Weekly Meal Plan

As we are getting ready for our weekly grocery shopping trip (shhh... don't tell us it's already Tuesday...), I thought I'd share. Here's our weekly meal plan and grocery list. Recipes are linked when available (they are underlined). Stir Fried Tofu comes from Fast and Fresh Vegetarian Cookbook by Marie Simmons.

French Onion Soup Sandwiches and Tortellini Crock Pot Soup are both new recipes for us this week.

Day	Dinner
M	Black Bean Fajitas with rice
T	French Onion Soup Sandwiches
W	White Bean Salad
R	Tortellini Soup Crock Pot with French Bread
F	Stir Fried Tofu (FF veg P. 104) w/ rice
S	Pasta and Sauce with Simple Salad
S	*New Recipe Night*

Produce Dairy Packaged Goods Spices/Sauces Bread

M

1 {16 oz} can black beans rinsed and drained

1 sweet pepper sliced (or sliced, frozen peppers)

1 onion, sliced

1 zucchini, sliced

1/2 bunch cilantro, chopped

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/2 teaspoon chili powder

1 garlic clove, minced

2 tablespoons canola oil

1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1 dozen tortillas

Rice

T

2 tbsp olive oil

2 large onions, thinly sliced

salt & pepper to taste

1/2 tsp dried thyme

4 ciabatta rolls, halved

1 c. shredded Gruyere cheese

4 c. no-beef broth, heated (you can find meatless beef broth at stores like Whole Foods)

W

• 3 cups cooked no-salt-added cannellini beans, from 2 (15-ounce cans) beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 small red onion, quartered and thinly sliced
• 4 cups tightly packed fresh spinach leaves, tough stems removed
• 2 1/2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 2 1/2 tablespoons cider vinegar
• 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
• Crunchy Bread

R

• 1 (19oz) bag of frozen cheese tortellini
• 1 small bag of fresh spinach (I used about half of a 5 oz package, but more is better!)
• 2 (14.5 oz) cans of Italian style diced tomatoes, drained
• 1 block (8 oz) of cream cheese** (softened in microwave)
• 1 lb. of ground sausage or chicken/turkey sausage (optional)
• 3-4 cups of vegetable broth
• French Bread

F

• 1 block tofu
• ¼ Orange Juice
• 2TBS soy sauce or Tamari
  2 TBS Japanese rice vinegar
  1 TBS Honey/Maple Syrup/Agave
• 1 TSP toasted sesame oil
  1 ½ TBS cornstarch
• ½ tsp coarse salt
• Pinch crushed red pepper
• 3tbs peanut oil
• 8 ounces mini bell peppers or 1 large red bell pepper
• 8 ounces oyster mushrooms
• 1 tbs fresh ginger
• 2 tsp orange zest
• 1 garlic clove
• 1 bag baby spinach

S

Bag of Salad
Cucumber
Tomato
Croutons
Dressing
Bag of Pasta
Sauce

Broccoli Mac and Cheese - Review

Broccoli Mac and Cheese was our "new" recipe of the week. It was slightly over rated. You can find the full recipe here.

I mean, don't get me wrong, it was good, but it was Mac and Cheese with broccoli in it.

This is how you make the sauce:

In a large, heavy skillet, melt butter. Add onion and cook over low heat about 2 minutes, add flour and cook another minute, or until the flour is golden and well combined. Add milk and chicken broth and whisk, raising heat to medium-high until it comes to a boil; cook about 5 minutes or until the sauce becomes smooth and thick.Season with salt and pepper.

Something about making my own sauce made me feel like a badass, but it also made me feel like I would have A LOT of dishes left over. And I'd rather feel mediocre with a one pot to clean than feel like Martha Stewart with a ton of dishes left over. Call me crazy.

I'm usually pretty harsh on pasta dishes though. I mean, I literally could have just taken a bag of pasta, dumped some sauce on it, thrown some veggies in, and called it dinner. That would take 15 mins, top. Instead I was boiling water, making rue, chopping veggies, simmering sauce, and then BAKING the entire dish...

I hate cooking things more than once. Why... Just why?

So, while it was good, we probably won't be making this again. If it's your thing, go for it. But I have two kids tugging at my legs begging for food... Rue making isn't for me.

