I’m happy to report meal planning is going pretty well! I enjoy sitting down with my list of recipes, thinking about the week ahead and writing out what to cook each night.  The recipes chosen are then translated into a shopping list to which I add breakfast, lunch and snack items.  Luckily lunch usually consists of leftover dinners, which makes it easier.  The project manager in me loves the process of making a plan and executing sed plan.

Week two was a success though I still seem to slightly over buy somethings and under buy others.  I’m starting to think meal planning for Jellybean needs to go beyond dinner, as many of the foods we don’t have enough of are for her.  Raspberries/blackberries/blueberries, in particular, are consumed at a remarkable rate.

MealPlanningWeek2

Here’s what we’ve been munching on lately …

Dinners for Week 2:

  • Grilled Lemon Dijon Chicken, Roasted Cauliflower and Baked Oven Fries … the oven fries are AMAZING.  You must try them, Mkay?!  I seriously want to eat them everyday all day long.
  • Brisket with carrots and potatoes … one of my favorite holiday recipes that I occasionally make on non-holiday weekends.  One of these days I hope to share the recipe with you!
  • Saucy Chicken with Rice … super easy and perfect for a week night.
  • Homemade Pizza … I’ve been dying to make homemade pizza crust for a while now.  The last time I tried to make it the yeast had expired – FAIL – this time I was properly equipped with non-expired yeast!
  • Lemon Almond Chicken Salad with Biscuits … I may or may not have been out of bread and way too lazy to venture to the store so I decided to just throw some frozen biscuits in the oven.  They were delish and it was kind of like having a deconstructed sandwich :)
  • Out to Dinner x2 … While the goal is to only order in or go out once a week, however this particular week was special.  My parents were in town over the weekend visiting & my girlfriends and I did a little girls night out.  So my once a week only is more like a guideline, not a rule {wink, wink}.

I made two new recipes this week!  I am glad they were both a hit so they can be added to the queue of dinner options.  It is always disappointing when a recipe looks delicious and then is just so-so or worse not yummy at all.

Goals for next week: try another new recipe (or two!) and try to use more of what’s already in the house.

What have you been making for dinner lately {please add links in the comments!}?  Any tips for meal planning?

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In my mid 20’s I went from being someone who went to the grocery store once a week to someone who went almost daily.  It helped Safeway was literally a 3 minute walk from my apartment.  I didn’t pre-plan meals in anyway shape or form.  On my way home from work I would decide what I wanted to make for dinner and head to the store for the ingredients.

When we purchased our condo, the number of times I went food shopping drastically decreased.  We were no longer within walking distance of a grocery store, which meant I started to go every couple of days on my way home from work.  I slowly started to think about meals in 2-3 day increments.

Enter newborn baby.  I was exhausted, often un-showered (SHHH don’t tell) and barely had time for a bathroom break, let alone cook or go food shopping multiple times a week.  Not to mention the logistics involved in going to the store with a newborn baby in-tow!  Store runs became almost nonexistent and the number of nights we were ordering in steadily inclined.

Let me be honest…cooking is way healthier AND less expensive than ordering in.  Plus, there is the added bonus that I really do LOVE to cook!  Once I went back at work full time and ‘adjusted’ to our new schedule, I started making a conscious effort to cook more often.

I go food shopping once … max twice … a week now.  It has been an interesting transition since I wasn’t giving much forethought to our meals.  With no plan in place, I’ve been working with what we’ve got in the house.  It didn’t take long to realize we were going to live off chicken/rice and pasta/meat sauce if I don’t start planning ahead.

So, a couple of weeks ago I made a decision to start meal planning.  I took out pen and paper and actually wrote down what I was going to make each night for dinner.  I gave myself one ‘order in’ night … I need{ed} to be realistic and not to bite off more than I can chew!

First thing I did was write out a FULL list of our go-to recipes.  Though I would like to get a mix of old and new dinner menus I figured it was probably best to start with what I know we like and go from there.  I decided to make a list of what to cook for dinner throughout the week and determine what we would eat when later.  The one caveat to this is recipes that were more time intensive I planned on conquering over the weekend.

Meal Planning Dinner Recipes - Week 1 | Life's Tidbits

Dinner Choices for Meal Planning Week 1!

  1. Smoky Southwestern Tilapia with Sweet Potatoes and Green Beans
  2. Roasted Chicken with Carrots and Potatoes
  3. Hamburger Casserole
  4. Chicken Fajita Stuffed Peppers (substituted with ground turkey and mozzarella cheese – was totally delish!)
  5. Baked Honey Cajan Shrimp with white rice and steamed green beans
  6. Chicken Pesto Pasta
  7. Order In!

Overall week 1 went really well! It was so nice to have everything on hand and the recipes preselected.  The other great thing about meal planning was there were plenty of leftovers for lunch each day.  Similar to my order in one night I gave myself a couple of days for going out to lunch with coworkers.  This was partially because I like going out to eat and be social, as well as to give myself an out when I needed to change things up.

Do I have any changes and/or goals for week 2 of meal planning?  Well, thank you for asking … because I do plan to make a few changes!  I need to not only meal plan for my husband and me, but for little Jellybean too.  Cook more meals over the weekend to save additional time during the week (make the freezer my friend hahaha).  Also, I would like to challenge myself to use more of what’s already in my pantry and refrigerator.  Doing so will take more planning/research, but I feel it will be useful in expanding my recipe ‘portfolio’ as well as saving a little extra mulla!!

