3 for the week

I’m a big believer in making 3 dishes a week that will become lunches, and quick dinners for busy evenings.  So this week I offer up these three culinary findings:

1.  Easy Baked Penne w/ Ricotta: I’ll probably do this with a salad.

2.  Zucchini Casserole- It’s in season and I have a ton!~  Mom made something like this last week, I serve this with a bunch of my Amish grown Ohio Sweet Corn.

3.  Kale, Potato & “Chorizo” Enchiladas. The kale/potato combo is popular in our house.  I’ll use mole sauce rather than salsa, but in our world anything covered with mole’ will be consumed in seconds.

Bellin Run, Green Bay

I haven’t been running as much as I want or desire to.  Due to a freak corn hole injury on Memorial Day.  I sprained my ankle and had to take three weeks off of running during some of the best weather for running we’ve seen in months!   The sprain kept me resting, icing, compressing, and elevating my right foot during three beautiful cool long spring weeks.  After discussing my injury with my chiropractor and a physical therapist they cleared me to run a 10K this weekend.

Joleen, making it look easy!

Months ago Joleen invited me to join her on her first 10K, the Bellin Run.  Not wanting to turn up a weekend of girl fun with Joleen, I wore an ankle brace to prevent further injury.

We separated after the first half mile, as the euphoria of running again  coursed through my veins.  It was a beautiful run, through lovely rolling Green Bay neighborhoods on a beautiful day. The race course was great but  PACKED with strollers and children which lead to 6.2 miles of tricky crowd navigation.   Joleen & I were both pleased with our finishes, mine an 11:43 avg pace for me, which was much better than I hoped for running injured and taking so much time off.

Joleen, making it look easy!

Ian & I prerun~

Joleen & I after the race

Rocco & I relaxing after the run

Strawberry Freezer Jam

I’ve been jamming with girl friends for several years now.  I’ve experimented with varrious recipes, but last summer a novice jammer taught me a lesson from her grandma. Freezer Jam is fresher tasting, faster and easier to make, and by far my new favorite kind of jam.   Jamming can take a long time if you are making several batches, but without having to heat the fruit time is cut in half!

With 2 pound boxes of strawberries on sale I loaded up and jammed away.

Washing & Destemming

Adding pectin to sugar

Pureeing fruit, the easy way.

Adding fruit puree to the sugar pectin mixture.

stirring for three minutes

finished product

The only difficulty I encountered was jarring the jam.  In most jam recipes one heats the fruit and sugar mixture then add the molten fruit lava into heated jars.  Once lids are added, the heat of the fruit and the jars creates a vacuum allowing the jars to seal, and the product to become shelf stable for about a year.

Old habbits die hard, and I found all my glass jars, sterelized them, and added the finished product to jars.  After a day of hoping the jars would seal, I gave up and called my jam guru.   We decided that the preserves needed to be in plastic freezer containers.  Without heating the fruit no vacuum can be created, so in order to store the spread in a refrigerator or freezer, I’d have to use sterilized plastic containers.

After decideing this I recalled how my grandmother often have fruit compotes in leftover Cool Whip containers.  Now jar manufactures now make plastic jam jars especially for freezer jam, I prefer using these.   My jarring dilemma lead me to the this link, where you can also buy jars, or get coupons for buying  jars.

Menu October 5 to October 12

BREAKFASTS:

• “Awesome Fat Free Banana Bread” from the sample of the  Happy Hebivore’s new cookbook.
• Crock-pot Irish Oatmeal which I took from PVS.  I made this last night, to make sure the hubby had a solid breakfast for his big work day. Unfortunately, I used some whole milk I had sitting around after making ice cream last week, and the results are tastey, but gloppy looking. (I’m not looking forward to cleaning out the crock-pot after this).  I’m normally a soy milk only kinda girl, but I’ve yet to find a soy milk with enough fat to make great icecream.

LUNCH:

• Cucumbers & Hummus on dark bread w/ fresh cracked pepper, yum!
• Leftovers.  I know it sounds dull, but my cooking style is to do most of the prep for three to four dishes on the weekend, then make and eat them for dinner or lunch as the week progresses.

SUPPER:

• Because I can’t wait to try the spices I bought yesterday. Roasted Cauliflower & Tofu Curry. This is a recipe that I got from the Weight Watch website.  It’s core, and super easy!  I’ll serve this with an easy to make Chana Massala – which is like an Indian Chilli: 2 cans of garbonzo beans, 1 can of diced tomatoes, 2 to 3 TBS of Chana Masala spice, 1 TBS of Curry Powder, Cayenne Pepper to taste, and 2 cloves of garlic. Combine and let simmer for 30 minutes!
• I have leftover Tomato Basil Spinach Sauce after making lassanga Friday, and I”m going to use it for an Eggplant Parm. Let it be known I’m not a fan of eggplant, but I am a fan of this sauce, and breading and broiling.   This should be pretty fast, so I’m thinking this will be dinner on Monday.
• Finally, I’m wrapping up the last of the most perishable items from the CSA with a Potato Kale Soup recipe I found reading Better Homes & Gardens in the optomotrist’s office.  I love soup, but I’m typically a little skeptical when bland potatoes are added to such a strong green that can be easily over cooked.  But the recipe calls for Gouda cheese, and the greens are lightly steamed then added to a mashed potato, brocolli, and cheese broth. The magazine says this should take about 15 minutes, but I’m hesitant to believe such a lofty promise.  This will probably be Thursday night dinner.

october produce

EAT:

This is the container of goodness I base our meals around.  On this the frist week of October we recieved: 

Our Box of Organic Produce

First Week of October Produce

• carrots
• kale
• head of lettuce
• head of purple cauliflower
• broccoli
• eggplant
• parsnip
• beet

Recipes or Menu to follow.

I made a trip to the Spice House, and picked up some curry, gram massala, and some apple pie spice (next weekend is an apple picking extravaganza and I needed to stock up).

RUN:

It’s a beautiful fall Saturday, I got a great 8 mile run in this morning. By mile six I was ready to quit, good thing I’m not doing a marathon this fall!

VEG:

After recovering from my run with brunch and a shower then errands-I watched Run, Fat Boy, Run and I loved it. A montage laden, sporty, heart warming chick flick.  Good thing the hubby was working today.