Thoughts on menu planning

I've never really been into planning dinners in advance and especially now that we get our fruit and veggies delivered weekly, it's been easier to just decide each night or the night before based on what we have in the fridge or cupboard and maybe can collect on the way home from work. But today I've been looking into menu planning because next week I'm working the full five days (the first time since I went back to work three days a week after my maternity leave) and I want to make sure I am nice and organised with dinners so there's less to stress about.

I found a few websites that had lots and lots of recipes and ideas for planning menus weekly or monthly (can't even fathom that!). I love the ones that come with a mobile app where you can choose your meals for the week and add the ingredients to the list. Then when you go shopping you can cross them off as you get them. At the moment my husband and I use a website for our calendar and shopping lists. That way, either of us can add items to shopping list and whoever is shopping can cross them off as they go. Of course, you have to have mobile service in your supermarket otherwise it doesn't work very well, as we've found out on several occasions!

The most interesting website was one called Planning With Kids. There are lots of recipes that seem to be easy to do and are great for both mid-week and kids. I even got the app to go with it although it seemed a bit restrictive in what you could do with it. It's a good start though, if you just want to think about organising your dinners and planning the week's meals. I made a list of the meals I'd chosen, both from the website and my own, and then added the ingredients I needed to my shopping list. It's the first time I've done a whole week's worth of shopping in one go and it felt good. My fridge is now laden with lots of goodies and as long as I can control myself and not change things too much, the week should be stress-free when it comes to cooking!

Feel free to tell me if you've ever planned your meals weekly or monthly before and how it worked out. Or if you still do, and how it's going!

Dinner 30 - lamb cutlets and vegies

Well, here it is, the last of my 30 Dinners. It's been quite a challenge remembering to get a photo of every dinner and apart from a couple of leftover dinners I think I did it!

Tonight we marinated half the cutlets in worstershire sauce, cider vinegar, olive oil and rosemary then cooked them on the barbie.

When I went to the fridge to see what we could have with the lamb, I found that all we had were lots of potatoes and onions and some broccoli! My problem is always what to do with potatoes. Tonight I decided on potato bake and what a good decision. They always say about 45 minutes to cook but I left these in for about an hour and they were great!

Now it's time to reflect on the photos we've taken of our dinners over the past month and see if there's something going on that can be improved or varied. One thing I've noticed is that I'm more aware of what I'm having for lunch! Maybe that's the next step - 30 Lunches!

Dinner 29 - parsnip soup, pork schnitzel and roasted vegies

You know, I've always thought parsnip were just tough old things good for nothing but being roasted to smithereens. Tonight I discovered cream of parsnip soup and it is heavenly! So sweet and thick and yum. I definitely recommend giving it a go next time you don't know what to do with your parsnips!

Dinner 28 - pasta with chorizo and homemade red sauce

There were pork schnitzels in the fridge ready for tonight's dinner but this afternoon I decided to go for a walk with Austin and consequently got home late so I reverted to an old favourite: pasta and red sauce. To dress it up a bit I fried some chorizo and made a carrot salad and a lettuce and fennel salad.

We always have some containers of red sauce in the freezer for just these kind of nights. Michael cooks up a dozen tins of tomatoes with an assortment of other ingredients and then whizzes it all up. Over the years he's perfected the recipe so that we always have great tasting red sauce at our fingertips. As a consequence, I have lost the taste for jarred pasta sauces. Maybe that's a bit snobbish but there you go. I know what's in my red sauce (well, Michael does) and I know that there's nothing bad hidden in it.

I don't know if I've mentioned the sauce we put on our salads? We make a few variations of a vinaigrette. Growing up we had vinaigrette on everything, from lettuce and tomato salads to cold leftover vegies and meat. In our house everything had a sauce and most of the time it was vinaigrette. So I've taken on some of that tradition and always have vinaigrette on our lettuce and garden salads. In fact, I really don't like the Australian tradition of serving a big bowl of mixed salad vegetables dry as a bone. I need a sauce!!