Do you meal plan?  Any tips or tricks you can share?

I would love to hear your EASY and favorite week night recipe!

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Growing up green beans were always called string beans in my house.  Or at least that’s what I think they were called as each time I go to say green beans my brain desperately wants to say string bean.  STRING BEANS, STRING BEANS, STRING BEANS!  Okay I think I got it out of my system. =)

Oddly enough I have a few fond memories of cooking with string green beans.  I’m standing in the kitchen next to my grandmother (or mother) snapping off the ends of the green beans and eating a few along the way!  Green beans are one of those things I can eat cooked or raw.

But back to the recipe …

Do you ever have one of those days where you defrost meat and then none of your go-to recipes sound appealing? I’ve been having that happen to me frequently as of late.  The other week I decided to defrost some ground turkey for dinner.  Shepard’s pie, taco salad, turkey meatballs and a few of my other easy recipes felt just well ‘over-done’ … get it?! I’m so funny – well probably not, but I couldn’t help myself.

So yeah, anyways, it was time for something new, easy and healthy!  I was browsing Pinterest while contemplating dinner.  After doing a quick search-a-roo on ground turkey I had a few contenders.  The husband and I really enjoyed this new meal.  One of the best parts … it’s a ONE pot meal so relatively easy cleanup.

Recipe: Szechuan Green Beans with Ground Turkey | Life's Tidbits

Recipe inspired by The Lemon Bowl

Ingredients
1 lb ground turkey
4 garlic cloves – grated
2 tsp ground ginger (or 1 tbs fresh grated ginger)
1 lb green beans – trimmed
½ cup chicken broth
1 tbs corn starch
3 tbs soy sauce – low sodium
2 tbs rice vinegar
1 tbs chili sauce (more or less to taste)
½ tbs sesame oil

Instructions
Serving Size – 4

Pre-heat a large wok or frying pan over high heat and spray with non-stick spray.  Add the ground turkey, garlic and ginger.  Break up the turkey and cook until browned.

In a small bowl, whisk together chicken broth, corn starch, soy, rice vinegar and chili garlic paste.

Once the turkey is browned, add in green beans and broth/soy mixture.  Cover and let simmer on low for 5-10 minutes.  Stir occasionally so the sauce doesn’t burn.  Add in the sesame oil.  Cook an additional minute or two then serve.

Serve with Israeli couscous or rice.

SzechuanGreenBeansGroundTurkey

This recipe has definitely grabbed a spot in our dinner rotation!  What’s an easy recipe you are digging lately?

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I’m a little bit behind in posting gift ideas given there are only 7 days until Christmas and let’s face it Hanukkah was almost a month ago!!  However it might come in handy for any of you last minute gift buyers out there (like my hubby)!!  Heck this year I have to put myself in the last minute present buyer category.  If you are already done with holiday shopping these items would make for pretty good Valentine’s Day gifts as well.   Best part is these gift ideas won’t break the bank!  With a baby on the way, we decided to keep the gift giving/spending to a minimum this year.  Being on (more) of a budget this year has enabled me to find ideas I might have overlooked in the past.  I would certainly be excited to receive any of these items …

Gift ideas under $50  | Life's Tidbits

For the Wine Lover – wine cork collecting kit
For the Lady Friend – Lenox Adorn Ring Holder
For the Home – Monogram Drinking Jars – Set of 4
For the Photographer – Fingerless Shooting Gloves
For the Cook – Nordic Ware Reversible Griddle

What gift would you love to receive that’s under $50?

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Admission – I am a sweetaholic!  Always have been and probably always will be.  I’m starting to believe Jellybean, like her mommy-to-be, has a wicked sweet tooth as well.  Yes, wicked … I am from Massachusetts and wicked is an adjective, promise!  I’ve been tried out a lot of new baked good recipes over the last couple of months.  Two of my favorites are classic brownies from Smitten Kitchen and white chocolate brownies from Bake or Break.

Recently I’ve been looking for new bloggers to follow when I stumbled upon Tin’a Chic Corner.  The chocolate crumb cake recipe immediately grabbed my attention.  Last weekend the husbands were away for a boys “football” weekend so the girls and I decided to do a dinner/game night!  I figured it was the perfect time to give this new recipe a whirl.

chocolatecrumbcake_slice

Ingredients Needed:

  • white sugar
  • dark brown sugar (I used light brown sugar since that’s what I had in the cabinet)
  • ground cinnamon
  • salt
  • butter
  • all-purpose
  • unsweetened cocoa powder
  • baking powder
  • baking soda
  • egg
  • skim milk (I substituted 2%)
  • oil (I think vegetable … at least that’s what I used)
  • vanilla extract
  • boiling water
  • miniature chocolate chips (totally forgot to put these on the cake and it was still delicious!)

Get the recipe and directions from Tina’s Chic Corner here.

chocolatecrumbcake_ingredients

chocolatecrumbcake

chocolatecrumbcake_piece

Although my crumb topping didn’t come our nearly as pretty as Tina’s the cake was absolutely DELISH!  The girls all loved it.  We even had seconds.  The husband, who isn’t a big chocolate fan (seriously, what’s wrong with him?!), really liked the piece he had when he returned from his trip.  I will definitely be making this chocolate crumb cake again … and soon!

Any recipes you’ve tried lately that you’d recommend?

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