Menu Plan Monday Jan 17-23

I wrote what follows below earlier today. This is the menu I have for this week so far:
Stuffed Green Peppers (hubby wants to cook)
Porkchops with Fried Apples
Stuffed Mushrooms (Finger Food Night)
Beef Barley Soup (didn't get to make last week)
Chicken & Stuffing Casserole
Beef Wraps
Leftovers

Visit Menu Plan Monday and get inspired to cook!


The fridge is finally clean. It was not a pretty sight. But it's done. Hopefully, never to get that bad ever again. We'll try to eat mostly from the pantry again this week. There are several food rebates and deals I would like to do. So I'll be stocking up on weird stuff like peanuts (Kraft Jingle Rebate) and will need to appropriate my food budget accordingly. Next, I need to tackle the freezers. Then we'll see what we have on hand for a menu.

Meanwhile, here is a recap of our meals this week. Our unexpected eat from the pantry week- I wanted to do a huge grocery shopping trip. But after having to throw away an embarrassingly large amount of expired foods, I just couldn't make myself go shopping. I've been on a cooking funk and didn't want to end up buying stuff we won't eat. Looking at the pictures of what we ate, I guess we didn't fare so badly even though we just bought a little bit of groceries this week.

I hope you enjoy this look at how we eat. And maybe get inspired to clean out your fridge and pantry. You never know how much money you'll save!

Beef & Mushroom Stew. Didn't turn out like the Pioneer Woman's. I made a gravy for it. Nonetheless, it was so delish! The Meuller's whole wheat pasta tasted like regular pasta!

I saved a few slivers of meat for Beef & Broccoli Stirfy for lunch. I cooked the last of Trader Joes Brown Rice Medley. It was so good I called Everman's to see if they have it... they don't. So, this week was Feast of Broccoli. We ate it so much. I bought 2 bunches at Target for $0.80 each after a Target Q. Their coupons for produce rock! This dish is just Broccoli Cheese on pasta. I made it for the kids because there was no way they'd eat all those mushrooms in the beef stew. They loved it. I made alot of cheese sauce to use for baked potatoes stored in the freezer. Then my dear sweetheart husband ate 3/4 of the sauce. He "thought" it was cheddar soup. Needless to say we had enough sauce left for 3 potatoes. But I would make this again. It's so easy and filling, even if potatoes are supposed to be bad for you.
This was deer meat- backstraps to be exact. A dear friend (couldn't help the pun!) gave us a few. It was so tender! Simply sauteed in butter & olive oil. I made pasta alfredo but this Ronzoni Healthy Harvest was awful, very wheaty. I added spaghetti sauce & it was fine!

With the leftover awful pasta alfredo, I made a pasta version of Chicken Rice Broccoli. It straightened out left in the crockpot a few hours with some cream of chicken soup. I used mozzarella instead of cheddar. Ah, the experiments I do to avoid shopping at Wal-Mart.
We came home late one night and I made these open-faced Ham & Egg Sandwiches on whole wheat egg muffins. Great combination. It's only open faced because there were just 4 pieces left!
Last night, I made Black-Eyed Peas Soup with carrots, bacon and smoked beef sausage. No fresh onions, celery or parsley. I used dry spices instead. It worked just fine!

I also made French Lentil Soup. The French lentils are smaller and don't get as mushy. I still want to make that Blueberry-Breakfast Strata but we're out of bread. I even considered making homemade bread. But who am I kidding?