Pasta Salad

This is my basic pasta salad recipe.  You can change up the meat, cheese, veggies, and dressing to make it anything you like.  I stick to this basic combination most of the time.  This is a great basic meal on a budget.  And as an added bonus, it is very kid friendly.  My kids love being able to pick out each individual piece.  I do use both green and red peppers if the price is right.  If red peppers are really expensive, I'll just double the amount of green peppers and not use the red.

Pasta Salad
Serves 6

1 pound rotini
1 small summer sausage roll (about 8 ounces), cubed
4 ounces cheddar cheese, cubed
4 ounces mozzarella cheese, cubed
1/2 cup green bell pepper, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup red bell pepper, coarsely chopped
1 cup grape tomatoes
1/2 cup sliced black olives
1 cup Italian salad dressing (more or less to taste)

Cook pasta according to package directions.  Drain and rinse in cold water.

Meanwhile, chop remaining ingredients (except dressing) and combine in a large bowl.  When cool and well-drained, add pasta.  Add salad dressing to taste.  Toss well.


*I always have more peppers, tomatoes, and olives than I can use.  Chop the remaining veggies for a salad another time or use in a different recipe.  One ingredient, multiple recipes.  You can save money and decrease waste.

Weekly Menu for 6/3

Good morning, internet world!  It is a lovely day here and I'm excited that we get to start spending more time outside and at the pool.  In light of the weather warming up, again we are looking to more summery fare on the menu this week.

There is one exception, of course.  One day we are going to be having meatloaf because we are taking dinner to some friends that just had a baby. Since the new dad is a fairly picky eater, a meat-and-potatoes kind of guy, we are doing meatloaf with a side of macaroni and cheese for them.  And because I'm a lazy cook and don't really feel like making two dinners in one night, I'm just going to double it and have the same for us.

There are a couple of recipes that I will post this week to make the weekly menu plan complete.  You can be on the look out for recipes for both pasta salad and meatloaf.

I think with the dinner that we are taking to our friends, I will be over my $100 budget.  We'll see how it all pans out.  Also of note, we will be out of the house for dinner one night this week.  So without further ado, here is the meal plan for this week:

Pasta Salad
Spaghetti and Meatballs (as requested by my oldest)
Grill Something
Fish Tacos
Meatloaf
Chicken Fajitas

The chicken fajitas is just something that I will throw together.  I suppose I could put an actual recipe together for that.  If I'm feeling ambitious, I may do that.

Anything interesting on your menu for this week?  I'm always looking for new meals to add in to our menu plans.

Weekly Menu for 5/27

Happy day after Memorial Day!  I hope you had a great long weekend and were able to enjoy any time off that you had.  We ended up doing some projects around the house and then relaxing together as a family.  Did you do anything fun?

This week's menu will have a few familiar-looking menu items on it.  Because we ended up having to change our dinner plans on two different occasions the week before, two meals got bumped to this week's menu.  No worries, though.  That's actually one of the benefits of buying ahead and having some meats in the freezer.  Because the main ingredients hadn't been thawed yet, I was able to hold those meals until this week.  So you will see the Cashew Chicken and Pork with Apples again this week.

Another repeat this week is Hamburgers.  We had leftover hamburger buns, and I hate to have food go to waste.  So we're having hamburgers again this week.  Not that anyone minds.  My kids love burgers, and they are a favorite of mine as well.  I'll have to have my husband guest post some time and tell you what he does with them.  His recipe for burgers is easy, and oh so tasty.  I have to say that I enjoy the fact that I can just pick up some ground beef, and then dinner magically gets done.  :)

One other thing to note, we have dinner plans one night this week and we will be eating out one night this week.  So, that means 5 things on our weekly menu plan.  Eating out is helpful for my weekly grocery budget, but we do have to remember to keep our eating out budget under control (yes, we have one of those, too).  Keeping to my $100 grocery budget for this week shouldn't be a problem at all.

On to the menu for this week:

Hamburgers

Honey Cashew Chicken with Rice

Spinach and Artichoke Pasta

Grill Something

Pork Medallions with Maple-Glazed Apples

The Spinach and Artichoke Pasta is something that I'm going to be making up as I go along.  If it is any good, I'll post the recipe for you.

