Week 67 Menu and New Year Resolutions... a little late

This week I've been thinking of a New Year's Resolutions that will make life in the kitchen easier at my house. It's still January, so I guess it's not too late to post resolutions. Here they are:

1. Make very realistic menus for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday nights. I teach piano until dinnertime two of these days and the kids have gymnastics until dinnertime the other night. So, if you look at my menus hopefully these days will have quick and easy dinners or dinner that I can prep while the kids are still at school and throw in the crockpot or bake right before dinner.

2. Make bread at least twice a week. I've realized that my bread doesn't stay soft for days and days, but I'm tired of buying bread and having it be dried out. Making bread isn't that hard and it doesn't take that long if I plan ahead a little bit.

3. Stick to my food budget. I've never been very good at sticking to a set budget for food, but I'm going to do better.

4. Since my baby is entering the baby food stage of his life, I'm going to try to make more of my own baby food instead of shelling out $.50 for each little jar.

Basically, I want to eat healthy, cheap, easy to prepare, home-made food, so hopefully now that I've written my goals down, I'll do better at doing them.

So, here's my menu for this week:

Monday: Swedish meatballs, steamed potatoes, IKEA gravy

Tuesday: breakfast burritos

Wednesday: crockpot taco soup or chili w/cornbread muffins

Thursday: chicken spaghetti

Friday: honey-lime chicken enchiladas

Saturday: steaks, Maggie's quinoa salad

Sunday: chicken salad sandwiches in either bread or soft-wrap bread

Thanks to Maggie, Meagan, Laura, and my sis, Lis, for posting their menus last week. What's on your menu this week?

One Hour Rolls

These rolls are amazing! I've been making these rolls since 2001 when I was a newlywed and my sister-in-law shared the recipe with me. The rolls are light, fluffy, easy to make and they only take one hour! And delicious too! I've made these rolls more times than I can count, so I've perfected the art of making them. Here are some step-by-step instructions with pictures for you. Here's what you'll need. I buy pretty much all of the ingredients in this recipe at Sam's club, thus the huge containers. You need warm water, yeast, oil, sugar, salt, egg and flour. In the mixer bowl, add warm water (not hot), oil, sugar and yeast. Mix together. After ten or fifteen minutes the yeast mixture should be puffed up like this. Time to add the salt and beaten egg. Then mix in the flour. (I've used a mixture of half wheat and half white flour successfully.) Keep adding flour until the dough is manageable. It will be a little sticky, b

Don't like your house to smell like food? I've got a kitchen tip for that!

I have a smallish, one story house and if I cook food that is kind of smelly, like onions, the smell tends to linger in every room. This is a pet peeve of mine and (also my husband's). Over the years I've found a few ways to cook smelly food without smelling up the kitchen. Use your garage! I use my garage quite often to cook things in. I open the window and it airs out, especially when you open the garage door. I'm sure my neighbors wonder what I'm cooking. I've used two different kitchen appliances in the garage: my crockpot and my food dehydrator. Crockpot - I did this very thing today since I'm simmering chicken, onions, carrots and celery to make chicken noodle soup tonight. I don't want my house to smell like onions all day, so I plugged it in on my husband's workbench. Food dehydrator - when I make jerky, I plug the food dehydrator in in the garage. I don't really want my house to smell like meat for hours

Week 394 Menu

Hi there! This week is flying by! So excited that we've been having blue skies and warmer weather. Our snow is almost all melted and little bulbs are sprouting in the flower beds. However, we had our 10th snow/ice day last week!!! Hopefully it was the last one. Life has been busy, busy and I need to plan out the rest of our week's menus, even though it's already Thursday. Here's what we've eaten so far and what I'm planning: Monday: chicken stirfry, rice/quinoa Tuesday: breakfast for dinner Wednesday: flatbread pizzas Thursday: roasted butternut squash, pasta, chicken sausage Friday: tacos Saturday: leftovers Sunday: pot roast, mashed potatoes, one hour rolls Alrighty, that's what we're eating this week. How about you? What's on your menu this week? Feel free to share. I love it when you do! More from Jenny:

What is on your menu this week?

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