One of my mum's favorites was carrot salad, which was just grated carrots, vinaigrette and parsley. That's what I made tonight as well as the lettuce and fennel salad. There are countless ways of making vinaigrette and of course it should be made to your taste, but here's how I make it:

In the bottom of your salad bowl put some salt and pepper, finely chopped garlic and hot English mustard. This is very important for us as we love the flavour it gives. Using a different type of mustard like Dijon or American changes the taste of the sauce dramatically. Add some cider vinegar and mix together well. Finally add olive oil to taste. The usual proportions of vinegar to oil are 1:4 or 1:3 but we like it vinegar strong so tend to put about 1:2!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 27 - chicken and chips

I think in an ideal world I'd have cooked the chicken and chips myself but alas work was chaos today and this is our fallback dinner. Everyone has a dinner they do/buy when they've run out of time or can't be bothered. What's yours? I'd love to hear your ideas so post them in the comments below.

You'll see in the photo a nice glass of beer. It's Michael's home brew and it's really good. He started home brewing years ago with the cheap and nasty supermarket brands. Then gradually over the years he's got more into it, culturing his own yeast and trying more fancy beers. This one is an amber ale and happens to be one of my favorites.
I haven't always been into beer. It took me a lot of trying and eventually while living in Europe I developed a taste for Belgian and Dutch beers. The town where we lived in Holland had a local brewery and restaurant where you could order the local beers with your food. We don't have much of that here in Oz but I guess we're younger and don't have as big a history of beer making. Luckily I have a husband who likes making beer so I can have my own little taste of Europe here!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 26 - wraps ups

My little boy always asks for 'wraps ups' these days. In the beginning when he had never tried them before, he couldn't manage to keep the wrap together and all the salad and chicken would fall out so he'd just end up eating them like a normal dinner of things on his plate. Then a little while back he got the hang of it and now he's a real pro at holding them and not having too much spillage (unlike with every other dinner he has!).

The reason I like this dinner is there's minimal cooking involved and you can vary the fillings with whatever you've got at the time. Sometimes I do chicken, sometimes kidney beans, sometimes beef mince.

I usually buy the large fajita wraps but today for some reason I bought some soft round corn taco shells that you fry up and curl over into the taco shape - major flop! Austin refused to eat them and both my husband and I preferred the usual wraps. It could be that I'm not a good fryer but whatever, we don't like them!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 25 - leftovers

The other night we made three pizzas and only ate two. So tonight's easy dinner was leftover pizza with salad. We'd made two pepperoni and one ham and pineapple (Austin's favourites) and had the pepperoni left. We were a bit worried that Austin wouldn't eat it again, since the other night he decided he didn't like the pepperoni one even though he'd eaten lots of slices of pepperoni as I was preparing the toppings! Anyway, turns out he loved it and wanted more than we had!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 24 - lamb ribs and lentils

I can't take the credit for this dinner unfortunately. It was my husband who did some creative cooking and came up with the lentils dish. It has spinach, lentils, baby carrots, cream and tangelo juice in it. And it is yummy!

The lamb ribs come from the 'lamb man' (see Dinner 5) and were marinated in a BBQ sauce. Michael pre-cooked them then barbecued them.

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 23 - homemade pizza

I think we normally have homemade pizza once a fortnight but I see the last time we had it was three weeks ago, the first dinner of my 30 dinners.

I love how Austin eats most of his toppings during the preparation, snapping up slices of pepperoni and capsicum as I'm cutting them up. He's even into putting the ingredients into the bread maker for the dough. One day he'll be making our dinners...well, we can only hope!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 22 - pork schnitzel with sweet potato chips

I found this one a few weeks ago on the taste.com iPhone app when I had some pork schnitzels and didn't know what to do with them. Admittedly this recipe takes quite a bit of time but there are breaks while it's baking and there's practically no preparation. Just chop the sweet potato into chips and put them in the oven for half an hour. Then bash the steaks and dip them in flour, egg and bread crumbs. Put them in the fridge until the timer for the sweet potatoes goes off then add them to the oven for a further 25 mins. I made the apple sauce that's in the recipe too.

