About 3 weeks ago I had a very frustrating moment. Everything that I was planning on making for dinner made me want to say, "We're having that AGAIN?!?!"... to
myself. I thought, "This cannot be good. J and I are not even married yet and I am hitting my meal wall??" So I made a decision. For the following week I would make something new for dinner every night. I would also try a couple of new things for lunch.
Most days, I eat all three meals at our flat. Typical ex-pat day: I have breakfast in the morning with J, then go to the gym or get lost in some project on the computer. Then it's time for lunch. I don't often go out for lunch unless it is with someone. In the afternoon I may go back to the gym, go for a run, do some exploring, or end up falling into another project black hole on the computer. It is amazing how much time 're-naming' all of your Pinterest pins can take. This is pretty much the type of thing that only someone with borderline OCD would do, but I'm pretty sure I have mentioned... that's me! I will spend hours making sure all of my file names are formatted exactly the same, or all of my photos are labeled in the same way. At least it gives me something to do when it is raining and cold out.
So having decided that the following week would be an adventure in the culinary arts, I set about choosing my menu. I scrolled through Pinterest and settled on the following:
Monday: Supremes de Volaille aux Champignons (Chicken Breasts w/ Mushroom & Cream)
Sides: Zucchini Spears & Roasted Butternut Squash
Tuesday: Chilean Salmon w/ Avocado Cream Sauce
Sides: Roasted Avocado over Mixed Lettuce & Couscous (Recipe No Longer Available)
Wednesday: Baked Cod w/ Summer Vegetables
Side: Rice & Broccoli
Thursday: Spinach & Tomato Chicken
Side: Tagliatelli
Friday: OUT (We went for Turkish after going to 'To Kill A Mockingbird')
I really enjoyed trying new recipes and boy did we land on a keeper!!
Monday: The Chicken Breasts w/ Mushroom & Cream was TO DIE FOR. I shouldn't have even questioned the fabulousity of it as it was a Julia Child recipe. J was in LOOOOVE. In fact, I would recommend this dish to any woman looking to woo a mate. I have heard of something called "Wedding Chicken", well... THIS is "Honeymoon Chicken"!
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| Chicken Breasts w/ Mushroom & Cream Sauce (Roasted Butternut Squash & Zucchini Spears) |
Tuesday: The Chilean Salmon w/ Avocado Cream Sauce was very good. The Roasted Avocado over Mixed Lettuce and Couscous was somewhat of a disappointment. I substituted quinoa for the couscous and that part was still yummy. But the roasted avocado... I had such high hopes... and it failed me. The recipe says to make sure the avocado is ripe or it will taste bitter after roasting. Well, our avocado was perfectly ripe and soft but it was still bitter. The initial taste was good, but the lingering bitter kind of ruined it for me.
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| I may try this one again in the States. I don't trust these avocados! |
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Wednesday: We really tucked into the Baked Cod w/ Summer Vegetables. If I were making this in the US, I would have done heirloom tomatoes, zucchini, and yellow squash. But, here in the UK, I can't find yellow squash or heirloom tomatoes. I used a regular red tomato. I added large chunks of red onion. I left out the olives. I would have liked to have included them, but the grocery budget had already been hit and exceeded. I was not about to push it any further for a bottle of olives. I served it with white rice that I cooked down with garlic and butter added into the water. We had white rice in the house. Ideally, I would have made this with brown rice. The broccoli was just for me as J does not eat broccoli. It was sauteed with garlic and olive oil.
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| About to go into the oven. |
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| This was very tasty. It has earned a spot in the rotation! |
Thursday: I am not sure what happened to this dish. It had the potential to be great, and honestly, I don't think I have given up on it yet. It looked beautiful. It smelled wonderful. But the taste was... a little bland. For me, it was actually fine. In the future, however, I would kick it up a notch if I really wanted it to be fantastic. J felt that it was a little bland for his taste, and honestly, if I wanted to serve it to a larger group, I would say the same. The recipe did not give any side suggestions, and I was feeling the yen for pasta, so I served it with tagliatelli. This dish improved with time. I had leftovers and those flavors that hadn't intensified on first serving really came together the next day.
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| Has potential. |
So that was our week in meals! It was, overall, a very delicious week. Sometimes it was a little stressful as I was juggling new recipes left and right, but it was fun. Because I had to buy a number of staple items that we had lost in the move and not needed since, the grocery bill was out of budget for the week. Buying two kinds of fish also added to the greater than usual total and quinoa is not cheap. But if you are going to spend money on something it might as well be on good, clean eating. Although not all of these recipes were diet recipes, per se, all parts of the meals were made from fresh/real ingredients. I think both J and I enjoyed our culinary adventure!
I will leave you with a few more pictures from my evening with Julia!
