Planning Dinner - what we ate

We're a passionate meal planning family here. It creates a reliable, exciting, different dinner to look forward to each night. It's always a challenge to make sure we're eating a variety of colors throughout the day, and dinner is probably where we find ourselves adding the most greenery to our meals. 

For the past few weeks we've been cooking primarily out of Family Flavor and Smitten Kitchen cook books. 

Last week we tried the Mango Salsa over Salmon from Family Flavor

And the Risotto Stuffed Poblano Peppers from Smitten Kitchen

We also tried Black Bean Burgers from Family Flavor, and made the Red Onion and Swiss Cheese sandwiches from Smitten Kitchen. Those where two really quick, easy meals to throw together after work and the gym, when time is very valuable.


The burgers and the stuffed peppers both made enough for left overs, and when we knew we were going to run out of left overs, we fell back to our bulk meal favorite - slow cooker chili. We always have beans, broth, and salsa in our pantry and recently added a bag of frozen chicken breasts to our freezer. This combo, as well as any other random veggie scraps and spices you have makes for a solid, healthy meal. I recently read this blog post from (neverhome)maker about the perfect slow cooker chili recipe and I could not have said it better myself. We usually make one every other week and it sets us up for dinner, and leftovers for at least two days.

TIPs- Read the recipes all the way through. Is this a 30 minute prep and cook or a 30 minute prep and 30 minute cook kind of meal? You can plan the longer meals when you have more time and the shorter meals when you'll be home late.- Think ahead to which meals will create left overs ($ay no to cafeteria lunches!) so you don't get stuck with too many leftovers or too little.- When in doubt, Slow cook a bulk meal.

Good luck with your meal plans this week!!