Sweet potato actually makes great chips. They're crunchy on the outside and beautifully mushy on the inside. This recipe is definitely a keeper!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 21 - pesto ravioli

This is a quick and easy meal. You can make your own pesto if you want. I just bought a jar of the Italian brand from Woolies along with some fresh ravioli. It only takes a few minutes to boil the water and 5 minutes to cook the pasta. Then chuck in the pesto and it's done. I also added a salad on the side just for a few extra goodies.

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 20 - leftovers

Not worth a photo but definitely worth eating! With lamb mince, potato, carrot, tomatoes and eggplant it's packed full of goodness and you can make a massive batch to freeze for a lazy day (just like we did!).

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 19 - potato moussaka and salad

Here's one we had in the freezer from a while back and got to pull out tonight when the in-laws came for tea. Note to self: it takes a long time to defrost and heat up a big casserole dish of moussaka! We thought it would only take about 30mins but in fact it took close to 1hr 30mins! But everyone got fed and that's the main thing!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 18 - Chinese takeaway

Oops! It's only taken 18 days to forget to take a photo. I was distracted though, being at the in-laws, and surrounded by excited children (and adults). So it was Chinese takeaway, as you can see from the leftovers. Not something we have very often, mainly because I'm not too keen, but a nice change nonetheless. The meal started with cut up vegies and dip and ended with cheesecake, ice cream and fruit. What's your favourite takeaway?

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 17 - chicken, olive and chorizo casserole

What a find! I was just browsing through taste.com.au yesterday and they were showing off their range of casseroles on their homepage. I came across this one and it sounded really good and I can now confirm that it is really good! Definitely on my favourites list. And best of all, I've now got leftovers for lunch tomorrow!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 16 - BBQ

I love a good BBQ with friends. When everyone brings something to share for dinner it always turns out so good and it's a great way to get some new ideas too. Tonight was no exception.

There were sausages of course, a whole selection of them in fact. I contributed my new favourite salad from a few days ago, spinach, avocado and walnut, and there were baked potato wedges, BBQ prawns and prosciutto wrapped asparagus. It was all so good most of us had seconds. Then for dessert there was a beautiful chocolate date and nut cake. Yum!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 15 - sausages and veg with leftover pasta

Austin decided he wanted to make bikkies at 4.00pm today and I stupidly concurred - I hate to quell his creativity (or his desire to cook!). So I only started on the dinner quite late and it was all a bit uninspired tonight I'm afraid. Everything was quite bland except for the mushrooms. I can't help making them with creamy wine sauce. Must be the French in me!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 14 - macaroni carbonara with salad

Never made this before but it was quite tasty and got a 'this is good' from Austin so definitely a keeper. It was a bit dry though so next time the boys need to be sitting waiting as soon as it's ready!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 13 - chicken and roasted vegies

Ok, so I cheated on the chicken because of time limitations but the chips and roasted vegies are home oven cooked!

This is another one of Austin's favourites. If you ask him what he wants for tea he always says either wraps up or chicken and chips. He likes the chicken part best but the chips are still good. I've started making my own roasted in the oven instead of buying them with the chicken. I feel better about them that way. And they all go nicely with garlic sauce!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 12 - bean nachos

This is an old favourite in my household but until recently we hadn't really made it for Austin, probably because serving chips to a 2 year old seemed a bit like bad parenting! But when you think about it, everything else is really healthy and the chips are a fun addition. Well, we don't have to worry too much about Austin requesting nachos that often anyway, he much prefers what he calls 'wraps up'!

