Crunchy Turkey Kimchi. I didn’t use pork, but lean ground turkey instead and we had broccoli raab as a side dish. I meant to serve this on whole wheat buns, but then last minute realized we we’re out, so we did brown rice. We’re totally due for a Trader Joe’s run. The girls devoured this dish. They loved it and out ate Ben and me. These girls of ours are tiny, but boy can they eat! When I make a recipe, I seriously quadruple it to feed everyone in our house, and even with that sometimes we still don’t have leftovers (or run out).

Grilled Chicken Banh Mi. I used this recipe to make the marinade for the chicken, but minus the lemongrass, and I use this recipe for the picked daikon and carrots. The pickled veggies came out yummy, but man oh man was it stinky when I was making the marinade for it. I used chicken breast for the meat and low fat mayo and that sandwich was yum-o. Ben says it was better than the ones we get at Mr. Lee’s. I thought it was good, but not sure if it was better than Mr. Lee’s, but I think the healthy factor made it that much more appealing to him. I would consider making a whole wheat bread to go with it, but I think it just tastes so darn good on a good ‘ole French baguette. I think I want to try this recipe that Robyn suggested next time.

Week 4/1 – 4/5
Monday: Spring Minestrone with Chicken Meatballs (thanks for the suggestion Steph!)
Tuesday: Dumplings
Wednesday: Leftovers
Thursday: Pork Meatball Banh Mi (will probably use turkey)
Friday: Pizza night

What’s on your meal plan for next week? I need some ideas!

Spring Rolls with Spicy Peanut Sauce. This was for a swim night dinner and it was easy to already have prepped beforehand and when we came home, we all ate. The girls had theirs with hoisin sauce (and True’s had tofu in her rolls). We had a lot of left over veggies from the weekend and I just used those to put in our rolls, along with some greens from the garden. It was a yummy and quick dinner on a busy evening.

Crunchy Tacos. We use ground turkey and we like to indulge in crunchy shells. It’s just kind of yummy that way. For the record though, Ben eats his on whole wheat tortilla.

Quick Swiss Chard and White Beans Stew. Ben made this with our first chard harvest from our garden. He made two batches, one not spicy and one so spicy my nose was running. Despite, how heat packed it was, it was definitely delicious. I’m so excited to have chard back in full force in our garden.

Week 3/25- 3/29
Monday: Sandwiches
Tuesday: Crunchy Pork Kimchi
Wednesday: Leftovers
Thursday: Banh mi (anyone have any good recipes?)
Friday: Tuna Poke (never got to make it this week, so saving it for next)

I didn’t exactly follow last week’s meal plan, but I forgot to give Ben the grocery list for the week, so I went with whatever was already in our fridge. Still getting the hang of it with two swim nights during the week, so it takes sometime to get used to making meals for those nights. Do you have any quick meal suggestions for those nights?

Chicken Piccata. We had all the ingredients, so this was an easy thing to whip up. I didn’t use as much butter as the recipe called for and I would quadruple the recipe for the sauce and I just used the .

Broccoli Chickpea Puree and Parsley Hummus with pita bread. This was our quickie dinner after swim class. I didn’t have tahini, so I worked with sesame oil. I definitely need tahini next time. The girls ate it all up, but I wasn’t wild about it. Maybe it would have tasted better with tahini. We’ll see. I’ll get some and try making it again.

This was the last time I meal planned. For awhile in December, Ben was home and just doing it and then my MIL came into town and was cooking up wonderful things for us (migas and fries… oh my!) and we’ve had a lot of quickie Trader Joe stuff in between and I’ll do a meal here, a meal there, but no real meal planning. I’ve totally missed it. If we don’t meal plan, our lunches are kinda eh because we don’t have any good leftovers to eat. So here we are again, well into the new year and picking it back up.

Our meal plans will change slightly because the girls have swim classes twice a week now in the evenings, so we’re thinking quick meals that we can take to the park and have a picnic after swimming. I experimented with hummus for one of the swim nights and I might want to try hummus wraps too. I need ideas for meals that are healthy, quick, and easy to grab and go. If you have any suggestions, I would love to hear them! Or maybe I need to try crock potting.

Week 3/18 – 3/22
Monday: Spring rolls (need to find a recipe)
Tuesday: Crunchy Pork Kimchi Burgers (will probably use ground turkey)
Wednesday: Leftovers
Thursday: Cold Soba Salad with Shiitake Dressing
Friday: Tuna Poke (reader’s recipe from Jozen, so will feature that the week after)

It feels good to get this list down. It gets me mentally prepared for the coming week and I love knowing what to cook instead of trying to figure it out right before a meal. It’s probably not a good idea to plan this out while I’m hungry (because I really am right now), but I’m already excited for next week’s dinners.