Meal Planning 101

It wasn't easy for us to start meal planning, but it had to happen. It actually happened more by accident. We found a Whole Foods Meal Plan online and followed that for four weeks and then adapted the meal planning process to meet our needs.

We went from planning breakfast, lunch, and dinner on the Whole Food plan to just planning out lunch and dinner. Now we just plan out dinners.

I like to plan all our meals in a Google Doc so Mr. M or I can access it at any time from anywhere (like at work, or at the grocery store!). I link all of the recipes that I find online and list ingredients out by day. I then color code the ingredients so it's easier to find when grocery shopping. This is an adaptation that we made to better suit our needs. I use to list out all the ingredients, then spend SO much time reorganizing them into categories. It just was taking too long so I decided to just color code them and whoever is shopping can just look at all the green things and grab them quickly in the produce isle. This also works because if we decide to cut out or replace a meal, all the ingredients are listed together and we'll know what we no longer need.

I usually scan our cabinets (or ask Mr. M) what we still have from last week. This week we have a whole pack of tortillas, pesto, and soba noodles hanging out in our cabinets as well as everything we need for the Kale Avocado Salad since we didn't get around to making it last week, so on the meal plan it goes!

I don't really worry about 'days' anymore. I just want to make sure that we have six meals for the week. For instance, Sesame Peanut Noodles is on the meal plan for Monday, but in reality, we will probably have Kale Avocado Salad since we need to use up the kale before it goes bad.

I prefer to print out our plans and then write anything extra we may need on the bottom, like we need butter this week. There are some snack staples that we know we'll need too, like cheese sticks for the boys, bread, and things to make quick lunches during the week (grilled cheese, mac and cheese, etc.) Usually dinners make enough to roll into lunches for Mr. M and me, but the boys will only eat so much Quinoa before they're over it.

Overall, it takes less than an hour to plan the meals for the week. I'll start by adding the recipeis that we know are going to roll over from the week before and just copy and paste the ingredient list (so they are already color coded - win!). Then I'll pull out a family favorite or two and again, copy and paste the ingredient list since it's already color coded. Then I'll scroll my pinterest or ask Mr. M and we'll pick something new to try for the week. This week, it's the Broccoli Mac and Cheese recipe I found on pinterest. Then I only have to color code this new recipe and we're ready for print! I don't worry about formatting. A lot of times ingredients copy and paste funny from blogs. I'll try to single space it and make it a smaller font, but other than that, I don't care if it's indented. Ain't nobody got time for that. Saturdays I usually leave blank. Either we will pick out another fancy recipe and Mr. M will grab what we need during or grocery run, we'll eat leftovers. It also allows for a night when we might not be eating at home, have a party to attend (or throw!), or just get caught up in life and (gasp) order a pizza or pick something up (which rarely happens, but life is life).

After I make the list, I hand it over to Mr. M. Since he does most all the cooking, he knows what we have in the house. He'll cross off anything we don't need or anything that repeats in the list and will compile some items together. For instance, this week he made sure we knew we'd need 2 red peppers by changing the red bell pepper in the first recipe to 'two' peppers and then crossing out the red pepper needed in the quesadilla  recipe.

Make that, three red peppers...

Sometime we are short on time and we'll just pull a meal plan we already made. I have almost 20 vegetarian meal plans saved on our Google Drive!

Happy Eating!

-A.






This is what our meal plan looks like for this week:

Day	Dinner
M	Sesame Peanut Noodles or Asian Stir Fry w/ Rice
T	Pasta with Tomato Sauce with Salad
W	Kale Avocado Salad
R	Fennel, Roasted Red Pepper, and Goat Cheese Quiche with breakfast potatoes
F	Grilled Vegetable Quesadilla with pesto and goat cheese
S	Broccoli Mac and Cheese
S	*New Recipe Night*

Produce Dairy Packaged Goods Spices/Sauces Bread

M

• 1 (8-ounce) 100% whole grain so ba noodles
• 2 cups snow peas, strings removed
• 2 tablespoons roasted, unsalted, unsweetened smooth peanut butter or almond butter
• 2 tablespoons rice vinegar
• 1 tablespoon reduced sodium tamari
• 1 tablespoon sesame tahini
• 1/8 teaspoon crushed red chile flakes
• 1 1/2 cup shredded carrots
• 1 red bell pepper, thinly sliced
• 1 cup sliced green onions
• 3 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds
• Rice

