by Sam Tackeff | Mar 1, 2014 | Meal Planning
Oh, for shame! All I can say is that not-quite-in-season, imported produce is a temptress, and I am weak. WEAK! When I lived in San Francisco, it was a whole lot easier to turn down the stuff, but here, in this freezing grey northeast, I must admit that I succumbed to the $2.99 bunch of non-organic-flew-thousands-of-miles-to-get-to-my-plate-asparagus that was on sale today. They were thin, crunchy, and flavorful, and in my fantasy, I pretended that spring has sprung.
Week of Saturday, March 1st
Saturday: Leftover cumin braised chicken thighs, steamed asparagus, and Annie’s mac & cheese. I left the store tonight with part of my cart looking like an eight year old had picked out the contents. There’s also a pint of Ben & Jerry’s ‘Cinnamon Buns’ in the freezer now. (Do not head to the store hungry.)
Sunday: Pork tenderloin with sweet potato wedges, avocado, and roasted brussels sprouts. This doesn’t feel very Oscar worthy, but I’ll probably be reading an excellent book tomorrow during dinner (I’m captivated by the early review copy of Delancey that I’m reading right now!), and so it seems like a suitable enough meal.
Monday: Shakshuka (eggs simmered in a tomato sauce), and salad. This is perpetually my favorite quick meal to put together. Sometimes I’ll add roasted red peppers, other times, a little feta. It’s light, it’s vegetarian, and it’s terribly satisfying.
Tuesday: Thai chicken curry legs. I have a little container of Mae Ploy Thai yellow curry paste that I picked up at H-Mart a few weeks ago, and a few spoonfuls go into the pot with some chicken and a little bit of stock. I’ll likely add a few cups of roasted carrots, and a can of full fat coconut milk.
Wednesday: Turkish spinach and ground beef. This dish is really more spinach than anything else, served with a little bit of garlicky yogurt sauce.
Thursday: Wing it. By wing it, I’d love to make some Greek shrimp (or fish) with tomato and feta, but it’ll depend on what I can find fresh on Thursday evening. I’ll swing by the store to pick it up after work, instead of making my purchase on the weekend.
Friday: Out.
What’s on your table this week?
–– Sam
by Sam Tackeff | Feb 2, 2014 | Meal Planning, Uncategorized
This week at the office was our Hackathon at RunKeeper – two days we take a few times a year to build crazy projects outside of our normal course of work. In an incredible HGTV worthy timeline, the non-technical team “Addition by Subtraction” took second place for building this (working) bar in the back room of the office. (You read that correctly: RumKeeper.)
Week of Saturday, February 1st
Saturday: Langoustine Curry with jasmine rice. I had some leftover khao soi broth from Thai North, which I decided to fashion into something quite different for night two. Spinach salads on the side for some greenery.
Sunday: Stuffed burgers, tater tots (yes), and broccoli. I just can’t do wings, and I wasn’t going to make queso or a guacamole bar or hundreds of deviled eggs this year. But I did want to make something that would feel like “Superbowl Food”, so stuffed burgers (with blue cheese and bacon) seemed like the right way to go.
Monday: Salad with paprika and allspice chicken, chopped vegetables, mango, avocado, mint, and basil. Lime dressing. This week on Jamie’s 15 minute meals, he had a similar recipe which he called “San Fran Chicken Quinoa Salad” – I liked the flavor combination, although not quite sure what makes it “San Fran”…
Tuesday: Pasta with cauliflower, saffron, parsley, and feta. (From Deborah Madison’s Vegetable Literacy). I’ve been reading through this cookbook and everything looks good. It’s been months since we had pasta in this house, and I try to avoid it most of the time, but this recipe seemed too good to pass up – I thought it’d be a nice treat for us.
Wednesday: Braised brussels sprouts and apple, pork bratwurst. I’ve been craving sauerkraut lately (it’s always good to eat fermented foods!), and this was originally going to have sauerkraut, but I couldn’t resist brussels sprouts, and I went to the wrong store for the kraut.
Thursday: Wing it. Actually, I realized as I was typing this up that I had simply forgotten to write something down on the list, and proceeded to do my shopping neglecting this meal entirely. I’ll likely forage the freezer, but it might end up being a Whole Foods salad bar night.
