Well it is Sunday night again, I am writing my meal plan for the week.  I would love to say that I will blog every Sunday night, but I know myself better than that.  It is a good dream though!  The nice thing about blogging the menus is that I can look it up when I forget what I am suppose to be making or if the cat ate my menu.  It also helps because when people find out we raise our own food, they always ask me what we eat, well read on my friends.

It is winter and what is fresh is limited.  In the garden we are still harvesting fabulous sweet carrots.  They are simply covered with a single piece of plastic and they have survived all the unusual weather so far. We will continue to harvest them as long as we can.  I prefer fresh carrots to frozen or canned.

In the high tunnel, believe it or not, we still have lettuce, chard, kale, radishes and some spinach.  I will be using these throughout the week.

Our freezers are massive, which is a blessing.  However, to be able to get anything out of them I feel like I need a safely line so I don’t fall in.  That being said, my husband does the “shopping” from the freezers each week.  The only requirement is that he picks the oldest meat first and chooses a variety.  This week he choose; Round steak, 2 half chickens, pork butt, frozen peppers, corn and green beans.

We do go grocery shopping at the store, but we try to only buy things we can not produce on our own.  Our family has a horrible addiction to chips and gluten free pretzels, so we buy massive amounts of those.  We also purchase condiments, rice, gluten free bread, some dairy products like cheese, butter and sour cream.

OK back to why I am here, this weeks menu!

Monday: Creamy Tuscan Chicken with Mashed Potatoes, and Broccoli.

First, because we raise all of our own chicken, I never use boneless, skinless anything.  We do not have any sun dried tomatoes, so first thing is I am going to turn the oven up to 400 and pop some frozen tomatoes on a cookie sheet and have them roasting.  Season the chicken with pepper and throw in a cast iron skillet with a little olive oil cover with foil and throw in the oven. Mince 4 gloves of garlic, gather, butter, a pint of stock, 2 cups milk (ours is goats), 1 1/2 cup parm, 1 1/2 cups spinach (rough chopped), Italian herbs, tbsp of flour or cornstarch, your potatoes and the broccoli.  Peel and wash your potatoes, make mashed potatoes how you like.  Steam broccoli.  Pull your chicken out of oven and remove it from pan.  Put pan on stove top, on med heat. De-glaze pan with butter and garlic, cook down spinach. Slowly add in your stock and bring to a boil.  Add flour or corn starch to milk pour in pan. Heat milk till small bubbles appear, add parm and herbs.  When everything starts to thicken, add back chicken and the roasted tomatoes.  Plate up and serve.

Tuesday: Taco Tuesday, with Taco Soup!

We had roast beef on Sunday night, I will cut up the leftovers and make a taco soup in the crock pot.  I will add a quart of stock, some frozen tomatoes, frozen green peppers, corn, green beans, onions, cooked beans, and taco seasoning. Serve with chips, cheese and sour cream.

Wednesday: Swiss Chard and Sausage Quiche, Hash Browns, and Frozen Fruit.

So I brown the sausage and use it for breakfast for the week. I pull some of the browned sausage out of the fridge.  If I had ground beef or bacon I would use that too. I also use whatever cheese I have on hand.  I have parm and cheddar this week, but I have used goat cheese, Italian cheese, and even Swiss cheese.  It is basically eggs, cheese, milk, meat, chard and onions.  It is the ratio that matters.  Sometimes it is crust less, sometimes I use grated potatoes for crust, this week I have left over pie crust frozen from Thanksgiving so I will use that. Heat oven to 375.  Roll out pie crust. In another pan, cook onions, garlic and chard in butter.  Cook till onions are clear and chard is cooked down.  In a bowl mix 4 eggs, 1 cup milk, 2 cups cheese and pepper to taste.  Pour egg mixture in crust, add sausage, chard and onions.  Top with a little more cheese and pepper.  Bake till firm.  Normally about 35-45 mins. While it is cooking my husband will make his hash browns and I will make a fruit salad out of the frozen fruit from the summer.   It is a cool and refreshing treat. Might even throw it in the mixer and make a sherbet type thing.

Thursday: BBQ Pork Butt Steak with French Fries and Pan Seared Radishes.

I am going to cheat this night and cover the pork with a jar of BBQ and hand it to my husband to cook on the grill.  We have a fryer, so I will chop up some potatoes for french fries and pan sear some chopped radishes in butter and garlic powder.

Friday: Cheese Steak Subs, and Salad.

Take the round steak, sear in cast iron skillet.  Throw in crock pot on medium with 2 chopped onions, minced garlic, pepper and a little water.  Cook till done, for me that will be till my husband gets home from work.  He will add sliced frozen peppers and he will slice the beef, then put it back in the crock pot on low till I get home.  We will serve on gluten free bread with provolone cheese and a garden salad.

Saturday: Honey Mustard Chicken with Potatoes and Green Beans.

Preheat oven to 375. To bowl add 1/3 cup course mustard, 1/3 cup honey, tsp garlic powder, tsp onion powder, add chicken.  Pour all of it into a cast iron skillet, add rosemary if you like it and bake till done.  Put some nice size baking potatoes in oven on rack and cook green beans on stove top.  I might throw this in the crock pot if it looks like it is going to be a long day. Wrap the potatoes in foil and put them on top of the chicken. I would quickly cook the green beans when we got home.

Sunday: T-Bone steaks, corn and kale.

I will be handing the steaks to my husband.  I will cook the corn and kale on the stove top. The kale is just butter and diced garlic in a pan cooked till wilted. Love easy dinners.

I hope you all have a great week.  Please let me know below what you have for dinner that is in season, or let me know if you like the recipes.  I received some good feedback from last week, let me know what you think. Enjoy your week and I hope to post soon to bring you up to date on the rest of the farm.