Omnivore

Grilled hamburgers with guacamole starter and leftover enhanced tabbouleh 6/8/24

Posted on June 8, 2024 by Beebamom

Because our menu has adjusted due to the screaming hot weather, some groceries got used and some didn’t, there was takeout and repurposing of dishes.

It is a beautiful evening here in NorCal. No humidity and temperatures in the low 70s. A nice night for grilling some burgers and having a salad that incorporates leftovers. We start off with chips and guacamole. I thought we were using the avocados in some tofu bowls but it never happened. And I know that all of us love guacamole.

Along with our Mexican starter and an all-American grilled hamburger we are having leftover Middle Eastern parsley salad or tabbouleh. Since there is not enough for a portion for each of us, I am going out to my herb garden and clipping some additional parsley, mint, oregano, plus whizzing up some salad greens. Additional garlic, olive oil, lemon juice, and salt should give us enough.

Hopefully next week we will be able to stick to our menu. If not? I will try to follow the saying of “waste it, want not.”

Posted in American, Beef, Grilling, Hot weather meals, leftovers, Mexican, Middle Eastern, Salad, Vegetables | Tagged hamburgers | 1 Comment

Vietnamese chicken salad with rice noodles. 6/6/24

Posted on June 7, 2024 by Beebamom

After giving up on cooking Wednesday and ordering take-out, on Thursday we tried a new recipe found by our daughter for an Asian chicken salad. Earlier in the day we had bought a rotisserie chicken at Costco and I had shredded up one breast so part of the work was already done.

It turned out really well. The recipe calls for cooking the chicken but it is much easier if you use an already cooked one. The rice noodles are boiled in the recipe but I just soaked mine in hot water. It also calls for quite a bit of sugar but I suggest you start with a third of the amount and then add more to get it to your sweetness tolerance.

We will definitely make this again. Hopefully I will write down the amounts of sugar and other modifications I made and edit and publish the recipe again. But until then—-

https://thewoksoflife.com/vietnamese-rice-noodle-salad-chicken/

Posted in Asian, Hot weather meals, Poultry, Salad, Vegetables, Vietnamese | Tagged chicken, rice noodles | Leave a comment

Hot weather dinner – Hummus, pita, tabbouleh. 6/4/24

Posted on June 5, 2024 by Beebamom

California is experiencing a heat dome which means that it was in the upper 90s on June 4, 2024. The last thing I wanted to do was make the house hotter by using the stove or oven. I opted for a dinner of store bought hummus and pita with a homemade Middle Eastern parsley salad, tabbouleh.

Making the salad is a little prep intensive but a food processor lightens the load. Here is the recipe I use.

Posted in Hot weather meals, Legumes, Middle Eastern, Recipes, Vegan, Vegetables, Vegetarian, Weeknight dinners | Tagged hummus, tabbouleh | Leave a comment

Penne with meat sauce. 6/3/24

Posted on June 5, 2024 by Beebamom

Last week our favorite brand of pasta, Barilla, was on sale for $1.27/lb. Since I love pasta we bought the 4 boxes allowed and cooked up 6 ounces that were sauced with the ground beef and tomato sauce I made last week for our stuffed peppers.

As an aside, since grocery prices have increased, it is important to flex your economic power by stretching your proteins. I took 1 pound of ground beef and used half of it to make 8 stuffed pepper halves which were a dinner and two lunches. The other half pound was used for this spaghetti sauce. Actually if I had added another can of tomatoes I probably could have squeaked out another pasta meal.

Posted in American, Beef, Easy, Italian, leftovers, Pasta, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners | Tagged pasta | Leave a comment

Roasted chicken thighs with BBQ sauce, salad, and taco beans. 6/2/34

Posted on June 3, 2024 by Beebamom

Tonight everyone got into the dinner prep. John was in charge of the chicken, daughter wanted to try a new black bean recipe, and I made the salad.

Boneless, skinless chicken thighs were on sale this week for $1.97/lb. so I suggested we make a chicken dinner reminiscent of cooking chicken on the grill. John seasoned the chicken thighs simply with salt, pepper, and garlic powder. He cooked them at 425F in the middle of the oven for 20 minutes. At this point he brushed them with BBQ sauce and put them back in the oven a little closer to the heating element for another five minutes. The chicken thighs were cooked through but still juicy and had the outdoorsy flavor of the BBQ sauce.

The taco beans were simply two cans of drained black beans with cut up scallions, 3/4 cup water and a packet of taco seasoning. They were quite tasty and went well with the chicken. I put together a Buffalo inspired salad mix with some added scallions and cherry tomatoes.