T

Box of Pasta
Pasta Sauce
Bread
Salad:
1 bag lettuce
Tomato
Cucumber
Croutons
Dressing

W

• 1 bunch kale, stemmed and finely chopped
• 2 cups grated carrots
• 1/2 avocado, peeled and pitted
• 1/4 cup thinly sliced red onion
• 2 tablespoons lemon or lime juice
• 2 tablespoons sesame seeds, toasted
• 1/2 teaspoon reduced sodium soy sauce

R

• 1 medium fennel bulb, quartered and thinly sliced
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 cup jarred roasted red peppers (2 large peppers), drained and chopped
• 6 large eggs
• 8 oz. low-fat cottage cheese
• 2 oz. fresh goat cheese, crumbled
• 2 tsp chopped parsley
• breakfast potatoes

F

1 small zucchini, diagonally sliced into ¼ inch pieces

1 small summer squash, diagonally sliced into ¼ inch pieces

1 red bell pepper, stem and seeds removed

1 small red onion, sliced into ¼ inch rounds

1 large Portobello mushroom, cleaned and sliced into ½ inch pieces

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

salt

white pepper

4 whole grain tortillas

4 tablespoon pesto, divided

2 cups part-skim mozzarella cheese, divided

4 oz goat cheese, divided

S

12 oz high fiber elbows like Ronzoni Smart Taste

1 1/2 tbsp butter

1/4 cup minced onion

1/4 cup flour

2 cups skim milk

1 cup fat free chicken broth (vegetarians use vegetable broth)

8 oz (2 cups) reduced-fat sharp cheddar (Cabot 50%)

salt and fresh pepper to taste

12 oz fresh broccoli florets (I used pre-cut bag)

2 tbsp grated parmesan

1/4 cup seasoned bread crumbs

cooking spray

Vegan Banana Muffins: 5 Ingredients

Yum.

Yes. 5 Ingredients.

What you need:

1 Stick of Vegan Butter OR 1/2 Cup of Vegan Butter Spread (we use Earth Balance Spread)
1 Cup of Sugar
1 Teaspoon of Baking Soda
1 1/2 Cup Flour
3 Very Ripe Bananas

What you do:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Spray a 12er muffin pan with oil (we use a Coconut Oil Spray) or use liners.
Cream butter and sugar
Mash the bananas in a bowl.
Combine bananas, flour, baking soda, and sugar/butter mixture.
Optional: toss in any additional yummies: we like to add walnuts, vegan chocolate chips, and a few tablespoons of vanilla hemp protein powder.
Fill each muffin about 1/2 way
Scoop some muffin mix out of a few other muffin holes because you can never do it right in the first place to put an equal amount of muffin mix evenly into 12 muffin tin holes... Moving on...
Bake for 25 minutes.


Eat about a million six two muffins because they are dddddeeeeelicious!

Foodie Friday: Italian-Style Stuffed French Toast

We're trying something new. Mr wants to start blogging about our awesome food recipes we've been putting together into meal plan... but he doesn't want to do the blogging. He does the cooking, I'll do the blogging. This weeks meal plan included the following for less than 200$ for the whole week (including snacks, lunches, and breakfast foods for the 4- and a half - of us):

Day	Dinner
M	Mediterranean Stew (Veg CrockPot) w bread
T	Pasta with Tomato Sauce with Salad
W	Orange “Chicken” with Rice
R	Tortilla Pizzas
F	Stuff Peppers w Rice
S	Italian Style ‘French’ Toast
S	*New Recipe Night*

So, hopefully we can keep it up and blog a favorite from the week each Friday. First up, a favorite from this weeks meal plan: Italian-Style Stuffed French Toast.

I originally found this recipe here at Jessica in the Kitchen and though it looked fantastic and pretty simple.

