Mmmm, mmmmm good!

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Comment by Mary Friedeman on July 31, 2010 at 9:21am

Thanks for the great input, ladies. Keep it coming! Anne, would love to be off the northwest coast of Scotland with you. Especially since the temp here is supposed to hit 102 with a heat index of 110! And thanks for adding an international flavor to our discussion. I had no idea that our ground beef was "mince" there. Roast is actually on our menu for tomorrow! And I like the idea of extra meat for Sunday, because it's not unusual for us to bring people home from church also. Big eaters at our house, too; five of our six children are boys and they're all fully grown or nearly so!

Gwenyth, thanks for some new ideas. Looking forward to injecting more variety into our culinary lives! Just finished defrosting the freezer this a.m. so am ready to re-load. Had the brainstorm of wearing the kids' snow gloves while doing so, and wish I'd thought of it sooner! I've saved all the "snow" for my younger two boys, who left with their older brother at 5 a.m. to help with our church's food ministry. On this super-hot day, they should have a lot of fun with my discarded "frost."

Comment by Homeschool on the Croft on July 31, 2010 at 2:38am

Always looking for some inspiration!
I think these may be our top 5 meals with some of my random thoughts....as they come, so they may not make too much sense!
1. We have roast beef, Yorkshire pudding, mashed pots and loads of veg every Sunday (we're traditional here!). This would probably be a favourite with everyone in the house. It comes into the 'favourite' category, but not into the 'cheap' nor 'quick' ones. But....
2. I also roast a Chicken on Sunday, so we'll have extra meat if there are any visitors in church we ask to our home. So, often on a Monday, if we haven't had extra guests, we make fajitas with this chicken. That's inexpensive, and easy.
1. chilli - I like to make a big pot of it (maybe around 4lb mince - I think you call it ground beef in the US) and freeze some for another time. We like it especially mixed with rice, rolled in wraps with salsa and melted cheese on top. Or with 'stuff' thrown into the wrap itself: salad, salsa, cheese.... This is always there as a throwback for me.
4. We have a lot of home-grown veg, so I tend to make pots and pots of soup and have them in the freezer: leek and potato; Scotch Broth; brocolli and cauliflower. We have soup every Sat lunch and at least one evening through the week - although only as a starter. I'm afraid I married a *big* eater, and have bred more of the same! There has got to be meat in a meal or it just wont do! But for many people, the Scotch Broth, or Chicken soup (with chicken pieces in it), served with chunks of bread, would be a meal. That would definitely fall into the nutricious category!
5. Curry: 'tasty' - yes; 'inexpensive' - well, that depends....by the time you buy chillies, fresh ginger etc....the cost mounts up. But it can be made more cheaply - not everything has to be fresh, and with a curry, you can throw in or leave out as you please.
Meals with rice or pasta are so easy, but we grow our own potatoes and so *have* to have them often! Meals with tatties tend to be more time-consuming, but, for us, they're cheaper. So there's an up-side and a down-side.

* I do like to have something ready-made in the freezer at all times: often chilli (#1), bolognese, mince and veg, stew...
* Planning for the week's meals is definitely the #1 priority in terms of not wasting money or food. I confess I don't always do it, but I notice such a difference every time I don't.

I'm not really sure this has been of any help to anyone! But just some early-morning thoughts from a rather grey and drizzly island off the north-west coast of Scotland....looking out my kitchen window onto the Atlantic and waving to all you folks in Canada and the USA!

Comment by Gwenyth Eyler on July 30, 2010 at 9:09pm

Recipes that unite "simple, inexpensive, and tasty" can be hard to come by, especially when various family members have different definitions for 'tasty' AND when mom also wants to add 'nutrious' to the description!!! I will look forward to getting ideas from your other readers, as I, too, find myself stuck in a rut from time to time.

Since reading your post this morning, I've been pondering which recipes are in my "top five (or ten!)" AND fit your criteria. (I asked my husband to name his favorite meals, and he said homemade pizza, lasagna, and cheeseburgers!) MY favorite main dishes are (and he agrees that he enjoys these too, as do our young children!):

Cheesy Turkey Meatballs
Steakboli (homemade Italian bread dough filled with sauteed minute steak, onions, & peppers)
Vegetable Lasagna
Chicken Fingers
Second-Helping Haddock
Beef Stew or any soup served with homemade Honey Whole Wheat Bread or Light Tender Biscuits
Double-Crusted Chicken Pie
Southern Chicken Dinner (chicken gravy base with cornbread topping)
Salsa Chicken and Rice (MUCH better than it sounds... think 'Tex-Mex')
Tender Texas-Style Steaks (favorite crock pot recipe for less expensive cuts of steak)

The above don't all fit 'quick-and-easy,' so when it comes down the wire, some fall-back-on-when-all-else-fails ideas for me are:

Taco salad or BLT's (especially in the summer)
Baked potato 'bar' (with various toppings)
Hungry Boy casserole (various beans and ground meat - all prepared in one electric skillet)
Stroganoff

I will make myself stop with that! But I do find my weekly menu planning time to be a highly essential tool for survival, and I love the challenge of planning well-balanced menus! I rotate various meats in the main dishes and pasta/potato/rice sides and veggies to avoid the pbj or mac-n-cheese & hot dog rut... though we seem to have plenty of both of those anyway! Oh - a recent 'new-for-us' favorite side: baked sweet potato fries... there are never any left over!