Meal planning was soooo boring this week. I actually love trying to decide what to feed the family (in advance – not the actual day of. I hate trying to decide the day of.) This week, however, in an effort to stretch the paycheque a bit further (ahem, bathroom reno!) I took stock of everything left in the freezer. We didn’t need to buy any meat… so that’s good, but I don’t think I was as creative as I might usually be.

This disappointment may be spurred by the fact that 3 new cookbooks made it into our home over the last few days. I ordered Justin the Kid Chef book off of Amazon, I impulsively bought the Yum & Yummer one at Costco, and found a $2 copy of the Country Living Farmhouse Kitchen Cookbook on the clearance rack at HomeSense over the weekend. We have new recipes to explore for days and weeks and months!

Our meal plan this week is leaving an exception for food court food on Tuesday (dentist appointment at the mall right at the dinner hour) and a possible Valentine’s excursion with Justin & Kevin if Kaleb actually makes it to ski club this week. (Praying it won’t be cancelled again!)

Here’s our menu in no particular order:

• grilled cheese & salad (possibly some broccoli cheddar quinoa bites with these. I had plans to make them yesterday, but plans went awry!)
• eggs, toast, bacon, and fruit salad (Kaleb’s meal)
• broccoli cheddar soup, salad, and fresh bread (Justin’s meal)
• Ribs, hand-cut potato wedges, and veggie sticks (“Kevin’s” meal – I made him pick this one!)
• Jerk pork quesadillas with salad (I have jerk pork left over from Saturday to use) – our meatless Monday meal will not actually be today
• Asian salmon burgers (the recipe is the Asian Tuna Burger from the Yum & Yummer cookbook, but Justin read that you can substitute for salmon and decided he wanted to tackle two meals this week! I think we’re on to something!)

We still have some turkey strips and some bacon-wrapped medallions in the freezer if at any point we change our mind… plus, the remains of the 15lb bag of potatoes that doesn’t seem to be getting smaller! Options… so many options.

I ran out of time to do a full grocery shop… and again, am trying to stick to a food budget of sorts. I decided to use PC Express for our shopping. Our local grocery store has some amazing staff picking and packing and it just makes life so much easier in a hurry. Another bonus is that I strictly shopped from my list without the temptation of all the sales, end caps, and clearance racks. I loaded my cart online before bed one evening and picked up the next day at a set time in a designated parking spot with a quick phone call. I opted for no bags and just made sure I had laundry baskets in the trunk for easy unpacking of the cart. Bonus, they gave me a valentine and some chocolates as thanks! (Grocery shopping is always better with a Lindor at the end…)