trampoline kids at dusk; not food-related ...
**Monday's menu** Noodles in broth. Spinach salad with strawberries and sunflower seeds.
**Last-minute** I was doing a writing week, of sorts, so our babysitter stayed until late, and I had little time to throw something on the table before the girls' dance class at 6. Leftover noodles went into homemade stock. Admittedly unexciting, even jazzed up with Chinese five-spice. But the salad was a hit.
**Tuesday's menu** Black bean chili with steamed rice.
**Oops** Again, it was a writing afternoon, and I was late letting our babysitter go (she actually had to knock on the office door because her husband was here to pick her up!). And then I realized supper had to be whipped up from scratch in about twenty minutes. Which is exactly how much time it takes to steam white rice on the stove-top. Leftover black beans were quickly turned into chili, thanks to my home-canned tomatoes, and a bag of last-summer's frozen corn. This was the evening that we realized we have only one car. Which we do know, but somehow temporarily forgot. That meant six people gobbling supper and racing out the door en masse. AppleApple and I were dropped at the field forty-five minutes before warm-up officially started. But we made lemonade out of these lemons, and had a blast practicing together in the warm sunshine.
**Post-soccer-tableau** Arriving home at nearly 9pm, with tired children in tow, it is not the most thrilling sight to view upon the table: the abandoned meal and accompanying dirty dishes. Sigh.
**Wednesday's menu** Salmon roasted on the bbq, baked potatoes, steamed broccoli.
**Last-minute, again** I invited my former boss, Noah Richler, to come for supper before his reading in Waterloo, and he accepted, and was kind enough to remind me, when I worried, that he comes from a family of five children and is familiar with kid-induced chaos. It was another writing day, and I decided to ignore the messy state of the house. Before dashing off to the girls' piano lessons, I scrubbed a bunch of potatoes and put them in the oven. When Albus called my cell to say he and friends were home from school, I instructed him to turn on the oven. This works really well, actually. On the way home from piano, I swung by our local fishmonger and bought 3 pounds of beautiful salmon. Kevin cooked it perfectly. We were again racing against the clock as I'd discovered at around 4pm that CJ had his "congraduation" from nursery school starting at 6pm -- and that he really wanted to go (cake and juice had been promised!). But with some good team-work, supper was on the table and we dined with enough time.
**Passable** I would categorize this meal as bland, but fine. The salmon was tasty. Everything else was terribly plain. I put salt and pepper on the table.
**Thursday's menu** Leftovers: baked potatoes warmed up, with chili and rice.
**Uninspired** But it saved me time.
**Friday's menu** Hot dogs and buns from Bailey's pickup. Plus roasted asparagus, and cherry tomatoes.
**Easy-peasy** No rush, no hurry. A late meal, because we had swim lessons first, and then Bailey's pickup (Bailey's is our go-to source for much wonderful local food), but the kids snacked on cheese sticks and pretzels and we enjoyed relaxing around the table together. And then we watched Modern Family! A perfect end to a busy week.
**Saturday's menu** Pad thai with shrimp and tofu; hot and sour soup.
**Because** We had all the ingredients on hand, and I received a burst of energy at the end of the day, when Kevin arrived home from his training class. It cheered me up to cook and feel productive after a lazy, rainy, blustery, quiet, indoors day.
**Leftovers** We ate the leftovers for Sunday's supper, along with carrots. And that's the week!
Now, what's on the menu for this week ....?Labels: chores, cooking, fish, suppers