On Sundays I like to share with you, my sweet readers, my Meals of the Week. That is everything delicious I have enjoyed as my main meals over the past seven days, plus any pertaining recipes and suggestions for delicious sides.
I do normally eat at my sister's on Sundays for Sunday Dinner with the family every second Sunday and most Wednesday nights I go out to eat at a local diner with my father and his friend Hazel. I always provide "like" recipes as a substitution for those days. My daughter Eileen is always here with me at the weekends and she also joins us now on Wednesday nights.
As a person who lives on their own I try to always cook for myself rather than submit to the temptation of heating up ready meals or frozen dinners. I know that cooking for yourself can often seem like a lot of work when you have nobody to feed but yourself, but I think it is worth the trade-off in eating healthier meals.
Ready meals and frozen dinners are loaded with fat, sugar and salt, and they are never even half as tasty as the photographs on their covers would lead us to believe! The are more often than not BORING, and cost a lot of money as well. I would rather cook myself a meal and then freeze the extra for another time if it is a full sized meal. Mostly these days, however, I am cooking downsized meals for just one or two people. There is less waste that way.
All of my recipes can be either multiplied to feed more, or downsized to feed less. Just ask me how if you are needing any help with that!
I try for the most part to keep my meals fairly healthy and economical as well. I live on a small pension plus what I can earn on this page, so I need to watch my pennies. I do eat a lot of chicken however. Red meat is not something I eat very often, unless I am eating out or have company. I try to have fish at least once a week, or eggs if I can. It is a challenge to get in all the fruits and vegetables that we are recommended to eat.
When I was raising my children we always had at least two vegetables on the side every day with our supper. That is much harder I find when it is just me, so usually I will keep baby carrots and cucumber sticks, celery, in the fridge to eat just raw as a snack, so I am not binging on cookies and things that I shouldn't be eating!
And so without any further blah blah blah, here are my meals of the week for the past seven days! I hope you are inspired by them and will want to cook at least some of them for yourself!
SUNDAY, September 13th - Caramelized Onion Pot Roast
Every second Sunday we have a family dinner at my sisters. This was the week to have dinner at home and so I did Eileen and I a pot roast, but not just any Pot Roast. My recipe for Caramelized Onion Pot Roast. I used to make this with a rolled Brisket but that cut is not really available here. It is not by any means necessary. You can use any pot roast cut of beef.
Caramelized onions make for a delicious gravy to be served with tender slices of the meat. This does cook in the slow cooker, which makes it perfect for an easy Sunday dinner where you can just pop everything into the crock pot and walk away, hands free to do other things or get on with the making of any side dishes you may enjoy along with your beef. I popped this into the crock pot before I left for church in the morning. We enjoyed this along with some fluffy mashed potatoes, mashed turnips/swede, peas/carrots and of course gravy from the roast. Nobody was complaining.
MONDAY, September 14th - One Pan Chicken & Broccoli Alfredo
On Monday I had something that I had not made in a while, not since last September anyways. I got a good deal on some broccoli and I had some chicken in the freezer and so I threw together One Pan Chicken & Broccoli Alfredo Pasta. I am a huge pan of one pan suppers. Suppers where you can cook everything all in the same pan without having to cook things separately! This is one such dish. This dish is incredibly easy to make and oh so tasty!
Everything gets stirred together in the one pan, with the broccoli being added just a little bit before it is done so that it doesn't overcook. Chicken breasts, garlic seasoning, penne pasta, cream, stock, parmesan cheese and the broccoli of course. This is what I call a winner/winner chicken dinner! I like to serve a crusty bread on the side and a salad. These days I tend to use either the Smart Pasta, which has extra fiber added, or one with added protein.
TUESDAY, September 15th - A Traditional Cottage Pie
I had sent some of the roast beef home with my daughter but I kept enough back so that I could make myself a really small batch cottage pie. This Traditional Cottage Pie is a favorite. The original recipe is to feed two, but I cut it in half yet again to make only one serving.
A rich savory base of beef is simmered with onions, carrots, celery and swede to create a deeply flavourful gravy enriched with tomato paste, beef stock and a splash of brown sauce for extra depth. Once the hearty filling is nestled into the dish I scatter some frozen peas over top and cover it with a thatch of rich and creamy mashed potatoes. Every forkful delivers comfort. Rich meaty warmth beneath, crisp potato peaks above.
All you need on the side of this is a salad, and for the heartier eater perhaps a scrap of crusty bread to mop up all that gravy.
WEDNESDAY, September 16th - Family Dinner out
My father likes to go out for dinner on Wednesday nights. He's been doing it for years. He meets his friend Hazel at a local eatery. My sister, Eileen and I usually join them. The food is hit and miss but we go there for the company, not the food.
This week everyone but Eileen had the one piece fish and chips. Eileen had the burger special. The GamGam burger which is a double burger with cheese, bacon, onion rings and BBQ sauce. My fish and chips were terrible. The batter was too thick and doughy. I was really disappointed. Eileen really enjoyed her burger which came with fries and a fountain drink. (She chose iced tea.)
In its place I am sharing my recipe for the Smash Burger. Two portions of ground beef, smashed and grilled to perfection with plenty of cheese in the center on a toasted bun with your favorite condiments. This is truly delicious. Eileen would approve.
THURSDAY, September 17th - Crunchy Hot Honey Chicken Cutlets
Tender juicy pieces of chicken breast, coated in a light panko bread crumb and fried to perfection. Ready to serve cut on the angle and drizzled with that Hot Honey sauce. Oh boy, but this was some good. Make sure you serve extra sauce on the side for dipping.
I made a tomato mac and cheese with this and cooked some runner beans. The beans went really well, but the mac and cheese was a bit over the top. If I did it again I would have served it with rice, noodles or potatoes, not the mac and cheese.
FRIDAY, September 18th - Bread & Cheese Omelet
I had spent half the day out shopping with my sister and taking our father to the mall with his friend Maryann. It's getting more and more difficult to take him places as his mobility decreases. God bless my sister for all that she does. She is no spring chicken herself!!
Anyways, I was pretty beat by the time I got home. Simple and quick was just the ticket for me. I made myself a Bread and Cheese Omelet. This was simple and just hearty enough to be filling without needing anything else. A salad would go very nicely. I had some sliced tomatoes on the side that needed eating up.
Eggs for supper are always a great option. They are not that expensive. They are nutritious and they are very adaptable to a huge variety of ways of cooking them. I only ever very rarely will have eggs for breakfast, but eggs for supper? That is a most welcome supper for me! Quick, easy and delicious.
SATURDAY, September 19th - Curried Chicken & Coconut Rice Casserole
Traditionally Saturday nights in the U.K. were a night where a lot of people would treat themselves to a nice takeaway, a curry, a Kebab, something like that. There are no curry shops where I live now so I have to make my own. One of my favorites is this delicious Curried Chicken & Coconut Rice Casserole.
A fabulously different and delicious rice and chicken casserole with an East Indian Flair! An all in one dish that is built for two, but can easily be multiplied to served more! I love that it is not overly spicy and is filled with plenty of flavor, color and texture. I like to serve it with a yogurt drizzle over top and garnished with chopped spring onions and toasted flaked almonds. This is quite simply incredibly delicious! I love meals like this! Eileen was here for her Saturday night sleepover and she also really enjoyed it. Yay!
And those were my meals of the week for this week. I think I ate rather well and kept everything well within budget! If you have any questions or suggestions just leave a comment below!
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