I have a plan!

First I want to tell you that a few weeks ago, I got a new cookbook. We're slowly transitioning to vegetarianism, and to ensure we didn't bore ourselves - being lifelong meat-eaters, I thought there can only be so many ways to cook veggies - we found this book:
The Classic 1000 Vegetarian Recipes by Carol Humphries
(Ours has a different cover, but we got it at Joseph Beth here in town. Not sure if that makes a difference.)

We went grocery shopping Sunday, and I had already planned out a rough menu (below) for this week so we don't have to run out for anything else this week. I pulled 3 recipes for this week from this book; I have two other cookbooks from which I pulled the rest of this week's recipes.

Now that that's out of the way, I'm not posting the recipe I used tonight as it *is* copyrighted material. I will be contacting the publisher for permission to post others from their 1000 book, for the photographs and reviews I intend to keep here. (See previous post.) I'll let you know how that goes :-)

The cheese-topped mashed potatoes are easy though. The 1000 book gives it a different name and amounts and everything, but it's basically just mashed potatoes with cheese. I was taught by Mom, and have come to really like, mashed potatoes with the skins included. Wash, dice and boil - no peeling. Now my kids prefer skinless potatoes, so I often will peel a few but still leave most with skin. Tonight I decided my girl could take it or leave it and left all skins on (she even had seconds!). So - make mashed potatoes, then grate your favorite cheese on top, and stick it under the broiler until the cheese browns to your liking. Very simple, yet I never would have thought to do so had I not read this book. Seriously, I'm such a clueless cook.
Alongside these potatoes, I cooked some frozen mixed vegetables. Once it was all done, we all had a bowl with potatoes on the bottom and veggies on top ~ viola, dinner!

No photos tonight, but I do have leftovers and will eat those for lunch tomorrow. I'll take a picture then.

On to this week's menu... these are not set in stone per day, but are the meals I can make this week without having to go out because I don't have this or that. I'm kind of known for doing that, and it has to stop! My recipe worksheet goes from Monday through Sunday, with an extra space for notes. I do have the page numbers noted for myself, but for now I'm only linking to the books through Amazon.com.

Notes:
V = 1000 Vegetarian book <-- linked above
P = 365 Pasta book <-- from our friend Lee, bless him!
F = Old Farmer's Almanac book <-- from Mom last Christmas, my request :-)

Meals:
Cheesy Mashed Potatoes V
steamed mixed veggies
Chicken breasts and fettucine P
Pasta E Fagioli P
Carrot Salad F
Cheesy Chicken Casserole F
Vegetarian Lasagne V
Tea Scones F
Cottage Cheese Buns V
spaghetti & garlic bread
soups (cans were on sale a few weeks ago :D )

Bonus: Over the summer, Lee made the Pasta E Fagioli for us. It was deeLISH. Both kids liked it too, and it was good warm and cold. I so hope I can share that recipe, but I will definitely take and share photos from this week's Fagioli!

The kids will be gone this weekend, so I'm not too worried about what the hubby and I will eat alone. This is a short menu week for this reason, and I get to play around a bit with things I don't think they'd eat anyway! This Friday starts their Winter Break from school, so the next few weeks will be busy but I still hope to photograph meal prep with the intent of posting about it all here.

Happy Holidays :D

Been a while

I've been slacking on both my blogs, so I'm trying to change that now. I did suffer a hard drive crash last Christmas and lost about half of my recipe collection. Fortunately, I did have the other half printed out and in a binder. I'm still working on getting everything back in order, finding my favorite online sites, and thinking about what to do with this blog.

I was thinking today, while making lunch (This is seriously tasty, and was today's lunch!), that maybe instead of trying to come up with things to make or keeping some kind of log online of my collection, I could possibly just take some of my favorites posted elsewhere online - AllRecipes.com, for instance - and do a cook-along type of post. That would mean my taking pictures of each step from preparation through finished product, and I know many people prefer to see pictures along with a recipe rather than just reading it. Or, for someone like me who cannot begin to imagine how flavors will meld and things will look, it gives an idea of what to expect so that if something goes wrong it is evident.

I was thinking of making this change because I figured out that I plain don't enjoy cooking. I can do it, especially with a recipe in front of me, but I don't have any kind of passion for it. Poseidon and I were talking a couple months ago, and he asked me if I could taste the differences in anything - I think we'd gone out for lunch or something - and I honestly could not. I can't imagine how things will taste just based on the words in a recipe, and I'm not "allowed" to mess with a recipe ;) Been married for 7 1/2 years, cooking daily for almost 10, and I'm still learning some basic rules about it all!

So from now on, most of the posts here will be full of pictures of me cooking someone else's recipes. I may throw in a recipe of mine, or my mom or mother-in-law, from time to time, and they will also have pictures of how it's made step by step. I will have links to recipes I find online and make as well. I'll probably still only have a few in a month's time but I feel like I should make this blog more active than it has been. Bear with me :)

~Amphitrite

Broccoli and Cheese Casserole

This one is from my mother-in-law. It's quick, easy, and tasty; great for potluck suppers and reunions! It's also one of Poseidon's favorites, so of course I had to snag the recipe from her :-)


2 pkg. frozen broccoli (or big bag)
2 cups of Velveeta cheese (cubed)
2 sticks of margarine
1 1/2 cups of Ritz cracker crumbs

Cook broccoli as directed on package. Drain water and immediately add Velveeta cheese and 1 stick of margarine. Cover and let set until margarine and cheese are melted. Melt 1 stick of margarine in small saucepan (or microwave) and add cracker crumbs to melted margarine. Mix well. Pour broccoli into casserole pan, then top with crumbs. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes. Bubbly, little brown on top (not much). May be made 1 day before it is baked and kept in fridge.


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Now I have also added cubed cooked chicken to this, which appeals to the kids, and that makes it a one-bowl dinner!