Friday: Out.
–– Sam
by Sam Tackeff | Jan 26, 2014 | Meal Planning
Goodness, everyone is looking all sparkly and shiny at the Grammy’s tonight. I’m firmly planted on my couch, with a portable heater trying to warm up. Sherlock is being recorded because I want to watch it when I have time to properly squee at the screen. Yep, that’s a thing I do. I also talk at the television. I try to hold back in movie theaters, but sometimes I’ll start laughing at the wrong parts, and that’s pretty much just as bad in terms of theater going etiquette.
This afternoon I was on top of my meal planning game! I find that it makes for a better Monday when I’m not starving and I’m prepared for at least three days of quality eating. I prepped a few meals, made a batch of hard boiled eggs, planned out most of our lunches, chopped carrots, cucumbers, and bell peppers, and broke down a whole pineapple instead of wasting my money on the pre-cut stuff.
And then I made my breakfast of the week: the broccoli kielbasa frittata. If you look carefully, the picture above of my prep work isn’t the same as the finished frittata below. That’s because I’ve been making this dish once a week for the past month, and I haven’t shared it with you yet, and finally I’ve come to the conclusion that you probably should know about it. First, I preheat the oven to 400 before prepping the ingredients. I steam a bag of Trader Joe’s organic broccoli florets – it’s 12 ounces – and nestle them in a cast iron pan lined with tinfoil which I’ve oiled. [The first time I did it with tinfoil that I hadn’t oiled, and it stuck. The second time, tinfoil oiled, and it came out perfectly. Today, I forgot the tinfoil, oiled the cast iron, and now I have egg plastered to cast iron. Say it with me: oiled foil. Butter would probably work just dandy as well.] Then I cut up half of a Trader Joe’s smoked fresh turkey kielbasa – 6 ounces – into tiny cubes, and scatter them around the pan. I season the broccoli and kielbasa with a healthy sprinkling of salt and pepper. I prepare my egg mixture – anywhere between 4 and 8 eggs depending on how many I have on hand – with a few spoonfuls of water or milk, whisked with a fork. I season the eggs, pour them on the broccoli and kielbasa, and tap everything down with a spoon, making sure that egg has permeated between all of the cracks. I then pop it in the oven for about half an hour, until the frittata is set. I turn it out, cut it into four pieces, and let it cool, and then eat it for breakfast for four days. (This is flexible – you can really put any pre-steamed veg in here, or omit the sausage). As for the temperature – sometimes I cook it at 350F for 40-50 minutes if I’m cooking something else in the oven at the same time.
This week’s meals are made up mostly of the bits and bobs that needed to be finished up in my fridge. Last week I made a large pot of chicken stock that I hadn’t used up, so two soups are on the menu.
Week of Sunday the 26th
Sunday: Tomato soup and spinach salad. By tomato soup, I mean a half a jar of Rao’s, simmered with my home made chicken stock. I cooked a little bit of orzo and added that to the pot. Salad had a quick balsamic vinaigrette.
Monday: Pork tenderloin, with roasted cumin carrots, greens, guacamole and salad. I’ve been sitting on this pork tenderloin for a few days, and finally decided to cook it. I chopped the carrots into wedges, and tossed them with cumin, chile powder and salt, and roasted them for 40 minutes before adding the pork and roasting it until done.
Tuesday: Chicken tortilla soup (minus the tortilla). I simmered a pot of Rancho Gordo black beans with a shallot, then added the chicken stock, cumin, salt, and some leftover salsa. Everything cooked for about 40 minutes, and I added some rotisserie chicken that I’d saved in the freezer from the last time I got those two-fer chickens at Whole foods. Okay, it’s buy one, get one half off, but two-fer sounds more exciting than BOGO. I hate that acronym.
Wednesday: Girl food. Devon will have already eaten by the time I get home from the gym, so it’ll likely be a massive heap of garlicky greens topped with some tomato sauce and whatever protein source I have lying around.
Thursday: Burgers over salad. Lots of herby freshness – mint, parsley, whatever else is left in the fridge, and some crumbled pancetta bits that I made a few days ago.
Friday: Out.
