Day 1: Shrimp, orange, and arugula pasta salad
Day 2: Farmer’s casserole with chopped peppers and mushrooms
Day 3: Homemade pizza, Tossed salad
Day 4: Pulled pork, Kale and Brussels sprouts salad
Day 5: Baked lemon chicken with mushroom sauce, sauteed carrots
Day 6: Soup from frozen supply, Muffins from frozen supply
Day 7: Egg salad sandwiches, carrot sticks, orange slices
Notes: It’s citrus time! Oranges from the U.S. are coming available and the price is dropping for lemons and limes. Time to load up on all that extra vitamin C. Don’t be afraid of the flavor combinations in the shrimp pasta salad. It may seem strange to combine citrus with olives, garlic, shrimp, and arugula, but weirdly, the flavors meld really well. And if you prep everything while boiling the water for the pasta, the meal comes together pretty quickly.
I will avoid plastic in several different ways at the grocery store this week. First of all, for the Farmer’s casserole, I use my food processor with the shredder attachment to make hash browns from whole potatoes rather than buy pre-shredded in a plastic bag in the frozen section. Those types of bags cannot be recycled and the food processor makes quick work of the task. I also buy my oranges loose rather than in a bag. Even the mesh orange bags are made from plastic. Finally, I will be serving up my version of “fast food”. When the produce was fresh this past summer, I froze extra batches of soups, other meals, and muffins. So when we have a busy night, I simply defrost, heat and serve. Honestly it is faster than take-out, without all the disposable containers and plastic utensils. If you don’t have anything frozen, you can peruse my soup recipes here and search the site for muffin recipes. Then make a double batch and freeze half for the next time you need a super quick meal.
Last note: check out the picture above with the squid carrot we got from our CSA farm this week!
GLP Tip of the Week: How low can you go? No, I’m not talking about the limbo. I actually was really good at that as a kid. But now I’m talking about your thermostat. You can save a lot of energy and money by setting your thermostat just a few degrees lower than what you are used to in the wintertime. The U.S. Department of energy recommends setting it at 68 degrees F during the day and cooler at night. They say you can save about 10% on your heating bill by simply lowering the temperature by 7-10 degrees for at least 8 hours per day. One way to accomplish this is to use a programmable thermostat so you can automatically lower the temperature while you are at work or at night. We set ours to lower 1 hour before we go to bed and then start heating up an hour before we wake up. Keep a snugly robe nearby for those bathroom trips in the night. I will admit that we currently only lower ours to 64 degrees at night, but I plan to work on slowly lowering it a little more. Just don’t go too far – just like the limbo things can tumble quickly. If you live in an area where temperatures regularly drop below 20 degrees you want to make sure to keep your home temp over 55 degrees at all times to prevent burst water pipes. What tips do you have for saving energy through heating/cooling?
