Menu Plan Monday, Week Forty

I hope you all had a splendid Christmas full of all the important things like good friends and family (and good food to share with them). This period of time between Christmas and Twelfth Night is my favorite part of the season -- my warm fuzzy Christmastide feelings are still strong, but the stress of the season has passed. My life, for too short a time, is all about maintaining a snugly comfortable sort of domestic bliss.

(This largely means the housekeeping goes straight to hell while I loll around on the couch with The Hubster and the Four Kitties of the Apocalypse).

And what would Menu Plan Monday look like for such a time? It would look like this:

Leftover Monday

• "Shepherd-ish Pie" and salad. Ingredients: leftover mashed potatoes, leftover corn, leftover gravy, lean ground turkey from freezer, onion, butter, egg, paprika, salt-free seasoning blend.
  

Tuesday (work)

• Leftover shepherd's pie with salad and the last satsumas.
  

Wednesday

• "Potato & Kale Soup" from The Ultimate Soup Cookbook (Reader's Digest, 2007) with garlic twists (smear crescent roll dough with Stonewall Kitchen's Roasted Garlic Spread, roll up, and bake as directed). Ingredients: onion, garlic, potato, kale, olive oil, pepper, water.
  

Thursday (New Year's Eve Supper)

• "Dill Biscuits with Smoked Salmon, Watercress and a Creamy Dill Spread," cupcakes, Riesling, and Netflix.
  

Friday (New Year's)

• "Mashed-Potato Cakes with Onions and Kale" with baked salmon (in the oven the same time as the potato cakes) and salad. Ingredients: mashed potato, kale, butter, onion, green onions, sage.
  

Saturday

• "Corny Tomato Dumpling Soup" from The Ultimate Soup Cookbook (Reader's Digest, 2007) with big bowls of salad.
  

Sunday

• Roast turkey (from freezer) with roast farmer's market fingerling potatoes, and green beans.

Hmmm ... a preponderance of potatoes in this week's menu?

Sometimes, I Do Like Shoppin'

Today, we left our house for the first time since Christmas Eve. What could motivate us to leave our snug nest, as full of cuddly kitties and Christmas loot as it is? The Coventry Regional Farmers' Market, of course!

I wasn't sure how busy the Market might be, so I drafted a list of what I needed and where I expected to find it ... needn't have bothered as the Market was nice and quiet. I presume a lot of people were either at home, still cabbaged out in post-Christmas recovery mode, or at the mall exchanging their loot. Silly buggers.

We bought:

• 2 baskets of Purity Farm's fingerling potatoes
• 1 sack of Purity Farm's baby kale
• 1 stalk of Brussels sprouts
• 1 bunch of watercress (for cucumber and cress sandwiches)
• 2 packets of New Boston Beef's ground beef
• 1 packet of New Boston Beef's sweet Italian sausage
• 1 hunk of goat cheese with cranberries from the Ladies of Levita Road
• 1 pack of teriyaki jerky from Wook's Beef Jerky (I am addicted to this stuff -- need a new pack every two weeks)
• 1 bag of chocolate chip cookies from Morning Glory Homemade Goods (The Husband's impulse buy)
• 1 jar of Norm's Best Marinated Mushrooms

I was hoping for some Jerusalem artichokes (sunchokes) to use in "Roasted Cauliflower, Brussels Sprouts and Jerusalem Artichokes," but did not spot any. I guess I'll just have to roast the Brussels Sprouts my usual way, instead.

For Christmas, my mother gave me a copy of The Ultimate Soup Cookbook (Reader's Digest, 2007) -- a most excellent cookbook I have borrowed from the library manymany times. I am going to use some of my tasty Market purchases in "Potato and Kale Soup" and "Corny Tomato Dumpling Soup." Perhaps, I will even bring my mom some soup for New Year's!

(I shouldn't make fun of you post-Christmas shoppers -- I was certainly keen to stop and pick up some bargains at Stonewall Kitchen today, too).

Christmas Dinner With Nobs On

Christmas Dinner, 2009

~ Marinated Beef Tenderloin ~
with Port Wine Sauce

~ Do-Ahead Garlic Mashed Potatoes ~

~ Buttered Parsley Corn ~

~ Savory Slow Cooker Squash and Apple Dish ~

~ Garden Salad ~

~ Pickle Tray ~

~ Floury Rolls ~
with Garlic-Herb Butter

~*~

~ Panettone Bread Pudding ~
Served warm with
fresh Whipped Cream

Owe most of Christmas Dinner's success to the Betty Crocker Complete Thanksgiving Cookbook (Wiley, 2003) which provided me with most of the dishes listed above. This is an excellent book which I have borrowed from the library time and time again for its tasty recipes and menus. The marinated beef tenderloin was particularly awesome (and will be repeated), but part of that was no doubt due to the quality cut of prime beef I purchased at whole Foods.

The mashed potatoes, gravy, and butternut squash where all made on Christmas Eve and just refrigerated until needed. I reheated them in the microwave while the meat rested and then just popped them in the still hot oven until everyone was ready to sit down and feast.

Everything was really good and there were far less leftovers than I had anticipated -- my Menu Plan Monday was largely dependent on repurposed beef getting us through the weekend, but that did not happen! After seconds for four people, we managed a few small sandwiches on leftover floury rolls and that was it. Yay for KFC, eh?

Christmas Eve Supper, 2009

Christmas Eve Supper, 2009

~ Roasted Cornish Game Hens ~

~ Baked Potatoes ~
with lashings of Brummel & Brown

~ Tiny peas ~

~*~

Roasting Cornish game hens is dead easy -- just rub them with a little olive oil, sprinkle liberally with salt-free lemon-pepper herb seasoning and roast in a 375°F oven for about 90 minutes. You can throw the potatoes in at the same time and forget about everything until the timer goes off (or you can baste the hens halfway through, if you're feeling fancy).

"Make Room" Pasta

As in, pasta that helps make room in my kitchen for Christmas Dinner's ingredients! I made a huge pot of this, because now is not the week to be faffing about in the kitchen every night.

Ingredients:

• 2 shallots, diced
• 4 cloves of garlic, sliced thin
• 1 small onion, diced
• 8 oz ground New Boston Beef
• 8 oz mushrooms, sliced
• 2 red bell peppers (from floral arrangement), diced
• 1 orange bell pepper, diced
• 28 oz Muir Glen fire roasted crushed tomatoes
• Generous amounts of basil, rosemary, thyme, and black pepper
• Parmesan cheese
  
• 1 box of Ronzoni Smart Taste elbow noodles

I don't think I need to post instructions for this, do I?