Three for three

Yesterday I noticed that, for whatever reason, our grocery bill was on target to be higher than usual for the month. That was when I decided that this week would be a "make-do" kind of week at our house. Instead of menu-planning around all the things I felt like making or eating, I would go through the food we had and plan around that.

Fortunately, our pantry, fridge, and freezer were filled with things that needed to be eaten.

Unfortunately, I was going to need to get creative considering there was a variety of foods that didn't necessarily go together or sound all that appetizing for this week, plus we were running low on some of our go to fruits and meats. In addition, I'm trying to eat gluten-free for the month as I try to pinpoint the cause of some allergy/health issues, so that removed a variety of menu options, too.

As I looked at my menu plan last night, I was a little nervous. Sort of dreading the experimenting I'd have to do. In the past, my food experiments have never really been spectacular and I wondered if I was going to be subjecting my family to sub-par meals all week.

I'm happy to say that today was a success. Breakfast, lunch, AND dinner were all hits with everyone in our house today (and that hardly ever happens, even when I'm grocery shopping for exactly what I want!).

Do you want to know what we ate?

Breakfast was Baked Oatmeal. I've never tried this before, but the recipe I found (and adjusted) was perfect. Trevin thought he was eating cake for breakfast, lucky boy, and Bryce took seconds...surprising for a guy who doesn't like oatmeal.

Lunch was an adjustment of my Taco Casserole recipe. I didn't have any ground meat, but I did have leftover brown rice, so I threw that in with some pinto beans from the freezer, and some frozen corn. And since I didn't have tomato sauce, I used salsa and a little water with the taco seasoning so it wouldn't be too spicy for my little guys. It was so yummy.

Dinner was a definite experiment. Honestly, I went into it thinking that it was going to be a complete failure, but at least I'd be using up those veggies in the fridge that really needed to be eaten. It was, what I'll call, "Very Veggie Lasagna" - sort of my take on a lasagna I had last week when we went out for our anniversary. It had no pasta noodles, just sauce, veggies, and cheese. The one I had at the restaurant was so yummy, I figured I'd give it a go with what I needed to use up in my fridge. While it was a little soupy (noodles would have helped, for sure, but I didn't have any brown rice pasta on hand), it was a hit! My boys ate all their veggies tonight with very little complaining. Bryce even liked it, and he's not much for veggie lasagna.

Here's my very basic "recipe" (in case your curious):

• Saute' any veggies you have on hand.
• I started by heating some olive oil and adding minced garlic and chopped sweet onion
• Then I added sliced mushrooms, zucchini, and chopped broccoli and cauliflower (not what I would normally put in there, but again, I was "making-do"
• Season with desired amount of italian seasonings and salt (I added a lot of italian seasoning, like a couple of tablespoons, and maybe 1/2 T sea salt)
• Pour spaghetti sauce into the bottom of a 9x13 or 7x11 inch baking dish (just enough to cover the bottom of the dish)
• Layer with half of the veggies
• Layer with about 1/2 cup cottage cheese
• Top with about 1 cup shredded mozzarella (or italian blend) cheese
• Repeat those layers - sauce, veggies, cottage cheese, mozz. cheese
• I added a layer of fresh basil between the cottage cheese and the mozz. cheese
• Bake at 375 for about an hour, until cheese is golden on top
• Let sit for 15 minutes or more

If I was grocery shopping for this meal, I think I'd add some pasta noodles, or at least some more hearty veggies that could "act" as noodles, like more zucchini, eggplant, some sliced tomatoes, or even roasted red pepper. I might omit the broccoli and cauliflower, though it actually tasted fine in the lasagna. 

So anyway, that was my day today - experimenting in the kitchen...with SUCCESS!