Ugh! Do you hate this question? Do you know the answer to this question? I’ve written about the coming home dinner predicament before, but this is new. I’m sick of everything I make.
I don’t eat red meat or pork so that limits my meal preparation somewhat. And I am SICK to death of chicken. I do cook beef or pork periodically for my family – last week was a pork tenderloin and once a month I make a pot roast in the crockpot with potatoes and carrots. It’s just sort of a bummer to make a meal that you can’t eat.
I need some help. What do you love to cook and how do you cook it? What’s relatively easy? I was doing crockpot meals every Sunday or Monday but I’m tired of even those…. We do grill. I like the flavor of grilled foods – we grill corn on the cob, chicken breasts, ka-bobs, or fish/shrimp, but it’s super hot in August and I don’t want to have to turn on the grill constantly (or have Bray do it, I can’t get the durn thing to work).
I like my mom’s turkey meatloaf really well and I make a delicious Chicken Tetrazzini but that is so time intensive. Plus, we try to eat healthy so we have veggies at every meal, nothing is fried, and nothing has creams/cream sauce. I will cook with butter or olive oil. I pull from allrecipes, Food Network, Pinterest, and my cookbooks for ideas, but do you ever just feel BORED of everything??? I am confident that some of you readers have some genius ideas that will spice up my poor dinner preparations. Two nights ago I made the kids peanut butter sandwiches because I literally could not dream anything up.
So, I will leave a couple of recipes that I make here and BEG you to leave me a favorite recipe from your family that I can manage after getting home from work at night.
Roasted veggies – I cut up brocoli, cauliflower, and/or zucchini and drizzle it with garlic salt, olive oil, and parmesan and bake it at 425 for about 25 minutes. I will serve this with a roasted chicken I picked up from the store and sometimes brown rice.
Turkey meatloaf – I mix up ground turkey, diced onions, one egg, a handful of crushed crackers, small chopped carrots, salt and pepper, and a little ketchup and milk. Then I make two round loaves and top them with barbecue sauce and cook at 350 for what I think is about 45 minutes, until they are no longer pink inside. I serve this with mashed potatoes (very basic ones but I add sour cream to the mashing) and green beans.
Grilled corn and chicken – I wrap packets of three corn on the cob in foil after rubbing with butter and lemon pepper and put on the top grill rack. Then I marinate chicken breasts in lime, olive oil, garlic, and salt and pepper (or lemon pepper) – sometimes I add diced onions to the mix or even a splash of white wine or balsamic. I don’t measure but I use a lot of lime. I serve this as our dinner standing alone or with some homemade guacamole and chips – for that I just do what I think everyone does, mash avocado, dice tomatoes, mince garlic and fresh cilantro and onions, squeeze a couple of limes again and add salt and pepper. No store bought guacamole compares to the stuff you make at home.
Your turn – HELP!
Love your column. Empty nester. Breakfast for supper, once a week. We still love it.
Gena – I have such happy memories growing up of doing breakfast for dinner, maybe it will be French Toast and eggs tonight (I can cook some breakfast!).
We do turkey burgers fairly often and turkey joe’s- (ground turkey with some cut up veggies-celery, tiny carrot pieces, onion and 1c. BBQ sauce). I also have an excellent recipe for Chicken Rollatini-it has ricotta cheese and shredded zucchini in it. We also do breakfast for dinner because my daughter will eat eggs and I can make egg whites. We struggle to find quick healthy meals because bedtime is 7:30. When you get home at 5:30ish, it doesn’t leave much time. Can’t imagine doing meals without using beef. I’ll look through some of my cook books and see if I can find anything.
Oh thanks Callie. I love the idea of Chicken Rollatini – would love that recipe. We do turkey burgers, I put spinach and feta in mine, but the turkey joe’s is a good twist!
I am in the same EXACT RUT! I took a leap of faith & subscribed to “No More To Go” (which I got a 50% discount on Mamabargains.com, so it was not an expensive risk). She has some interesting ideas, but time intensive, and meals that my preschoolers do not have a pallet for. Things like Baked Ziti, Ancho Chili Steak, Cajun Alfredo, Poblano Chicken Enchiladas, … you get the idea. I have started an excel spreadsheet with 4 weeks of dinner time meals to rotate. It was great for the first month, but I am bored. Here are a few meals that we do well with at all ages:
-Pan seared Talapia (seasoned to your taste) w/ chopped pineapple or chopped mango as a relish (topper) served with 1 butter tortilla heated up on a cast iron flat skillet & quartered.
-Oven BBQ Chicken: Chicken legs skinned & roasted in the oven at 350 degrees. After the chicken is cooked poor your favorite BBQ sauce over the legs, and cook an additional 5 – 10 minutes. Pair with your favorite sides (green beans, corn on the cob, watermelon).
-Garlic Rotini Pasta with broccoli (you can do this meatless, or add a pan seared breaded pork/veal cutlet or chicken cutlet for your meat eaters). Use 1/2 of a Box of Barilla Rotini Pasta cooked al dente. Drain the pasta. In the same pot you cooked the pasta, saute’ 1 teaspoon of minced garlic in 1 Tbsp of EVOO until slightly golden. Toss pasta back into the pot, and toss the pasta in the Garlic & Oil. Salt to taste. Add as much steamed broccoli (or other veggies prepped to your liking). You can use more EVOO & garlic to your taste.
Oh yummy!! Thanks – I needed that – sympathizing and practical tips!!!
Here is the link to the Skinny Taste website where we got our recipe. We LOVE her recipes!!!
http://www.skinnytaste.com/2011/08/chicken-rollatini-stuffed-with-zucchini.html
Awesome – thank you Callie for the link!!!
I second the Skinnytaste recommendation!! All of her recipes are so good!
One of our standby recipes is busy day pork-chops. I also make this recipe all the time with chicken breasts and its great! It seems so simple but what you get is delicious! I usually serve this with a pack of heated frozen veggies and 10 minute uncle ben’s rice on busy nights. Here’s the recipe if you are interested: http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/busy-day-pork-chops
Have you thought about cooking vegetarian some nights since you are tired of chicken? I have started cooking vegetarian some nights of the week because we are on a tight budget and I love it! Here’s a couple recipes that have become favorites.
Roasted veggie burritos: http://www.budgetbytes.com/2012/09/roasted-vegetable-burritos/
Spaghetti squash lasagna: http://www.skinnytaste.com/2011/09/spaghetti-squash-lasagna.html
Fiesta lime rice – This recipe is versatile. We often add grilled chicken on top, avocado slices etc: http://www.skinnytaste.com/2011/04/fiesta-lime-rice.html
Oh I LOVE these Jackie! What great ideas. And yes I do sometimes cook vegetarian. I don’t do it often b/c my husband doesn’t want me to “make our kids vegetarians” as a hunter 🙂 But I do with black beans sometimes, but I love that burrito and lasagne idea!
Too funny about not turning your kids into vegetarians, but I understand your husband’s thought process!
I was originally skeptical with the spaghetti squash lasagna but you really can’t tell that there is no pasta noodles in the dish. It was delicious!
I love salmon – mix Lawry’s teriyaki and lemon pepper sauces and marinate the salmon and there you go. A touch of honey and pepper on salmon is another great combo. Also try black beans – black beans with peppers and pineapples over rice or even in quesadillas – easy, quick, and somewhat healthy…
Anita – I love the salmon idea, why am I not doing that?!? Now to figure out where to pick it up fresh!