Well, I am playing a rousing game of Is It Covid? from home with my child, who had a fever and the sniffles and droopy/whiny child-illness-malaise yesterday! Yay! I am hoping to get her in to see her doctor today for a Covid test (or that we can do a drive-thru test at Walgreens, except in that case I will have to do the swabbing and I am not looking forward to that!)) so that we can… get her back to school? I have no idea what the rules are these days. Last year when she had the sniffles (once ALL YEAR which is a miracle; masks work y’all), she was out of school for four days. I am really REALLY hoping that she will be able to return to school by Thursday so she can participate in her much-anticipated Halloween parade. But please, at least let her be well enough to trick-or-treat next Sunday.
We are obviously hoping it is Just a Cold, for so many many reasons. (For instance, my husband has a rare day off which corresponds with a not-as-rare day off for Carla, so we have plans to go see a special art exhibit in town.) But the BIG one is that my in-laws are scheduled to arrive tomorrow, and my mother-in-law begins radiation therapy this week which I am assuming will suppress her immune system. Obviously they will stay at a hotel if Carla has Covid, and obviously we will all stay far, far away from them, but sheesh. What timing, amirite?
So I am distracting myself by planning meals for the week! Meals that I cannot shop for until Carla is cleared for Covid! Meals that I may never get to serve to more than myself and my husband! Woo! Covid-Era Living is fun fun fun all the time, isn’t it?
Dinners for the Week of October 25-31 (maybe, if we’re lucky)
- Soy-Ginger Pulled Pork with Tangy Slaw: I love this meal, plus it’s easy peasy, plus I don’t think I’ve ever served it to my in-laws before (and they are surely growing weary of BBQ pulled pork and various types of tacos). The last time I made this for my husband, I made homemade bao buns which were… denser than they should be. But it seems that Asian grocery stores carry frozen bao buns, so I plan to go to my local Asian grocery and see what I can find. Once I am not potentially contagious, obviously.
- Oven-Baked Chicken Fajitas with Cilantro Lime Rice and Black Beans: These are only taco-adjacent. Plus they are easy, plus they are yummy.
- Red Wine Braised Short Ribs: For some reason, I have had short ribs on the brain. I bought some short ribs at Costco already, so those are taken care of. Now I just need to figure out what to serve these with. I have only ever eaten them with polenta, but have never made polenta. And probably I will need to make a simple salad, too, to have on the side.
- Roasted Pork Tenderloin with Fall Veggies: I looked back in my “dinners this week” emails to myself, which is how I used to keep track of meals and my notes on how they turned out. Apparently we used to eat this all the time and it was good??? Time to test out the veracity of my notes!
Follow Up: This was, indeed, delicious. The “marinade” might be better if used as an actual marinade; next time, I may let the pork sit in it for a few hours beforehand. Also, the veggies I did this time were carrots, parsnips, sweet potatoes, and radishes. The sweet potatoes were the best, the parsnips were acceptable (and my husband loves them) and I didn’t eat the carrots because I already know I don’t care for carrots. But the radishes were DISGUSTING. No thank you, do not make again.
- Salmon and Fennel One-Pot Wonder: Alison recommended this one to me (thanks, Alison!) and it sounds like the perfect thing to make for my in-laws!
Follow Up: I made this with the “alternate” option of using leeks instead of fennel. (I only noticed that leeks were an option AFTER I had purchased a bulb of fennel, which I kept around for awhile until finally throwing it away.) It was DELICIOUS. I would 100% do this again. My husband doesn’t even like salmon and he liked this dish. It was very easy and semi-fancy enough for guests. I will definitely make this again YUM.
- Chicken with Mushroom Gravy: And a side of steamed broccoli. This is another meal that I found in my old emails. “GOOD. MAKE AGAIN.” say my notes. This is the moment.
Takeout for the other nights. And, who am I kidding, probably these will bleed over into next week, too. I can muster only so much momentum for cooking.
Should I be planning something special for Halloween? I’m having trouble thinking of anything fun, since Carla doesn’t eat anything. (She did not even eat the ADORABLE hot dog mummies I made last year.) Plus, the weather is likely going to be cool and rainy, and we will be pre-occupied with trick-or-treating. Probably I will just do one of the crockpot recipes and call it a day. Who knows. Maybe if Carla is all better and back in school, I will feel a surge of energy for planning some sort of baking project, at least.
Do you normally make something fun and Halloweeny for Halloween? Are you handing out candy this year? If you know trick-or-treating-age children, are they planning to trick-or-treat? Carla didn’t do it last year; I swear we set out candy for people to take, but my husband doesn’t remember doing so and is Firmly Against It this year (although he is okay with taking a masked [Covid free only, obviously] Carla this year). (This means that we have ZERO Halloween candy in the house.) (I am not counting the remaining bag of candy corn; we have had a bag already, plus two bags of the Brach’s pumpkins. But we have had no miniature Snickers bars or fun size Milky Way Midnight bars and that is tragic.)
I am curious what you do normally/are planning to do for Halloween this year. And also how Halloween will coordinate with football, since both are on Sunday.
Oh, fingers crossed it’s just a cold! How long does it take for the test results to come back? Crossing fingers, toes, everything.
I don’t make anything special for Halloween, unless you include Halloween themed sugar cookies. I’ll probably make a really simple meal. We had a lot of trick or treaters last year – for us, anyway, like 25 kids – and I handed out candy with tongs and a mask on. My kids are too old to trick or treat but they have eaten almost an entire box of chocolate bars my parents gave them in lieu of trick or treating, a couple of weeks ago.