For the filling:

• 2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 4 cups (6 oz.) loosely packed fresh baby spinach
• ½ cup ricotta cheese
• ¼ cup shredded Parmesan cheese
• 1 tsp lemon zest
• 1 Tbsp chopped fresh basil (or 1 tsp dried)
• 1 Tbsp chopped fresh oregano (or 1 tsp dried)
• Salt and pepper, to taste

For the French toast:

• 1 loaf French bread, cut into eight 1-1/2-inch-thick slices (We used larger slices of Italian Bread) 
• 3 large eggs
• ½ cup milk (We used Soy Milk)
• ¼ tsp salt
• ½ tsp garlic powder
• 2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil divided

For the topping:

• 2 cups marinara sauce, warmed

1. For the filling: In a large skillet over medium heat, add the oil. Add garlic and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add spinach and cook until wilted, 1-2 minutes. Let cool then coarsely chop.
2. In a small bowl, combine chopped spinach, ricotta, Parmesan, lemon zest, basil, and oregano. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Using a small serrated knife, cut a horizontal pocket in the side of each slice of bread. Gently fill with 1-2 tablespoons on filling and press closed.
3. In a shallow dish, whisk together the eggs, milk, salt, and garlic powder.
4. In a large non-stick skillet over medium-high heat add one tablespoon of oil. Working with one slice at a time, dip into egg mixture, flipping to coat both sides. Place in pan with the hot oil. Repeat with 2-3 more slices without overloading the pan. Cook for 3 minutes per side, or until golden brown. Repeat with remaining slices, adding more oil as needed.
5. Transfer to plates, spoon warm marinara over top, and serve.

The verdict according to Mr: It was actually pretty easy. Cooking is the third part. You make the filler, the french toast dip, and then the assembly and cooking. It's not that healthy on our health-o-meter, but it's "Delicious" according to Big. We used fresh oregano and dried basil, but I don't think it really matters. The recipe also calls for French bread, but we used sliced Italian bread and think it worked out perfectly. French bread seems like it would make the sandwiches too small. There was enough ingredients left over to make this twice in the week. Each kid split a sandwich and we put the "dippy sauce" on the side for Big and omitted the sauce all together for Little.

Thumbs up from Big! 

Everyone though dinner tonight was amazing, and we had enough left over (after making eight half-sandwiches) to feed the boys lunch the next day. We'll definitely be adding this to one of our favorite meals and are excited to make some Mouse House tweaks to in in the near future.

Where have we been?

Where have we been? Jeeze, Summer has flown by and we are being thrusted into Fall already (against my will!) We've been really busy over here at the Mouse House because guess what...

M3 is coming!

We were beyond thrilled to find out that M3 would be joining us, but we had a few a lot of little big scares that made us worried the little one wouldn't make it. We were hush hush about M3 for a really  long time. We didn't even tell our families until M3 was 18 weeks along. Now were at 22 weeks and so so excited to announce it to the world. M3 is looking great now and growing right on track! We decided to stick with Mouse House tradition and NOT to find out if M3 is a he or a she, so stay tuned! January (or December! Eeek!) will be here before we know it! 

-A

St. Paddy's Fun

Well, it's been a while. I wanted to share with you a super cute St. Patrick's Day craft I did with the boys last week. I literally had a "Oh, crap. It's St. Patrick's Day. Maybe I should do something" moment. Not that I think it makes me a better Mom, but it makes me FEEL like a better Mom, so I decided to do some Pinterest searching and found this idea found on a blog here.

To be honest, I didn't even look at the blog. I skimmed Pinterest, saw the picture and figured it had basically no prep and my two year old could do it. Boom. Now I'm crafty.

While Little was exploring downstairs in a safely baby proofed room and Big was napping, I quickly gathered up some construction paper and sliced it into strips. Not gonna lie - my strips were pretty big because I didn't want this to take forever.

When Big woke up, we got our craft on. I know two year old's like tape, but Big LOOOOVVVEEES tape. I don't get it, but whatever kid. He really enjoyed putting a strip of paper through the hole of our paper chain and then sticking a piece of tape to hold it together (and then I would stick another piece of tape to ACTUALLY hold it together).

Little loved handing us colors of paper and waving them around in the air. I was actually shocked with how well they worked together. Shocked, I tell ya.

In the end, we hung our "rainbow" on the door so Daddy would see it when he was on his way home. I ended up going back later and cutting out a black pot with some gold gold in it later when Daddy got home and had no clue it was suppose to be a rainbow.

Our rainbow and gold hung in our kitchen for a few days after St. Patrick's day and Big loved pulling at it until it finally fell apart. Overall, I'm glad I could take some time and watch how much my little guys really are growing. They both are impressing us daily.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

(Oh yea - I was also 'that mom' who made 4-leaf clover sandwiches)