Posted in American, Easy, Hot weather meals, Legumes, Poultry, Salad, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners | Tagged chicken | Leave a comment

Weekly Menu. June 3 – 9, 2024

Posted on June 2, 2024 by Beebamom

This is the first week this year where we are confronted with temperatures in the upper 90s. Starting Tuesday it is going to be hot especially in the late afternoon. We try to avoid using the air conditioning and are usually pretty successful by opening the house up in the morning when it is cool, using fans, and making dinner without using the oven. Most of our dishes planned for mid-week when it will be the hottest will be either no-cook salads, Instant Pot, or grilling outside.

Posted in Weekly menu | Leave a comment

Seared scallops with mashed potatoes and asparagus 6/1/24

Posted on June 2, 2024 by Beebamom

Happy June 1st! Here in Northern California it starts getting light around 5 AM and the temperature will vary from lows in the 50s to highs near 100 this week. It will be our first taste of summer. To celebrate the summer we had a dinner of seared scallops, mashed potatoes, and asparagus.

Seared scallops, mashed potatoes, and asparagus

John did a great job searing the scallops while I heated up the leftover potatoes from yesterday, cooked the asparagus, and made a sriracha tartar sauce. I think the dinner took 10 minutes in total to prepare. Scallops are one of my favorite proteins so it always seems like an occasion when we have them.

Posted in American, Easy, Shellfish, Vegetables | Tagged scallops | Leave a comment

Flank steak with potatoes and broccoli 5/31/24

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Beebamom

Grilled flank steak with mashed potatoes and broccoli

I have to admit that the flank steak got a little more medium than medium-rare. Nonetheless it was super tasty. I had scored two packets of mashed potato mix at Grocery Outlet for $.50 so I mixed that up with some water, milk, butter, and sour cream. I probably would not buy the dehydrated potatoes again since the texture was not really potato-like. But $.50 for two packets is hard to pass up. We also had some steamed broccoli with fried onions.

To complete our dinner John opened one of our “good” bottles of wine, a Ledson 2015 Malbec. It was lovely!.

Posted in American, Beef, Easy, Grilling, Vegetables | Tagged flank steak | 1 Comment

Stuffed peppers. 5/29/24

Posted on May 31, 2024 by Beebamom

Stuffed red bell peppers with ground beef, rice, and homemade tomato sauce

Stuffed red bell peppers is a dish I make about once a month. Growing up my mother always made them with green bell peppers but I find that riper peppers are easier on my digestion. I make a fairly thick meat sauce and use half of it for the peppers and save the rest for a pasta dinner. After microwaving the pepper shells for around 5 minutes, I add cooked rice to the sauce and then stuff the peppers with it. I top the stuffed peppers with a little plain tomato sauce from a can. The peppers bake in a 350F oven for 40 minutes. Then we enjoy our stuffed pepper dinner and have enough leftovers for a couple of lunches.

Posted in American, Beef, Methods, Vegetables | Tagged bell peppers, ground beef, rice | Leave a comment

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. May 26, 27, 28, 2024

Posted on May 30, 2024 by Beebamom

On Sunday we decided to get some takeout Chinese food but it was not to be. Our favorite restaurant had decided to use this weekend to renovate their kitchen! What to do? We opted for pizza. Make a phone call and pizza arrives at our doorstep in 1/2 hour.

Our favorite, tomato and cheese with Italian sausage

Seriously it is nowhere near as good as Italian pizza or my hometown pizza from the Jersey shore but it’s pretty okay and so easy!

On to Monday! Today is Memorial Day and John is grilling hamburgers and I have made Texas caviar as a salad. Texas caviar is a two bean salad, black beans and black-eyed peas. All cut to about the same size as the beans are carrots, bell pepper, tomatoes, scallion, corn, celery, and onion. It has a vinaigrette dressing spiked with a few shakes of sriracha or Tabasco and a sprinkling of cilantro.

Finally on Tuesday we had tilapia tacos and Southwest bean salad. We used stand-up taco shells, oven baked tilapia, salsa verde, onions, cabbage, and mango. The Southwest bean salad was a repurposing of the Texas caviar. The Southwest flavor came from adding chipotle powder.

So that is our long weekend plus Tuesday dining. Wednesday I will make stuffed peppers and then we are having a family celebration on Thursday for the graduation from high school of our granddaughter.

Posted in American, Beef, Easy, Fish, Grilling, Holidays, Legumes, Salad, Southwest U.S., Vegetables | Tagged hamburgers, Pizza, Tacos | Leave a comment