Ack, keep us updated! xo
Noooo! We played that “is it covid” game this week, too (Alex). It sucks. We got a home test kit and it came out negative, which is a good thing because we had a lot of stuff to do! GAH. I hate it. Can’t we just have a cold anymore, and take DayQuil and get on with it?? NO, we can’t.
Hope Carla feels better soon and gets a negative!
I am not the biggest fan of Halloween, but I did buy some Reese’s and Skittles snack-size yesterday. Today I need to get out my Halloween decorations (soooo late) and buy pumpkins and maybe let the kids carve them. Alex says he won’t have time. I think Kate is going to someone else’s house to trick or treat, which is FINE BY ME.
I don’t make special Halloween food, but I buy vast quantities of candy. We are planning to hand out candy if any trick-or-treaters come to our door, but that is a fairly safe decision because we have been here for two Halloweens and have had zero trick-or-treaters. My own kids are too old to trick-or-treat, so we will stay in, and Paul will watch Simpsons Halloween specials with them, and we will feast on the giant bowls of fun-size candy.
Absolutely sending “only a cold, not Covid!” vibes to Carla (and all of you!) Goodness gracious, what timing.
I absolutely LOVE Halloween. My town, which I moved to in 2017, does one whole hour for trick or treat (!) but my street seems to be super popular because in one hour, I hand out over 500 treats. It is insane! The first two years I was here, I had to turn off the light after 30 minutes and hide because I ran out of candy, lol. Anyway, I have 400 pieces of candy this year (I used to only hand out snack size but now at least half are minis, because it is expensive otherwise). If I run out, I shall once again turn off the light and hide.
When my kids (now 27 and 31) were little, we were busy trick or treating so I didn’t make fun food. What I did was create a gruesome menu that I set out for them at breakfast. I named all our regular food in totally gross ways, and they had the day to try to figure out what was for dinner. (Green beans = gnarled witch’s fingers, spaghetti w/sauce was bloody intestines, stuff like that.) It was fun to come up with the gross names, I didn’t have to make the food look any different, and I had fun with my Halloween fonts while I made the menus. The kids still talk about it to this day, so I guess it was a hit as far as fun memories go!
Wishing your MIL the best and a week of dinner successes for you!
I’m sending “not covid, not covid” vibes your way! Being at all sick these days is so weird, isn’t it?
I hope it’s just a cold.
We go to the same farm stand for pumpkins every year and we did that on Saturday. Yesterday we carved our jack-o-lanterns and watched It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Neither of the kids ever seems to outgrow that.
North will go to school in costume on Friday (and planning to get up at 5 a.m. to do their makeup), participate in our town’s parade and costume contest on Saturday, and go trick-or-treating on Sunday.
We have candy or trick or treaters in the house. I am planning to conduct some scientific experiments on how one piece of various kinds affects my blood sugar. Hey, it’s science.
I always make goulash for Halloween. We say it Ghoul-lash, leaning heavy on the ghoul. I use Bobby’s Goulash Recipe from Paula Deen. It is the best and it seems to gets better the longer it sits…so I make it in the late afternoon so it is ready to eat before or after the various activities we have on Halloween.
I just hand out covid tests at my house all the time now. Matt and I pick them up whenever we see one, like someone might have gotten a gallon of milk in the beforetimes. I gave one to Alex last night in fact. She was sniffling and is it allergies? Or a deadly pandemic? Could be either!
I don’t make any special food for dinner on Halloween because I have A) tried that and B) they are all too excited to eat. Maybe I’ll make boxed mac cheese this year. At least they’ll probably eat a few bites of that.
I also think I am not going to hand out candy this year because we live at the end of a long street with construction on the front of it and I doubt anyone will come down here. Maybe next year once we are rid of the construction.
I laughed at taco-adjacent. I might have to give that recipe a try as I like tacos and all things taco-adjacent sound good. We tailgated at Ed’s college Saturday. We are still eating leftover pulled pork and chicken tacos from last week. I’m hoping Coach might grill pork tenderloins one night. Coach and I go out of town on Friday for just one night, so I’m thinking the chili leftovers from the tailgate will be perfect for our one night away. If I can keep everyone from digging into it before then.
So hoping it is just a cold. I feel like that is undoubtedly what it is.
I do not make Halloween themed food. Back in the day of costume wearing little guys, I made costumes and was practically collapsed on the floor on Halloween night.
Sending good thoughts – “It’s NOT COVID!” your way.
When Man-Child was small, the Halloween (especially if it fell during the week) meal was a no brainer (like hot dogs, etc.) because he was too keyed up and ready to head out for trick or treating.
I will have some candy (but not too much) to hand out. Based on the past few years we’ve lived here, we get very few trick or treaters – maybe only the kids on this street. We are in the back of our neighborhood and it seems the kids never make it all the way back here.
My sympathies, that game is terrible and no fun in any way. Fingers crossed that it is just a cold.
We will not be home for Halloween, we will be visiting family and having an early Thanksgiving meal. Because nothing says festive family holidays like TWO holidays that involve eating too much celebrated the same weekend. I think we might get a bag of candy and leave it in a plastic bowl on the front porch and ask the neighbor to point trick or treaters in the bowl’s direction.
I just started a new job last week and I am working from home, so leftovers are the next day’s lunch, which is awesome and easy and cheap but increases the pressure to Actually Make Dinner since TWO meals require effort now. I am drowning in peppers from the CSA box, so things that involve peppers seems like a good plan. Maybe fajitas? I also have two cauliflowers that need to be used up.