I usually do my nachos with red kidney beans, onion, tomatoes and capsicum. It took us quite a few goes to get the grilling right and Michael is the current expert at turning the chips nice and crisp and the cheese nice and melty. Yum!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 11 - BBQ

Gotta love dinner at the folks! We mentioned we would stop by on the way home and they said they'd do a BBQ. Little did we know that they would also have prawns and homemade mayonnaise for entree, the BBQ, which included sausages, marinated chicken thighs, pasta salad, potato bake and green salad, cheese platter, dessert and champagne to finish! Admittedly, the champagne was for someone's anniversary but otherwise it was a pretty good feast all accompanied by some delicious wine!

Actually, this so-called feast was pretty much what we had growing up and what we have now when the whole family gets together. When I was younger the 4 hour lunches/dinners were a complete bore but now they're a comfort. I know we're always going to have some great wine and beautiful food. And of course fantastic family company.

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 10 - leftover meatball pasta bake and salad

I love when you're on holidays and don't have to cook every night or think about buying groceries for dinner. And I love it even more when you're on holidays, your friend cooks dinner and then the next night you get to have the leftovers again. That's what holidays are all about!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 9 - meatball pasta bake with Poirier lettuce

An interesting twist on an old classic. It was going to be lasagne but with travelling it was easier to pre-prepare the meatballs and just bung in some pasta and red and white sauces, and Bob's your uncle (thanks go to Rose for doing it all!).

A funny story about me and lasagne - I never used to make it because it was soooo time consuming to make. I loved my mum's lasagne and would relish it every time she made it, simple as it was (now). Then Austin came along and when he was about 18 months old we introduced him to some Jamie Oliver's 30 minute meals recorded tv shows. When I saw him make lasagne in such a small amount of time I got game enough to try it for myself and was amazed at how simple it really is. Oh and the fact that in France someone had told us the secret proportions to making a bechamel sauce: 50-50-50, that is, 50g butter, 50g flour and 50cl (500ml) milk. It's magic and works every time and so quickly. Ive even made it with 10-10-10 proportions with great success. And here I was, I'd always thought making a white sauce took forever because it always seemed to when I helped mum make it growing up. Funny how things seem different when you actually do then for yourself!

Anyway, since then lasagne isn't such a scary meal and actually is very easy! PS my mum's secret ingredient is salami - what's yours?

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 8 - fish and chips

Not much colour to this meal I'm afraid! But eh, we're on holidays so I'll let it slide this once. Beautiful grilled barramundi though.

It's pretty hard to stick to good fresh food when you're on holiday if you don't have your own kitchen. I find myself ordering salads for lunch if we eat out to compensate for the dinners like tonight's. you'll be happy to know that we've penned in a trip to the local farmer's markets tomorrow so some goodies to find there. Tomorrow night's dinner is all planned but maybe Sunday's? Stay tuned to find out!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 7 - leftovers

The first time I've forgotten to take a photo of my dinner tonight and lucky it was just leftovers from last night's minestrone. So for a photo just take a look at Dinner 6, the only difference was the bowl!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 6 - minestrone

This dinner has been almost 24 hours in the making! Because I had to work today I browned the vegies and meat last night and put them in the slow cooker on low overnight and all day today. When I got home I simply added some potato and sweet potato and the pasta and cooked for another 30 minutes on high. Et voila!

I've never made this minestrone recipe and have my brother-in-law to thank for it. Austin devoured it and I have to admit I did too!

With winter here right now it was high time I got out my slow cooker. I also need to hunt down all my slow cooker favourites. I'd love to hear from you - do you have a slow cooker and what do you cook in it?

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Day 5 - lamb sausages and roasted vegies

Better late than never...here is last night's dinner and tonight's is already cooking away!

A little while back we started ordering lamb from a farm in Wellington called Nanima Lamb Farm. I liked the idea straight away both because of the ease of ordering online and also because of the fact that the lambs are fed local grasses and saltbush and are free range. Happy lambs!

