Meal Planning

I thought it might be a good idea to go through my meal planning process and start setting goals for the budget.  So what I do is, every Sunday, or Monday if I get distracted on Sunday, I plan out my meals for the week based on what I have left over from the week before.  I also like to at least consider what the Tuesday grocery store flyers say will be on sale and what’s in season, but I usually just end up making what sounds good.  I have the Pepper Plate App for my Kindle where I can schedule the meals for the week and type up a grocery list.  I also use www.caloriecount.about.com to calculate the nutritional value of my meals.  It is a lot better for me if I calculate the meals before I cook, that way I am much more aware of what is influencing the meal and what my goals are.  I have noticed that sometimes they will give you different information so you have to use common sense and double check the values if they look funny.  I use www.livestrong.com as my confirmation.  There are a ton of websites and apps for your phone that will calculate nutritional information I have just been using calorie count for a long time so a lot of my recipes are stored there.

My menu for this week

Sunday plus 2 lunches – Thai Basil Stir Fry (6 servings)

Monday – Cilantro Chicken, Potatoes and Broccoli

Tuesday plus 2 lunches – Chicken Enchiladas (6 servings), Spanish Rice, and Salad

Wednesday plus 1 lunch – Vegetable Risotto (4 servings) and Salad

Thursday  plus 1 lunch – Cajun Chicken Pasta (4 servings) and Salad

Friday – Should cook but no plan yet

I like to keep a decently stocked pantry and plenty of vegetables so I have most of the things I need on hand all the time and then I just have to replace them every once in a while.  I like to keep different types of rice, homemade pasta in the freezer, pastas I don’t make like penne, bread crumbs, a bag of onions, and all kinds of spices.  For standard spices I go to Penzey’s because they are really good, not cheap, but good.  For any Indian spices like cumin, cardamom, turmeric, etc, I buy at an Indian grocery store.  They are ridiculously cheap there, every store I’ve been to has been.  They are always “expired” so I buy them as whole seeds.  Spices that are old and already ground will not be as flavorful as whole spices freshly ground.  I buy large quantities and store them in the freezer.

So for my grocery list this week I had to purchase the meat and almost all of the vegetables.  I already have the pasta and the rice, but I did have to replenish my stock of Arborio rice for the risotto, but now I will have enough for quite a while and I do like to make risotto pretty often.  So you can see that buying in bulk may make your grocery bill a little high one week but when you use the ingredients often it evens out over all.  And when I say bulk I don’t mean I have turned my laundry room into a pantry filled with 50 boxes of cereal and 100 1-lb bags of rice like on those coupon shows, I mean I purchase 2 or 3 bags of rice when they go on sale or a couple packages of chicken and freeze what I don’t need.  I am not denying those people are “saving” tons of money, but in my opinion having 50 bottles of ketchup that I got for $2 doesn’t do anything for me when I go through 1 bottle of ketchup a year. Who wants 50 year old ketchup?

So thinking about this, I realized that counting cost/serving based on my grocery bill for the week didn’t make sense since I already had a lot of the ingredients.  So I am going to try to break down the cost of the meal based on the amount of the ingredients that I actually used, regardless of when I paid for them.  We’ll see how that works, sounds like a lot of work. 

Stuffed Chicken and Ricotta Mashed Potatoes

The name of the game last night was to try to use up ingredients I have bought over the last two weeks.  Cheese is expensive so I wanted to try to use the boursin cheese and the ricotta cheese and try to make a meal with a reasonable amount of calories.  My goal for the day is 300 calories for breakfast, 100 calorie morning snack, 400 calorie lunch, maybe a 100 calorie afternoon snack if I get home early enough, and then 600-800 calories for dinner for me and a little bit bigger serving for my husband. 

So I had a couple chicken breasts in the freezer that I bought for the chicken parmesan, boursin cheese from the smashed cauliflower, spring mix from the Caesar salad, potatoes from the chicken and dumplings, and ricotta cheese from the ravioli. So I made a stuffed chicken with boursin cheese and spinach that I picked out of the spring mix with ricotta mashed potatoes.  Now I know what you are thinking, no way that is less than 800 calories, but oh my friend I am just that good.

2 small chicken breasts (6-7 oz)

2 tbs boursin cheese

¼ cup spinach, torn into bite sized pieces

¼ cup bread crumbs

1 tbs Olive oil

6 toothpicks

Preheat oven to 350 and get your toothpicks out. 

Pound the chicken breasts so they are as thin as you can get them before they tear, about ½”.  Crumble the boursin cheese and sprinkle it across the entire breast.  Place the torn spinach on the breast as well.   

Start at the small end of the breast and start rolling it up, rolling as tightly as you can and making sure the stuffing stays inside as you go.  Once you get to the end try to tuck in any straying ends to try to keep any stuffing from being exposed.  Use 3 toothpicks to keep it rolled up.  Coat the chicken with bread crumbs.  This is where you need to be careful, the calories in the bread crumbs and the olive oil add up quick, so don’t go crazy.  Heat the olive oil over medium heat and once it’s hot add the chicken, one at a time.  Turn the chicken multiple times just to brown the bread crumbs.  You want to try to get the bread crumbs browned all the way around with as little olive oil as you can.  Browning it in the skillet before you put it in the oven will keep the bread crumbs stuck to the chicken better but you want to minimize how much oil is soaked up.  Remove the chicken to a sheet with a cooling rack and bake for 25 minutes.  It’s better if you put the cooling rack on a sheet because something is going to drip out of your chicken and it’s much easier clean up if there is something underneath to catch it rather than having to clean the oven.

