Menu Plan (Midweek)

With our trip to the play last Saturday, and our family's off-kilteredness earlier in the day due to middle-of-the-night Friday awakenings, we didn't get the goulash made last week. Also, I realized we are out of tomato sauce -- and the husband is not adventurous enough to use the substitutions I probably would have, such as ketchup and/or tomato soup (both of which we do have). So, no goulash -- so far. It may show up on next week's menu plan.

Instead, last Saturday, we ate at Wendy's (his choice), had Sunday dinner out at an Indian restaurant after church, and popped up some popcorn on the stove and added a bunch of M&Ms to it for a Sunday evening supper with Secretariat viewing.

This week's menu has/will also consist(ed) of:

Monday: Two-Cup Corn Casserole. Had the macaroni set out for the planned goulash, so used some of that, plus a couple of cans of cream of chicken soup, and the last of the corn trimmed for last summer's ears out of the freezer. (Now we're down to commercially frozen corn.)

Tuesday: Spaghetti with Meat Sauce. I had thawed some of the browned hamburger and didn't want to let it go too long unused, so we threw it -- and some chopped onion, also from the freezer -- into the half jar of Ragu sauce that was in there to make a meaty spaghetti sauce. (Also because I was thinking of the winter health benefits of onions and garlic.)

Wednesday: Ham and Bean Soup with Apple Cheddar Bread. It's a week for hot soup, and this recipe (from Nestle, posted on 247moms.com) was wonderful when we made it with leftover Easter ham last year. I did have to buy the beans, but I pulled evaporated milk out of the pantry, and a bag of leftover, ground-up ham, some frozen peas, and a chopped-up onion out of the freezer. There's also some dried rosemary from herbs grown on the deck a summer or so ago that some of us put into this. The Apple-Cheddar Bread (recipe from Gooseberry Patch Celebrate Autumn cookbook) also came out of the freezer: I tried the recipe with last fall's apples, and it made two loaves. I really liked the bread -- the husband and the kid were sort of indifferent, but oh well.

Thursday: At DH's request, we'll be going to a Chinese restaurant on the Chinese New Year.

Friday: Pizza.

Saturday: Turkey, Mashed Potatoes, Cranberry Sauce. Look, it's Thanksgiving in February! Actually, it's that my workplace gives me a free turkey every holiday season, and I need to get its largeness out of the way in my freezer, cooked up (on a cold day when I won't mind having the oven on for a few hours), and eaten and then ground/chopped up into leftovers to be frozen for future turkey-based meals. (You notice that the rest of this week's menu plan is providing plenty of room for this bird to thaw in the fridge...) Also, the four--year-old (and I) love mashed potatoes, and I have a couple of boxes of them in the cupboard, as well as a couple of cans of jellied cranberry sauce, from Thanksgiving-time sales.