–– Sam
by Sam Tackeff | Jan 5, 2014 | Meal Planning
Yesterday I popped into Trader Joe’s to do the bulk of my shopping, and they were out of coconut milk. I much prefer their light coconut milk to other varieties – it has zero additives, which for that matter, why is it that every brand of coconut milk at Whole Foods must contain guar gum? Because they were out, I decided that I’d just push my shopping trip to the next morning, thinking that they’d have restocked by then.
Alas, the scene at Trader Joe’s today was grim. Already a day behind on my grocery shopping, and after a late morning start, I turned into the parking lot to a five minute line to find a parking space. Ah, Sunday shopping, how you delight me! There were more people in the store than a downtown Manhattan Trader Joe’s at 5pm, and incidentally, the trucks had failed to arrive because of the snow storm, and the shelves were barren. There was no coconut milk. There was also no chicken. Nor canned tomatoes, cucumbers….
After several hours, and another two stores, I came home with very little on my main shopping list, so my week of braises and stews (that I really only have time to cook on the weekend) was foiled, and I had to scrap my meal plan completely. This is what I’ve come up with to replace it, but I’m feeling a little bit non-committal – gone are the Moroccan cardamom and apricot laced braises, the Thai fish curry, and the chili I was planning. At least we have enough cabbage in the house to last us a week.
Week of December 28th–
Saturday: originally we had planned to go out on Friday night, but because of the storm, we pushed back our date night to Saturday. And then Saturday came around, and neither of us felt like leaving the house, so we had salads, chicken soup, and a bowl of fruit.
Sunday: this was supposed to be a warm beef braise, but after my shopping debacle, I opted to make Kapuska (braised cabbage with lamb) – a mish-mash of a recipe I have for the traditional Turkish dish, and another for Marcella Hazan’s smothered cabbage. (Inspired by this.)
Monday: roasted pork tenderloin with apples, garlic cauliflower mash. I steam the cauliflower and garlic, and then make a puree with my immersion blender. You could probably trick someone into thinking it was a potato puree, but I love it for what it is!
Tuesday: Whole Foods hot bar. Yep, I’m weak. After two false starts shopping this weekend, and leaving with only vegetables and no real protein options, I’m guessing that I’m going to be tired and cranky on Tuesday and want seven little tastes of hot bar instead of a lovingly home cooked meal. Plus, their zucchini with tomatoes and garlic is always a winner.
Wednesday: mini burgers, roasted broccoli and sweet potato fries with aioli. The Cottage restaurant in Wellesley has this absurdly good paprika aioli, that I can’t come close to replicating. But I can try.
Thursday: seared scallops with Brussels sprouts and pancetta. This might be a different type of fish. Or it might not be fish at all. Or it might be something totally different. Are we seeing a theme here?
Friday: Out!
While I didn’t have the ingredients to make my braises, I did get a head start on the week of breakfasts, and baked a big frittata. Looking forward to a low key Monday to ease us back into the five day work week. Happy new year everyone!
–– Sam
by Sam Tackeff | Dec 28, 2013 | Meal Planning
I’ve developed an odd fascination with Anthony Bourdain’s wife Ottavia, specifically because of her obsession with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and MMA. She’s a tiny Italian who can pack a punch with the best of them, what’s not to love? She’s persistent and dedicated – trains five days a week, and doesn’t smoke or drink. Somehow this level of discipline seems to be the antithesis of Bourdain’s scripted lifestyle of excess – maybe she balances him out. (Or maybe I shouldn’t believe what I see on tv.)
I’ve long been tempted to take up martial arts. When I was in elementary school, my best friend’s father was a black belt in multiple disciplines, had a 7th degree in his main practice, and was a Shihan Sensei. He was also a Greek Orthodox priest. Between these things, he had seemingly infinite power in the universe. My first attempt at martial arts was bittersweet – after a glorious morning spent tumbling on mats and learning new grappling skills, I woke up the next morning unable to move – it’s been nearly a decade, but I think I may be ready to try again. (This actually happened to me when I first tried CrossFit. My muscles just don’t adapt quickly to new movements!) My one major obstacle is my bad vision, but I finally broke down this year and acquired a new prescription of contact lenses for my athletic pursuits – so I have no excuse but to go and DO!