I will say, one of the benefits of having Grill Something on the menu plan each week is that it is a perfect thing to have on holidays such as yesterday. Sure enough, that's what we did.  Steaks with garlic bread and corn on the cob.  Yum!

What are you looking forward to having this week?

Grocery costs

All of the groceries have been purchased, and like I suspected, I am over budget.  As you'll see, my buying ahead is going to be a lot more this time than it usually is.  The great sales at my store are over now, so this time next week, my weekly budget and menu plan should look a lot better.

The grand total spent was $126.28.  Here's where it all went:

Breakfast: $2.69
Lunch: $3.53
Dinner: $34.21
Staples: $40.71
Buying Ahead: $29.08
Splurge: $3.29 (chocolate so I can make cookies.  Yum!)


I also bought a basil plant for $2.49.  If I can keep it alive (my gardening skills will never be worthy of a blog), it should end up saving us money.  Even if I only use it once, we've broken even.

So, I am over budget, but next week should find me under.  And almost $20 of the buying ahead is in the form of coffee.  That alone will save us almost $5 a week for probably the next two months.

I know this cost post is getting out late.  A combination of bad math and my kids kept me from getting it out in a timely manner.  Keep a look out later today or tomorrow for my menu planning for this week.

Pork Medallions with Maple-Glazed Apples

This recipe is really easy, but also really popular with my family.  Not only will my kids eat it, but my super-picky sister will eat it, too.  And sometimes it's harder to get her to try something than it is with my older son.


Pork Medallions with Maple-Glazed Apples
Serves 4

4 baking apples (Granny Smith, Gala, etc.  Pink Lady is my favorite), peeled, cored, and sliced
1/4 cup maple syrup
1 pork tenderloin, trimmed, and cut into 1 inch thick slices
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
2-3 tablespoons canola oil (can use olive oil if you prefer), divided


For the apples, heat a nonstick skillet over medium-high heat.  Add apple slices and saute until lightly browned, about 5 minutes.  Reduce the heat to medium-low and add the maple syrup.  Simmer until the apples are tender, about 10 minutes.  Stir occasionally.

Pound pork slices until thin (1/4 inch).  In a shallow dish or plate, combine flour, salt, and pepper.  Lightly dredge pork medallions in flour mixture.   Heat 1 1/2 tablespoons of oil in a large skillet pan over medium-high heat.  Add pork to pan in a single layer.  Cook 2-3 minutes on each side until the pork reaches desired level of doneness.  To serve, spoon apples over the pork medallions.


A couple of notes:
*I like to do the pork in my cast iron skillet.
*The pork usually takes me a couple of batches with the size of my pan, hence the extra oil.  Between the batches, add more oil to the pan as needed.
*If it will take a couple of batches to do the pork, turn your oven to warm and have a baking dish inside.  Remove pork from the pan to the baking dish as it is finished to keep it warm.
*This will serve 4 moderate eaters.  If you are serving big eaters, I would double the amount of pork and count on it serving 6.

Enjoy!

Weekly Menu for 5/20

Things are warming up, and we are starting to use our grill a lot more.  Pretty much from here until the end of summer, you will see a regular item on my menu for each week.  That would be: Grill Something.  Very specific, I know.  My husband loves to grill and I love grilled food, so we are a good match.  Pretty much when the plan is to grill something, we choose either something that sounds good or is on a good sale.  Also, Grill Something is prepared with a fresh vegetable side.  You can see that I'm big on advance planning when it comes to grill night. :)

Other than Grill Something, the menu planning strategy is the same as it was before.  Of course, I'm trending toward menu items that are a little lighter on the palate and generally a little quicker to prepare so that I'm not heating up the kitchen too much.  It is definitely okay to take kitchen temperature into consideration when you do your meal planning!

So this week, we are having:

Taco Salad
Grill Something +Vegetable

I'm Back!

Well, after too much time has passed since I last visited the blogging world, I am on my way back!  I've been working on new menus and am getting even better at keeping within my budget.  I can't wait to share my wealth of knowledge with all one of you who currently reads my blog.  :)

I'm hoping to change my menu weeks from starting on Wednesday to starting on Sunday.  I think it will make more sense for others and be easier for me to keep on top of.  I'm looking forward to posting some time this weekend!