Day 1: Pan-roasted chicken with lemon garlic green beans and potatoes
Day 2: Ratatouille
Day 3: Homemade pizza, Easy cucumber and tomato salad
Day 4: Grilled steak, Wild rice salad, Roasted beets with orange yogurt dressing
Day 5: Turkey pesto wraps, Salted cucumber slices
Day 6: Grilled peach, brie, and basil sandwiches, Carrot and celery sticks
Day 7: Santa Fe shrimp salad
Notes: Tomatoes are just starting to ripen in Wisconsin, so expect to see a lot of recipes with this delicious fruit in the near future. This week they are featured in the Ratatouille (the quintessential high summer recipe) and the cucumber and tomato salad which is one of my favorites because it is so easy and fresh. Don’t forget to keep storing more food for the winter. It is so simple to do and you will be glad to have these quick meals for school/work nights so you don’t end up taking another trip to Culver’s. Of course I’ve never done that 😉 I will be using some veggies from my garden to double (I might even triple) the Ratatouille recipe and freeze half. One last note – skip the avocado in the Santa Fe salad, they are super expensive right now and not worth it.
GLP Tip of the Week: As my son heads off to Cub Scouts camp this week, I am reminded of a key Boy Scout motto – be prepared! I’ve found that I am more wasteful and spend more money when I don’t have a plan and I’m not prepared. That is the whole point of meal planning and why I started this blog to help you all plan too. It is the fourth principle in my Green Life Philosophy. This principle also works for pretty much every other area in my life. If I don’t pack a bag before heading out with the kids, we end up spending money on drinks, buying yet another tube of sunscreen, and throwing away all sorts of plastic packaging and cutlery. Even though all my kids are finally out of diapers (praise be!), I find that it is still important for me to maintain a bag that I can grab for outings. This bag includes a change of clothes for all 3 kids, clean silverware or bamboo sporks, cloth napkins, sunscreen, bug spray, and a few other things. Then all we have to do is grab our water bottles and throw a snack in the bag and we are ready to roll. This also goes for grocery shopping and lunches for work. I keep a bag in my trunk that has more reusable bags, bulk containers, cloth produce bags, empty egg cartons, and glass tupperware. Then I am prepared for shopping anywhere and also if we are out to eat and need a container for leftovers. Additionally, have a designated place for my lunch box and am sure to have clean silverware ready to go. So this week, take a few minutes and prepare yourself. Even if you don’t have kids, make a going out bag (this could just be a large purse or a backpack) and stock your trunk with a shopping kit. Be sure to put your bags in places where you will remember to grab before leaving the house or car. You will also need to get into the habit of cleaning out the bag when you get home and replacing the used or dirty things.
CSA Notes: I typically don’t make any substitutions in my weekly share and challenge myself to use the produce that is chosen for us. I’ve been able to discover new veggies this way and build my arsenal of recipes for things that are a little more obscure. I can also work on making substitutions so that I can enjoy some of my favorite recipes at varying times of the year (for example, the spanakopita last week with collard greens instead of spinach). That said, I really struggle with beets. We were recently on Mackinac Island and ate at a restaurant that served a beet salad with orange yogurt dressing. This was so different that I just had to try it, and boy am I glad I did. It was delicious! So I am trying to recreate my own this week. I hope you like it too. Those beets will keep coming and I will keep finding new ways to use them. Please share if you have any ideas! This is how I am using my share this week:
- Celery: wild rice salad and cut into sticks. I will keep any leftovers to use for soups or to make broth in the future. It will last a while in the fridge.
- Tomatoes, slicing: ratatouille
- Tomatoes, cherry: cut in half for the cucumber and tomato salad. A few saved for snacking
- Eggplant (Japanese or Globe): ratatouille
- Beans, Green: roasted chicken. If you don’t want to use that many, you can cut them up into 1 inch pieces and freeze for winter use in soups. Some people say you need to blanch them first, but I never do and they turn out just fine.
- Zucchini, Green/Gold: ratatouille
- Onion, Sweet: 1 in ratatouille, 1/2 in cucumber/tomato salad, 1/4 in wild rice salad, 1/4 in Santa Fe salad
- Potato – Red: roasted chicken. Save the rest in your fridge or pantry, they will last for months
- Basil: 16 leaves for peach and brie sandwiches, 1/3 bunch for ratatouille, rest for pesto
- Beets: peeled, diced and roasted for orange yogurt salad
- Cucumber: 1 for cucumber/tomato salad, 1 sliced for a side to turkey wraps, 1 for Santa Fe salad
- Garlic: roasted chicken, ratatouille, wild rice salad
- Corn, Sweet: Santa Fe salad