Shrimp Fra Diavolo

Ingredients:
1. 1 tbsp of Better Than Bouillon to make one cup of chicken stock (or just chicken stock if you have it on hand)
2. 1 – 14.5 oz can of diced tomatoes and sauce
3. 1 small onion diced
4. Whole wheat pasta
5. A few sprigs of fresh basil
6. 1 tbsp of minced garlic
7. Cajun seasoning
8. 1 lb. peeled and deveined shrimp (we did tails off, but you can leave them on)
9. 1 tbsp red pepper flakes (can add more or less depending on your spice level, I think I ended up doing 2)
10. 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
11. Chopped parsley (optional)

Directions:
1. In a medium bowl, toss the shrimp with cajun seasoning (or any other kind of seasoning you like).
2. Brown the garlic until light brown and then add the diced onions. Season with sea salt.
3. When the onions and garlic are cooked and transluscent, add the diced tomatoes. Proceed to add the basil (can used dried if you don’t have fresh basil) and cook down until the tomatoes are broken down.
4. Add the chicken stock. Simmer until reduced a little, then add red chili pepper flakes, depending on how spicy you like it.
5. While the sauce continues to cook, bring a pot of water to boil and cook the pasta. Once the pasta is cooked, add the pasta directly into the sauce and toss to coat.
6. Heat the extra virgin olive oil in another skillet over high heat and saute the shrimp until thoroughly cooked, about 1 to 2 minutes. Top the pasta with the shrimp and parsley for garnish. I made two batches of sauce, one spicy and another sans red pepper flakes for the girls. They also had chicken in theirs instead of shrimp because True is allergic to shrimp. I liked how it turned out, though Ben wasn’t a fan of the cajun seasoning. I think it’s the celery salt in it that was throwing him off. I think the recipe would also be great without any seasoning on the shrimp or maybe just lightly sauteed with garlic. I love cooking with garlic! It makes everything smell and taste yummy. Well, everything but dessert. I can’t do garlic in my dessert. I’ve tried garlic ice cream before and wasn’t a fan.

This recipe comes from Linda who pens the blog Pound of Glue. See her recipe for Shrimp Fra Diavolo here. She’s always cooking up something that looks yummy and she has a few other recipes she sent me that I want to try out. This is only my third reader’s recipe, but I love trying out things that you guys love. If you have something you love to make and eat in your home, please do share (just leave it in the comments and or email me). I would love to try it too!

Thank you Linda for this delicious dish! I can’t wait to try the Pad See Ew recipe you sent too! 

Wanna see other past recipes recommended from readers? Check out this Vietnamese chicken pho and this paella recipe. Both so good!

We had a little celebration to welcome March. I made this cake again because it’s so good. I used fat free milk instead of whole (and a quarter cup less sugar) and it wasn’t as moist, but still good enough to eat. Obviously, if Soul was licking the plate clean, it definitely was still good. If that girl loves what’s on her plate, she will almost always lick her plate until it is completely gone.

Chocolate cake was a good way to ring in the new month! Actually, we also had a special family milestone to celebrate that day (no, I am not pregnant), so it was another good reason for indulging. The celebrate banner topper is from Lisa Leonard and the perfect little topper for our March 1st celebration.

Now, I have to admit that it’s dangerous to have that cake here because I keep going to the fridge to sneak a bite. I have a hard time resisting dessert sometimes. The girls loved their little surprise snack on Friday afternoon, and even Glow got her first slice of cake and she’s definitely a fan! This is definitely my go-to chocolate cake recipe. What’s yours?

For our Christmas with my family, I made this Mexican Chocolate Cake that I found on pinterest. It sounded interesting, but the cayenne pepper had me nervous. Let me just say that we all loved it so much, this included Ben, who really could care less about desserts. You can’t really taste the cayenne pepper, but whatever it did to the mixture, it sure came out yummy. The mascarpone frosting was also excellent. My oven tends to cook things faster, so while the directions said 45 minutes, I did 30, but next time I think I might only do 20 or 25 minutes.

I want to try to make this again into cupcakes or maybe even into cupcakes in  jar. I think it might be my favorite chocolate cake recipe yet!
Besides the chocolate cake, the girls and I made these Mexican Wedding Cookies, which were another thing I pinned. I omitted the food coloring because Brave is allergic to artificial colorings and one batch was done with walnuts and another using chocolate chips because True is allergic to nuts. To distinguish the chocolate chip ones, we added cinnamon to the powdered sugar, so that True would know which ones she could eat. It’s all butter and a whole lot of sugar, so obviously it tasted good.

I’m totally a sweets person. I have to exercise a lot of self control when I’m around any sugary goodness. Most times, I do good at moderation (like here), but there are sometimes I totally cave and indulge. I can’t help it, sugar can be addicting!