In and among the other things I am doing, I have been thinking about dinners almost nonstop. Where an endless list of options should be is a blank space. My brain simply refuses to volunteer any ideas, except on the occasion when it brings to mind the dinner I ate last night. (Frozen pizza is what I ate for dinner last night.)
Dinner is The Worst.
Okay, okay, enough complaining. To be clear, I am in the mood for some fall food. But my current schedule has made it impossible to plan ahead enough to prepare the things that sound good. Like my favorite fall salad, for instance. It seems dumb to buy the ingredients for a salad that will inevitably wilt into unspeakable liquid in my fridge, please do not ask me how I have so readily come up with that image.
What I should be doing is making something in the slow cooker every night. It just feels like I’ve exhausted all my best slow cooker options, though. In the past few weeks, I’ve made chipotle chicken tortilla soup, white chicken chili, balsamic pork, and boeuf bourguignon (which Carla requested! and ate!!!!! and then ate leftovers!!!!!!!!!!!!). All were delicious, all produced copious leftovers.
I need QUICK – like, “can be prepped and ready in 30 minutes max” – and I need EASY – like, “sits in a slow cooker all day and can be scooped onto plates” or “can be plopped onto a sheet pan and shoved in the oven” and I need NOT TACOS because otherwise my husband might excommunicate me.
Let’s see what we can come up with.
DINNERS FOR THE WEEK OF SEPTEMBER 29
- One Pot Lemon, Basil, Corn & Ricotta Pasta: I don’t know why I’m even listing this here. It sounds delicious, is why. But I already have a robust cons list before I’ve even put a single item in my grocery cart: 1. This is NOT a fall meal. Corn and basil are SUMMER foods. However… I do have a very happy and productive basil plant on my porch, and I think my grocery store still has fresh corn in abundance. So maybe it IS a fall meal. 2. There is no meat in this dinner, which means I have to figure out how to add it in. Probably I’ll turn to a convenience protein, like pre-shredded chicken or a ready-made chicken breast from the prepared foods section. I don’t WANT chicken though, but I guess I could make salmon for myself and Carla. 3. I planned to make this earlier this summer, bought all the ingredients, never made it, and ended up wasting the ricotta. (I do think I made use of the corn and basil.) 4. The recipe was on a list of “easy” dinners, and Teighan claims this dinner is ready in just 30 minutes, but… do I believe that??? 5. Corn silk, all over my kitchen.
- Chili Honey Chicken & Sweet Potatoes: We haven’t had this in a while. The sweet potatoes make it feel slightly fall-escent. It’s a sheet pan meal, so it meets the “can be plopped onto a sheet pan and shoved into the oven” criterion. But… it does take some prep work. Plus, the cilantro yogurt sauce – which is the star of the show – feels like it requires too much energy. But… maybe I could prep the chicken and potatoes the night before? And do the cilantro yogurt while everything is cooking? This dish IS delicious.
- Sheet Pan Veggie Shawarma: If I also make this dish, I can have the cilantro yogurt sauce from the previous recipe do double duty. (I prefer it to the tahini sauce listed in the shawarma recipe.) The big downside to this recipe is all the chopping of veggies. Also, I will need some sort of protein for my husband. Maybe a rotisserie chicken could give him one breast for the corn and basil pasta and a second breast for the shawarma? That means I need to make the pasta on Night 3, though, and probably make a stop for the rotisserie chicken on Night 2.
- Cold Noodle Salad with Spicy Peanut Sauce: We haven’t had this in a long while, and it just sounds yummy to me right now. It does not meet two-thirds of my afore-mentioned criteria, though. But it would produce leftovers, which is a plus. I don’t know. This might be a reach.
This is A Very Optimistic List. There’s no way I’m making all of these. Is there a chance that I will make any of them? Or will my husband and I continue to do the thing where one of us asks what’s for dinner and the other says I don’t know and then I end up listing the extremely unappealing contents of our fridge/freezer/pantry? Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion!
I have defaulted to mostly ingredients. We usually have some chicken breasts already baked or grilled in the fridge, along with ground beef and ground turkey– usually seasoned in taco-y or Italian-ish ways. I always have a variett of veggies that can be steamed in the bag, and I make either baked sweet potatoes or baked potatoes in bulk for easy reheating, plus I stock a variety of frozen rice options. People can just assemble what they want (add chicken to salad and throw it in a tortilla! Put ground beef in a baked potato! Make a breakfast taco with some eggs. Cook your favorite pasta and have some meat and a quick cheese and butter sauce).
I am eagerly waiting to find out if you make the dinners or not! They sound amazing. The memes made me laugh. You’re in a pretty busy season right now, so pizza may be the perfect option!
Listen, you have my permission to alternate between frozen pizza, tacos, and ham sandwiches for the rest of Carla’s school career…and maybe even beyond! This is a time for low standards!
With that said, I am always here for cold peanut noodles. Yum!
I feel seen in this post. I see you Suzanne. I looked at the honey chilli chicken and sweet potato recipe that has prep time listed at 15 mins. It would take me that long to slice the sweet potatoes so I think the recipes also lie about prep time. Or I’m incredibly slow. Maybe both.
Have you ever tried prepping dinner right after breakfast? When I was in the throes of early parenthood and was dealing with the witching hour every night, I would often make/prep dinner very early in the day when I still had energy. Then I just had to do the cooking / assembling at night, which was way easier. Now I end up doing a lot of prep on Sunday, but if we have a busy night, sometimes I do it before work. We also eat a lot of pasta with jarred sauce and convenience foods and takeout too – having teenagers makes for busy nights and having to be flexible. It’s just a season of life. Your menu sounds great though!
I laughed when you mentioned your husband’s attitude about tacos because that’s what I would have suggested. 🙂 They’re so customizable. You make amazing meals! I’m always very impressed with your creativity and the wonderful combination of ingredients you use. A fancy meal for me is homemade chili and cornbread. I love it in the fall!
Oooh I am making your fall salad TONIGHT. I’m using one of my many butternut squashes, although peeling those are a bitch. I just looked it up and the internet tells me if I microwave it for three minutes, then it will be easier to peel. But…will it cook the squash? I don’t want actual microwaved squash. I mean, I could try this. It’s worth a try. What’s the worst that could happen? I guess the squash could explode.
All of those meals sound good. Oh! I heard an interview with Caroline Chambers who has a new cookbook called “What to cook when you don’t feel like cooking – cook it fast” (that is the actual title) and supposedly every recipe is truly 30 minutes or less, not cookbook “30 minutes or less” which has like two hours of prep. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but it sounds like it would fit into your life nicely!
Hahahaha… “My great work is defeated by dinner.” That really sums it up! I’ve pretty much given up, but yesterday I did make a huge pot of chili, which should last for at least two meals.
I love your new blog! And I’m excited that you’ll be participating in NaBloPoMo!!!!! You could do a weekly dinner review- what you planned to cook, and what actually ended up happening. We want all the gory details!!!
I love the Shirley Jackson quote. I’ve read a couple of her memoirs and they’re almost as good as her fiction.
I am having an exciting week, cooking-wise. I traded cooking nights with Noah because he had to work late over the weekend, so he’s taking one of my nights this week and Beth’s home from Wheeling and cooking twice a week and that means I last cooked on Monday and won’t have to cook again until Saturday. Woo hoo!
Meanwhile, I am eyeing the basil in the garden and wondering how to use it up before it gets too cold outside. I recently made pesto, but I might just do it again.
What? Corn is harvested in August and September here, so I think it’s seasonal. YOU DO YOU!