Time to Plan

It's time to think about the next menu for mom. She will be needing food by next week sometime. In planning, I have to think about the future and what mom may have going (i.e, visitors, holidays).

In two weeks, it will be Thanksgiving and mom will have a house filled with visitors. Her visitors don't have the same nutritional needs that she has, so they may be eating foods she should not eat. If there isn't food for her already prepared and easy to grab for, she will eat whatever her guests are eating. Historically that has been a challenge for her.

I am thinking this time I will provide a full menu as I normally do, so that mom has ready-to-eat gourmet food throughout the holiday. Also, I want to make sure she has a full supply of food for the week following Thanksgiving so that she won't be tempted to eat any of those left overs that may linger in her kitchen.

Experiment
I had a new soup the other evening at a restaurant. It's called apple rutabaga soup. It's To Die For! I can't find a recipe that duplicates exactly the flavors that were in my soup, so this weekend I'm going to experiment with several recipes and see what I can come up with for mom. Mom LOVES rutabagas! And 'tis the season right now.

She Thoght It Was Meat!

Success! Mom thought the stroganoff was beef! She had no idea--she called to thank me and tell me how absolutely delicious the stroganoff was--in fact, it was the first of the three choices she picked last night to eat. She was flabbergasted when I told her. It was the best stroganoff I've ever made if I do say so.

This time I used seitan in addition to the TVP as the protein base. I chopped it up in bite size pieces about the same size as beef tips. The seitan is amazingly similar to beef in consistency, dense and chewy. Once the consistency is there, the key is in the flavoring.

So, the food drop off was a success and mom has about 14 to 16 main meals. Here is the final meal list:

Pot roast with gravy, carrots and onions, and mashed potatoes
Stroganoff with brown rice and steamed green beans
Roasted chicken, sweet potatoes, brussel sprouts with raisins and pecans
Chicken/vegetable soup
Two cheese spinach frittata
Tuna salad

I didn't have time to make the parslyed parsnips or the tillapia. I'll start with those two next time.

No Time

Time is now the biggest issue. I do not have normal or consistent hours on my job, and often, I don't know even 24 hours in advance when I'm going to have to work. So for this week, as of yesterday, I did not know I would be working a 12-hour day today! I'm revamping my plans even as I work.

As a result, I will be modifying my menu. One idea I had was to make vegetarian stroganoff instead of beef--I don't have time to go to the grocery store today. They are nearly identical in flavor and my version is much healthier to eat. It's a no-brainer. :)

I made tuna salad for mom as I made it for myself at lunch today.

Recipe
Simple Tuna Salad
1 can tuna in water
White balsamic vinegar
Mayo
chopped onion
chopped hard boiled egg, 2 per can of tuna
S&P to taste

Mom doesn't like pepper so I hold the pepper for her. Sometimes, I also splash a little fresh lemon or lime at the end of mixing to taste. It's a delicious extra layer of flavor!

Hard boiled eggs tip from Martha:
If you are chopping hard boiled eggs for a recipe, instead of peeling them (which is sometimes impossible!), cool them and CUT THEM IN HALF WITH A KNIFE! Then you can scoop out the egg and chop it up.

No more worries about difficult to peel eggs! Magic!

Gearing Up

Looks like Thursday is the target delivery day. Theoretically, that gives me one more day of prep, but realistically, I have a full work schedule, so it's going to be a sprint to the finish, I can just smell it.

I'm thinking I will do batches this time. The pot roast is finished—I'm told by my lucky taster it's fantastic. :)

I'm thinking I will do the chicken soup and the chicken dinner today. I'm thinking I will package things as I finish instead of doing all the packaging at once—that is quite a task all by itself.

I used a different method of cooking my halibut last night: I actually cooked it in the garlic lemon marinade—it was incredible. I might use this technique on the chicken for mom today.

Stay tuned.

Back to the Kitchen

It's time to cook for mom again! She's had a series of guests the past several weeks and hasn't needed new meals. But now she's cleaned out the fridge and is ready for a new batch of delicious food.

The first entre I have decided upon is pot roast. I'm using Tyler Florence's recipe with a few changes of my own. I'm going to use some red wine and vegetable stock instead of water and the fresh herbs I have on hand in my garden right now: thyme, oregano, and marjoram. This meal will also include the carrots, celery, onion, and mushrooms that are cooked with the roast.

In addition, this week I will be making:
Parsleyed parsnips, sauteed and steamed (new technique!)
Roasted sweet potatoes
Frittata, probably spinach
Beef stronganoff
Chicken/vegetable soup
Lemon garlic chicken breasts
Tillapia (if there's time)

I'm targeting Wednesday or Thursday as food drop-off day downtown, depending on my work schedule.