   
   

 Crockpot White Chicken Chili

• 4 chicken breasts, cubed
• 1 cup chopped onion, cooked (from freezer)
• 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 1 1/2 cups chicken broth
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp dried leaf oregano
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp Tabasco sauce
• 2 cans (about 15 ounces each) great northern beans, drained, rinsed
• 1 can (12 to 15 oz.) corn, drained
• 2 Tbsp. chopped fresh cilantro, optional

Mix onion, garlic, chicken broth, cumin, oregano, salt and Tabasco in 3 1/2 to 6-quart crockpot. Add cubed chicken breasts. Cover and cook on low for 4 1/2 to 5 1/2 hours, or until chicken is tender (this may vary depending on how hot your crockpot cooks). Stir in beans, corn, and cilantro, if using. Cover and cook on low 30 minutes or until thoroughly heated.

 

 

 Cornbread with Honey Butter

• 1 cup cornmeal
• 1 cup flour
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 3 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1 cup milk
• 1 egg

Preheat oven to 425°F. Put half of the olive oil in a 9x9x2 cast iron skillet and preheat in oven without burning oil. Mix all remaining ingredients in a bowl. Pour batter into preheated cast iron skillet and bake for 20-25 minutes or until done.

Note: if you do not have a cast iron skillet, spray a pan with non-stick spray and mix all of the olive oil into the batter. Do not preheat your pan if it isn't cast iron.

Serve with softened butter that has been mixed with a little honey to taste.

 

 

Chocolate Pudding

 

* Indicates that of the options listed, this item is the one on the grocery list.

This week's Grocery List can be downloaded here:

Grocery List for Jan 26-30 , 2009 - PDF

Grocery List for Jan 26-30 , 2009 - TXT (for PDAs or text editing)

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Eating healthy? Find out how to get the meal makeovers, nutrition data and point values for the menus.

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