My delightful friend, Red invited me on a journey to Trader Joe's. Red introduced me to Trader Joe's and it's been a whirling romance ever since (between myself and Trader Joe's, not between myself and Red...)
One of the cons of living in suburbia is the lack of access to trendy grocery and specialty stores. The nearest TJ's is about an hour away so we really have to make a journey out of it.
Red plans out her weekly menus here. I witnessed her natural culinary inclinations in action today as she planned her week's menu on the fly amidst the fluorescent lighting of TJ's produce section. It took me approximately one hour in the car while muttering ideas to myself and about 20 minutes of staring at different kinds of squash and frozen foods to come up with a menu for the week. Here's the plan:
Monday: Butternut squash ravioli (a very ambitious choice...my fallback is noodles and butter)
Tuesday: bday dinner for my sister-in-law, no cooking for me!
Wednesday: Dinner with Red and her hubby, maybe I'll make a sweet treat, TBD later
Thursday: Spaghetti squash with meatballs/garlic Parmesan sauce
Friday: Homemade pizzas
It's going to be a very squashy week.
Around 3pm this afternoon, while playing a board game with my hubby, it dawned on me that we would probably need to eat dinner tonight. I was inspired to wing it and throw some odds and ends in a crock pot (an inspiration that typically ends in near disaster).
Into the crock pot went: one frozen chicken breast, some chopped up red potatoes, half a diced onion, a splash of chicken broth, a bit of ground mustard, and a heavy sprinkle of a new seasoning I bought at TJ's today (21 Spice Salute).
After about 3 hours the chicken was cooked so I shredded it and decided it needed a little more substantial sauce so I cooked up a quick roux (I'm still trying to use that word like I have any idea what it is) with butter, flour, garlic powder, onion powder, ground mustard, a splash of Worcestershire sauce and some chicken broth (it may be more of a gravy than a roux or sauce...who knows, I'm just pretending to know what I'm doing). I slathered that on the crock pot mixture and then grated some Parmesan cheese on the whole thing and it came out as a big 'ole bowl of carb-alicious comfort food. The potatoes way outnumbered the chicken but I think that's what I was going for....
I snapped that picture on our ping pong table minutes before devouring the whole thing with Mr. Gamer while watching a movie. I'm clearly a professional.
All in all, it wasn't terrible and definitely was not a disaster so let's count that as a success. It wasn't mind blowing but it was warm, full of carbs, and great for a dreary, rainy Sunday. Hubby insisted it was super yummy but he would say that no matter what because he's wonderful :)
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