–––
This week I’ve been writing lists of books I’d like to read, lists of things I’d like to write about, financial goals, health goals, things I’d like to eat in the winter – finally today came around and I realized that I didn’t have the one list that I need to get through the week: my meal plan. While I’m waiting on a few new cookbooks in the mail, I decided to stick with my standby culinary crush Jamie Oliver, and catch up on some of his 15 minute meal series on the DVR – the influence for many of the meals this week.
Week of December 28nd
Saturday: Southern Indian seafood soup. With fresh crab, fresh curry leaves (which I pick up at a local market called Russo’s), a multitude of spices, and coconut milk. I had a little bit of extra tomato sauce that needed to be used up, so that went in the pot as well. (Cinnamon buns for dessert!)
Sunday: Beef stroganoff, fluffy rice, red onion and parsley pickle. We watched this on Jamie’s 15 minute meals, and it’s slightly more exotic than the Hamburger Helper variety. I have some sierra cut steaks defrosting from my freezer, and I may igloo cooler sous vide them before sticking them in the grill pan.
Monday: 5 spice duck salad, with pomegranate, mango, lime and gem lettuce. Whole Foods only has smoked breasts and whole duck, so I might have to make a quick trip to get myself a breast or a leg for this dish. (Incidentally, a woman at the store told me to buy the whole duck because I’d be “the talk of the town; just like going to culinary school”. I have no idea what she meant by that one.)
Tuesday: New Year’s Eve! Japanese food – likely takeout. Four or five years ago we were invited to our friend Gary’s house, and his wife cooked a Japanese feast with fresh soba and yuzu that was so very memorable. We made wishes for the new year, and celebrated joyously. We’re not really the types to go out and party on New Year’s Eve, but Japanese takeout is one of our mutual favorite things ever!
Wednesday: Roasted white fish, tomatoes, and leeks. There’s sure to be some bacon in there too, and lots of herby freshness – mint, parsley, whatever else is left in the fridge.
Thursday: Avocado, pancetta and pine nut salad, with crispy grilled chicken thighs.
Friday: Out? Although, possibly in, given that we’ll be eating takeout on Wednesday. I’m still debating a Whole30 for the month of January, which limits what I can eat out of the house – at minimum we are going to be committing to five home cooked meals a week, and a fairly clean diet.
What are your New Year’s Eve plans?
–– Sam
by Sam Tackeff | Dec 22, 2013 | Meal Planning
Starting my week without a meal plan around here is bad news bears – even worse when I make my grocery trips while hungry. I’ll invariably end up spending double or even triple the amount of food during the week, and end up with things I really don’t need. Don’t shop while hungry folks. Just don’t do it.
In an attempt to re-enforce good habits before the new year, here’s my meal plan! This week I’m doing a fair amount of cooking inspired by Mel Joulwan’s new cookbook “Well Fed 2“: bold global flavors, lots of fun spice mixes, and some basic condiments like her olive oil mayo on the docket.
Week of December 22nd
Saturday: merguez burgers with moroccan carrots and spinach salad. Carrots are a confirmed favorite vegetable around here, so I’ve been picking up a few pounds of them each week at the store. Trader Joe’s has a new bag of “carrots of many colors” which make for much more colorful meals!
Sunday: turkey + cranberry balls with potato pancakes, brussels sprouts with pancetta. (I’ve strayed from Sunday night fish night because I’m less enthused about the market not having a fresh catch.) I like the idea of the festive holiday flavors in this meal!
Monday: deconstructed gyro salad (p. 126) (the cookbook recipe is slightly different). Adding it to the “Greek” rotation in addition to one of my favorites: Andie’s lemony chicken gyros.
Tuesday: I was considering duck and mash, but there was a request for Mexican Christmas foods… tamales/enchiladas/etc. so I’m going to see what I can do.
Wednesday: Chinese + a movie (Jewish Christmas!) I think it’s going to be American Hustle.
Thursday: deli tuna salad (p. 118) on salad/melts. Everyone likes a good tuna recipe! This one uses fancy oil packed, which if you ask me, is the best way to go.
Friday: out! Likely Japanese takeout, or our regular date night restaurant.
Saturday: piña colada chicken (p. 96). I’ve long been a fan of the American Chinese restaurant polynesian flavors – and cooking this stuff at home is far superior.
And that’s a wrap! What are you eating this week in between holiday feasting?
–– Sam
