Weeks 9 & 10, 2022

Mon 2/28: steak and eggs with asparagus and hashbrowns. There were potatoes and asparagus and eggs from Well Rooted Farm to use up, so we decided to try to perfect hasbrowns… and missed a crucial step in the de-starching process. Still delicious thanks a Smoke City Meat bavette.

Tues 3/1: French Country sausage and artichoke pasta. One of our Smoke City faves. This was our inspiration — but with sausage.

Wed 3/2: green eggs and ham fauxtada. We had some sad tortillas that were not going to roll, homemade pesto Hampton made from saddening arugula, prosciutto, and eggs. This was ridiculous and also amazing. We warmed up tortillas with cheese in between — so it was inspired by a tostada but crossed a mini quesadilla? Eggs were scrambled with pesto, proscuitto was crisped, it was all piled up and drizzled with extra pesto, leftover hollandaise, and sriracha, and that makes zero sense but I swear it worked.

Thur 3/3: pickle-brined, dry rubbed St. Louis ribs, pickled slaw mix, grilled zucchini. We only got — and can’t get rid of — Amazon Prime for the TV [even though we still haven’t started this season of MRS. MAISEL], but the Whole Foods sales are a close second. Not much else to say but nom.

Fri 3/4: bone-in pork chops with pan sauce, saffron/pancetta potato salad, zucchini. Hampton is the king of pan sauce and this non-mayo potato salad from an old Trader Joe’s cookbook is a house fave. It was the perfect comfort food after a stressful audition. *foreshadowing*

Sat 3/5: lemon butter scallops with greens and walnuts, mushroom/parm risotto. I wanted to do something fancy after a long day of rehearsal. Having found recipes for scallops and greens and scallops and risotto, both it was.

Sun 3/6: Italian sammies and fries. Smoke City had a sale on their Steakhouse Grind burger meat and Hampton wanted to serve it on ciabatta rolls so we’d have extra rolls for prosciutto, mortadella, and fresh mozz, to use up that pesto he made earlier. It was a good plan. This was actually a big late lunch before I had a callback from Friday night’s audition. We figured we’d graze and maybe make frozen fried ravioli later. But I didn’t get home until it was way too late to eat. *more foreshadowing*

Lunches: leftovers and work caf. When all else fails.

Mon 3/7: burgers with bacon and smoked Gouda on ciabatta rolls with pickled veg, truffle mac. As mentioned, we had burger meat and ciabatta rolls on hand. Hampton quickled up some random veg to balance out the richness. Since we had fries the day before, we used up a pantry box of mac and cheese.

Tues 3/8: jackfruit and soy chorizo tacos with curtido. #tacotuesday. Hampton wanted to make this El Salvadoran slaw after seeing it somewhere, and we didn’t have a plan for a veg meal this week [and yes, we didn’t do one last week, thanks for noticing], so Hampton cooked his first jackfruit. It really is an excellent sub for tacos. With the slaw and some sautéed black beans and corn, the texture was just perfect.

Wed 3/9: wings two ways, carrots, fries, pickles. Hampton wanted to use up the wings in our freezer. He prepped some with a sweet and spicy Asian sauce and the others with a more traditional Buffalo. The pickles were a combo of leftover curtido and those made for the burgers. The fries were actually leftover from a lunch out Hampton had earlier in the week, warmed up in the toaster oven.

Thurs 3/10: chicken piccata meatballs with spaghetti squash, sautéed mushrooms and zucchini. I wanted to do something fancy for my one night off from rehearsal. And by “fancy”, I meant “lots of steps”, not just, like, steak. When we watched this week’s Food Network Tournament of Champions, there was a meatball showdown, so meatballs seemed to fit the “Ann fancy” bill. We used this recipe and served it with spaghetti squash and saddening shrooms and zukes and holy heck, it was So. Good. Hampton used the leftovers to show off to coworkers, and I ate them cold during our all-day Saturday rehearsal lunch break and was so happy.

Fri 3/11: pappardelle with pancetta and burrata. TJ’s now has pappardelle nests, so we decided to finally try them out. Easy peasy. Used up pancetta from the potato salad last week.

Sat 3/12: NY strip with white wine morel sauce, cous cous, roasted Brussels sprouts. Hampton wanted red meat and I wanted to try something new. This sauce used up the dried morels on our spice rack and was a perfect compliment to, you guessed it, and other Smoke City steak.

Sun 3/13: crispy chicken thighs with mustard and thyme, roasted potato and green beans with burrata. We had potatoes and burrata to use up so planned this meal around them, after seeing a few versions of roasted potatoes and melty cheese with herby oil dressing. We added green beans for color and cooked up these chicken thighs so as to try a new technique and also not have braising liquid leftover that we didn’t need.

Lunches: Cobb-inspired salads. Not gonna lie, I was inspired by this article. And also: they were amazing. I made the vinaigrette listed [plus garlic and oregano] but was wishing I just used ranch. But then when I actually ate the salads, I didn’t miss ranch at all! This may be my new backup when I can’t decide on/don’t have time for anything else. It was just salad mix, deli turkey, shredded cheddar, cucumber, and carrots — until Wednesday when I added corn leftover from taco night.