I never used to buy lamb much mainly because I had no idea which cuts to buy or how to cook it nicely, other than stews or meatballs! With Nanima you buy a half a lamb, which they divide into sections where you can choose between different cuts. The farmer himself makes the deliveries every few weeks to the Sydney and Blue Mountains areas. There are even recipes on the website for dinner ideas! A whole side of lamb might seem like a lot of meat, especially if you don't have a lot of freezer space but I know people who have shared orders with friends to reduce the cost and make the amount of meat more managable.

What did you have for dinner tonight (last night!)?

I have to add another picture here. Austin asked me to take a picture of his dinner, since he's been seeing me taking pictures every night of my dinner so I guess he felt a little left out!

Dinner 4 - pasta and salad

An easy dinner after work! Fresh ravioli (bought, not me-made-fresh!) with bacon, mushrooms and cream with a salad of lettuce, avocado, snow peas (they were cheap today!), cucumber and capsicum drizzled with a garlic vinaigrette sauce. Yum!

I have to say, I've noticed since starting this blog that I'm much more aware of what I'm cooking. I think more about what we're eating and try and include more variety into each meal. It's even got me thinking about my lunches and how they fit into the whole day picture!

Let me know about your dinners, I'd love to hear if you've made changes to the way you think about your dinners too!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 3 - baby spinach, avocado and walnut salad with caramelisedbalsamic vinegar

Well, after a massive Mexican dinner last night, a big bacon and eggs this morning and a long long birthday lunch today (from 2-5pm non-stop eating!), tonight I obviously didn't feel like a big dinner. My husband passed on eating anything and we gave Austin a boiled egg on toast and a yoghurt for his dinner (he didn't spend 3 hours at the table eating today!). I didn't really feel like eating either but felt obliged to have something just to take a picture of it for today's dinner post! So here it is, just the same salad we had the other night but with balsamic vinegar instead of lemon juice (because I didn't have any left!).

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 2 - pulled pork burritos

Ok, so I've contradicted myself within a few posts! Yes, we went out for dinner tonight but it was for a good cause, my sister's birthday. And without the kids so a wild night in store. Lucky this isn't 30 Dinner Drinks! Happy Strawberry Margaritas!!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Dinner 1 - pizza and salad

Here is my first 30 Dinners dinner, homemade pizza leftovers with a baby spinach, avocado and walnut salad.

I love making homemade pizza. We make the dough in a bread maker and then cook them on a pizza stone either in the oven or, my husband's specialty, in the BBQ! My 3yo helps with the toppings, which lately have been ham and pineapple and pepperoni, mushroom and olives. The leftovers are always the best!

What did you have for dinner tonight?

Planning

So I'm all set to start photographing from tomorrow and I'm planning leftover homemade pizza for dinner! Not a good start. Although, I did look up recipes for salads using spinach leaves (in the fridge and thought I should have something healthy at least!) and found a great one with avocado and walnuts so we'll see if that eventuates. Watch this space for photographic proof!

Your challenge is...

You've heard of a food diary, right?  Well, this is kind of that but in pictures, like a photo blog. Every night take a picture of your dinner and post it on your blog, facebook, instagram, pinterest or wherever you like. At the end of thirty days, I challenge you to have a look at what you eat for dinner over a month and see if there is anything you can change to make your evening eating habits healthier or more interesting.

I should mention that this is my first time doing this kind of challenge too so I'll be very interested to see what I come up with in the end.  I try to use fresh fruit and vegetables whenever I can and, because I love cooking meals from scratch, I tend to shy away from frozen dinners or takeaway. Of course, I love eating out but with a 3 year old boy running around, my husband and I don't get out as often as we'd like.

I also believe that eating healthy shouldn't have to mean cutting out all the good stuff and eating boring meat and three veg every night, but rather balancing your meals and, because we all know that variety is the spice of life, varying the ingredients we use for our meals through the week.

So, join me in the 30 Dinners challenge and let's see if we can't make a difference to the way we think about eating!