What’s on the menu? [NOT 3/1/22]

3/1/22 brightersideoflife 42
picture of different types of Italian pasta shapes
mmmm carbs

Hi, friends!

How did your Monday go? Work crazy after the holidays? Or slow because people are finally back and going through all their emails, etc?

I’m composing this on Sunday night, so Monday is definitely going to be a “what fresh hell is this” fingers crossed it’s a low-stress day.

So on to one of my favorite topics, snackies. What is on the menu for folks this week?

I’ve been working through some quinoa and veggie bowls I made and also the hopping john I did for New Year’s Day.

Over the weekend I needed some good background tv, so I binged the Stanley Tucci series about food in Italy. I’d watched it when it came out and it was just as awesome a second time around. Also, now I’m totally making pasta Wednesday or Thursday night depending on the leftovers situation. 🙂

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42 Comments

  1. I just had for dinner whole wheat pasta with walnuts, olives, greens,   garlic and parmesan, while the rest had plain old pasta with jarred tomato sauce because they don’t want anything fancy. Their loss.

  2. We took the pescatarian daughter grocery shopping today before sending her on her way back to school.  That inspired me to make something I can’t make with her around so I am doing corned beef and cabbage in the instapot.  My wife doesn’t eat much beef but loves cabbage soaked in the juices (shhhh…she doesn’t realize why it tastes so good!)  my younger one is around for another week and loves all foods.  When my older one was seeing me buying big baker potatoes today she asked why I was buying those.  When I told her I was going to make twice baked potatoes this week she got really upset!  “You can’t make those when I’m gone!”  We spent the earlier part of the day trying to get her to follow up on her desire to get an internship in environmental science this summer.  She is really shy and doesn’t like reaching out to people.  I told her it is not always what you know but who you know and gave her connections to a former UH professor friend who knows everyone in oceanography in Hawaii and another beer buddy of my nephew that worked for a WA tribe in salmon hatchery management.  She finally reached out and both have already responded and are trying to help her.

    • My daughter has an interest in that field, and her high school helped connect her with a crab researcher where she’s been involved in some surveys of crab food sources.

      It’s potentially a great field to get into, if the US can get its head around developing coastal areas for seafood harvesting and changing our diets toward clams, mussels, less popular fast growing fish, and other things Cousin Matt writes up in his FYCE pieces.

      • We have lots of shellfish farms here & I was never a big mussel fan until I went to a restaurant associated with one.  Amazing stuff, not chewy & melts in your mouth.  Crabs are a lifeblood in the PNW & we have tons of restrictions but they are hard to enforce & tribal treaties throw more problems in the mix.

        • So much of seafood and fish in general really comes down to knowing how to cook it. I think too much of the lack of motivation with home cooks is (1) oh fuck I just ruined that expensive ____ and (2) typically seafood and fish does not reheat well so you’re limited if you want to meal plan multiple days over it.

  4. I made linguine puttanesca for supper. The kids ate half the chopped olives before I could add them to the sauce. Note so self: don’t bother cutting all the olives next time.

    The other meal I’m looking forward to cooking eating is pork schnitzel with German potato salad (yes the vinegar forward warm type!).

    • Kudos to you for enjoying that warm potato salad.

      I remember watching my mom, her siblings, and her cousins fighting over my great aunt’s German potato salad. I think I was in high school before I was important enough in the family parties to get a chance at that potato salad and wow was I not a fan.

  5. I had grilled salmon for dinner and will be eating leftovers tomorrow. Tonight’s veg was cukes in chili crisp, I’m going to roast some green beans tomorrow. later this week I think I’ll make some pita bread pizza.

  6. Work day today was stressful enough, and then this afternoon I noticed that the fridge/freezer were not working as they should. I had to take a “break” to bag all the stuff in there and cart it to the garage. The winter temps in there will take care of the refrigerator contents, and we had enough room in the garage chest freezer for me to put all the freezer items.

    So it could have been WAY worse, but still not my idea of a fun day. Oh, and the soonest a repair person can make it out is Wednesday afternoon. I’m not looking forward to them telling me that they need to order parts, and what with the weather and supply shortages and all……

  7. Sometimes I forget to tell the Hello Fresh people what I want and I get random whatevers. This week I got TWO pasta thingies, one of gnocchi with spicy chicken sausage and a spaghetti with shrimp. They were both pretty good… Reminds me gotta go check the app…

  8. I finished up the last of the Corned Beef I made up here, and am clearing out the fridge for the things I’ll make at home during the week, in Mpls…. then it’s packing myself & Lil up and driving the 2 hours back home (hopefully we get there a bit before midnight?😉).

    Today went well, Dad-wise, but my stuff went kinda sideways (both the Diabetes 14-day sensors i got at the pharmacy had problems, so they both need to go back, verification of that was a PROCESS and took a few hours to do, and that killed the WHOLE middle of the day when I was hoping to get stuff done🙃), then I was exhausted from not sleeping well last night (worrying about Dad) so I gave up, gave IN, and just said “Fuckit!” and took a couple-hour nap at about 3:30, because I was exhausted…

    I’m better able to focus (and drive!), but later than I wanted to be getting out of here & heading back home to the cities.

  9. I know the menu will be chipped beef on toast among other tasty sundries at the crowbar hotel for Theranos fraudster Elizabeth Holmes.  Not for defrauding test users, but making her investors look really fucking stupid.

    Good result, bad reasoning.

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