2 Servings, 480 calories, 21 g fat

Ricotta Mashed Potatoes

4 new potatoes (was about 11 oz for me)

3 oz ricotta cheese

¼ cup skim milk

Salt and pepper to taste

 Cut the potatoes into 1” pieces and boil in water until soft, I leave the skin on but that's a personal preference.  I wanted mine chunky today so I mashed with a fork.  Stir in milk and cheese and add salt and pepper to taste.  You can always add more milk if you like it a little less fluffy and if you can spare some extra calories feel free to add more cheese.

2 Servings, 180 calories, 4 g fat

Now try and tell me you aren’t impressed.  That is a pretty filling and flavorful meal for 660 calories, of course yours will vary depending upon the size of the chicken breasts and the potatoes you use so be aware of that.  What’s great about the stuffed chicken is once you get the hang of how much filling to put in it and how to roll it up well you can stuff it with anything you can think of.  I have tried to do a stuffed chicken without breading it before and it didn’t taste very good.  Just seasoning and baking the chicken didn’t work for me so I think you really have to bread and pan sear it.

This week groceries were $31 and made 12 servings at $2.57/meal, I'll take it.

Baked Ziti with Turkey Meatballs

Last night was the big meal to get us through lunches for the rest of the week, but you could easily cut this recipe in half for just 4 servings.  This is pretty simple but for me it’s good comfort food, I can’t turn down anything with pasta and cheese.  

2 lbs 99/1 ground turkey

1 cup pine nuts

1 cup bread crumbs

2 eggs, beaten

olive oil

1 cup parmesan cheese

4 oz mozzarella cheese

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1 tsp oregano

1/4 tsp garlic powder

28 oz canned diced tomatoes with basil and oregano

16 oz whole wheat penne pasta

Mix turkey, nuts, bread crumbs, eggs, and the seasonings and form the meat into 1" balls. Heat 2-3 turns of olive oil over medium-high heat and brown the meatballs.  Be sure not to crowd the pan, I did this in 4 batches and had to add additional olive oil for the third batch.  Turn the meatballs a few times so they are browned all the way around.

Cook the pasta to al dente. Puree the tomatoes and season the sauce to taste with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and oregano.  Mix the sauce and ½ cup of parmesan cheese in with the pasta.  For me, tubular pasta I always break down and buy, even though I know it would taste better if I made it myself, but there is no way I have the time to roll up a ton of little tubes of pasta, I do have a day job.

Spread the pasta into a 9x13 baking dish and top with the browned meatballs.  Top the meatballs with thinly sliced mozzarella cheese and the rest of the parmesan cheese. 

Bake at 350 to melt the cheese and finish cooking the meatballs, about 15 minutes.

Serves 8, 650 calories, 27 g fat

This is pretty high in fat but I love cheese, so every once in a while I do splurge.  You could cut back on the cheese or use low fat mozzarella, which would also save some calories too, but cheese is not something I like to buy cheap or fat free/low fat.  There is a popular concept in healthy cooking that suggests using less or low fat cheese because you won’t notice the difference.  I think if the cheese doesn’t add enough to your meal such that you won’t notice if there is less or you won’t be able to taste the difference between an amazing fresh mozzarella ball versus fat free, plasticy like shredded cheese, why waste the calories and add it at all? If it adds to your dish, go for the gold, if not, leave it out, and this dish with its gooey awesomeness definitely calls for cheese.

Chicken Parmesan

Today my husband requested chicken parmesan. I of course readily obliged as this is also one of my favorites and any chance I have to eat fresh pasta I take it.

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, pounded thin

Bread crumbs (I like the Italian seasoning flavored bread crumbs)

2 Eggs

Garlic powder

Dried Oregano

Dried Basil

Salt

Black Pepper

¼ cup Parmesan cheese
Olive oil

14 oz canned diced tomatoes with basil and oregano

After pounding the chicken breasts as thin as possible without tearing, dredge in egg wash seasoned with salt and pepper then coat with bread crumbs seasoned with garlic powder, oregano, basil, and parmesan cheese. Heat enough olive oil to cover the bottom of a skillet over medium heat, once hot add each breast, one at a time, adding additional oil in between if needed. Just cook the chicken long enough to brown the bread crumbs on each side. I finish cooking the chicken in the oven at 375 for 20 minutes and I think the pan you use is critical. I put a cookie cooling rack on top of a cookie sheet and cook the chicken on the rack. This way the juices run out into the cookie sheet and the breading stays intact. I hate it when the breading gets soggy and comes off, this keeps it crispy.

For the sauce I cheat a little and use canned diced tomatoes with basil and oregano. I pulse it in the blender to break down the big chunks and season to taste with more basil, oregano, garlic powder and salt.

Serves 2, the vast majority of the calories in this are in the chicken, so you can set your calories based on how big of a piece of chicken you use. For 2 large chicken breasts it will be about 750 calories.

I think the most important tip you should take from today is not to be intimidated by homemade pasta. Making pasta is not that difficult and it is well worth the effort. Once every month or two I make a big batch and then separate it into 2-4 serving sizes in individual baggies and throw it in the freezer. An hour or so before I need to cook the pasta I put the baggy in a bowl filled with warm water to thaw it. This way I can have fresh pasta any time and rolling out the pasta once it’s thawed might add 10 minutes to your time in the kitchen versus using dried pasta. I promise that 10 minutes is worth it. I will post my pasta recipe another day.

To go with this I made a spinach salad with carrots, feta cheese, dried apricots, pine nuts and a red wine vinegar/olive oil dressing.