Meal Planning and Cooking

As many of you know, I am not naturally predisposed to the chore of cooking. There are a few things I enjoy making, more for the satisfaction in the end result than anything else. The actual process I usually find a bit tedious probably because I am not very practiced in cooking. But, things are getting better.

In Fall 2006, when Lance began his CGA program, we sat down and discussed changing our normal meal planning methods. Up until this point it consisted of Lance whipping up something delicious and (usually) nutritious while I did other things, usually chiming in to ask if help was needed at the precise moment that he was reaching for plates to serve. (We now call this the "helper-Jenn" maneouver). Now, I do most of the cooking during the week with a few exceptions.

I find it very difficult to think of things to eat. I think if I'd never met Lance, I'd probably be eating cereal for 2/3 meals a day and be having pbj sandwiches the rest of the time. There's a few things that I've found that have helped.

I'm a very organized person so I realized that it would be easier for me to have a plan ahead of time, rather than try to come up with dinner ideas at the end of each day. So, I started doing meal plans one week at a time. For inspiration, I check out Meal Plan Monday hosted on Organizing Junkie. You can also check out Organized Home or FlyLady for basics of meal planning. (I just linked to the home page, you'll probably need to dig for some meal planning info).

I also found a few recipe sites online that have helped tremendously. Not only do they help me to find new ideas, but I'm also a very computer oriented person and I take to storing recipes in digital format much easier than flipping through actual cookbooks on a regular basis. At first I found a social site called RecipeThing. It was pretty good for sharing recipes and had tagging features so you can categorize recipes in any way you want with as many different tags as you want. There's also a meal planning section and a pantry that can generate grocery lists. The grocery list never really worked for me. Even though you enter foods into your pantry, it didn't really differentiate when you had salt, but the recipe called for "a pinch of salt." So, unless you enter in every possible measurement for common items, they still wound up on your shopping list. The meal planner was useful, except sometimes I'd want something really simple (like Kraft Dinner) but didn't want to input a recipe for it. The only option was to leave that day blank, or drag a recipe from your list over.

What I've just started using, and am absolutely nutty about, is a much more comprehensive site called Meals Matter. The start page has a bunch of tips and recipe meal ideas. They even allow you to flag certain recipes for popular categories (quick meals, crockpot, kids love it, etc.) You can enter meals into your personal cookbook that has sections more like a traditional cookbook would. The only frustrating part of the experience for me has been that they want you to specify how many people it serves and how long to prepare and cook it. A lot of the time I'm unsure about how long it takes me to prepare or it's a flexible recipe that can serve between 4-6 people. But, that is just a minor part of the whole process. The meal planning section allows you to type in a description OR copy a recipe from your recipe book. It also gives you the option of selecting "eating out" for a meal. They allow you to plan for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and I hope they might add something in there for snacks too. The site is incredibly robust and now that I've copied my recipes from RecipeThing to MealsMatter, it's definitely what I'm going to be sticking with from now on.

A little later maybe I'll post some of my favourite online sites for finding great recipes.

Lent Begins

Several years ago, I started observing the season of Lent. I won't go into the all the religious significance of the holiday, but the gist of it is that you give something up or deprive yourself of something in recognition of Christ's suffering and deprivation before his crucifixion and resurrection at Easter. I'm sure those more religious than I am can explain it a bit better than that, so if you have more to add, please feel free to comment.

This year, I'd already decided that I would again observe Lent by depriving myself. Some people get confused that I do this since I don't go to church regularly (although regular church attendance does not necessarily correspond to devout belief) and many who do go to church no longer deprive themselves. I can't remember anymore exactly what I gave up . . . either soda or chocolate, but it doesn't really matter what I gave up, just that I decided to give up something that would be significant. When I first decided to give something up, my motivation was twofold. First, I had never observed Lent and wanted to try it out and actually observe something. The United Church has always been quite "laid back" about their observances and formalities so I'd never felt as though I should or I had to. But, I wanted to see what it was like, and if I could use it to focus my spiritual side more. My second reasoning was so I could purify myself of the "junk." It's always been difficult for me to ween myself off things, so going cold turkey seemed like a good method to try. I found that once I had it completely out of my system, I didn't really miss it that much, and was much less likely to indulge even after Lent was over.

My husband, who is not religious, but is spiritual, decided last year (or the year before - I forget) to also join me in my observation of Lent. He was quite impressed with the will power I show over the season and wanted to flex his will power. Plus, he enjoys the health benefits of cutting out bad foods for a time.

This year, we both decided we would again give something up for Lent. The way I always do it, is if I do have an occasional slip, instead of feeling incredibly guilty or anything like that, I "Buy a Bit of BC Goodness." What I'm referring to is a $2 contribution to the food bank that you can make at most grocery store cashiers, by simply tearing off the little coupon and adding it to your order. Anyway, this year we're both giving up alcohol and I'm also giving up chocolate, cake, 'junk' etc. It'll probably be a great move for our fitness training!

Now, there are certain things that I'm putting on my allowed list from the beginning . . .

1) fizzy o.j. - this is a treat Lance and I sometimes have that involves mixing orange juice with some seven-up. It's much healthier than straight pop is and since we don't drink pop and are giving up alcohol, it will be our indulgent beverage.

2) popcorn - the air popped kind made at home. I'll probably try it without butter and with less salt added.

3)chocolate protein shake - this is part of the training program we follow and I'm not going to spend $40 on a different flavour.

4)chocolate covered protein bars - same kinda deal as above. Besides, I don't think I've ever seen a protein bar that doesn't have some kind of chocolate flavouring/coating.

Since Easter Sunday is the week before we're supposed to run the Sun Run, I don't anticipate any giant binge that week. Maybe a glass of wine with Easter dinner and a small slice of dessert. But, other than that, we'll probably ease the foods back in.

Ok, I could go on a bit more, but I am still at work, so I should get back to it now!

Breakfast

If there's one meal that I take particular enjoyment in during the day, it would most definitely be my breakfast. It is the anchor to my culinary day and I have very strong feelings about my choice of breakfast food. I can't remember the last time I voluntarily went without breakfast. Unlike my colleagues and my family members, I'm not one of those people who can leave the house without breakfast. Plus, when I enjoy a particular type of cereal (like Cheerios) I can easily eat it everyday for years (from age 6-16) with very few breaks.

However, for some reason this morning I was running incredibly late and was forced to leave the house without even really packing a lunch (again, a rarity for me). So, I was forced to forgo my bowl of oatmeal. It has been my breakfast of choice for a while now. Nice and warm in winter time. I've been using the plain quick oats you can get in giant bags from Costco. Then I add my choice of flavourings. The things I add to my oatmeal are what really give it character. It can range from something quite normal like applesauce and cinnamon, to fruity jam, or even something a little 'nutty' like peanut butter. I like mine a little bit thinned out, so I'll add some milk to it. Lately I've been adding plain yoghurt to it instead of milk and it is quite tasty!

*sigh* It's noon and I've only just managed to finish my pesto scroll I bought from the bakery in liu of my oatmeal. It was not satisfying and it took forever to eat since I get interrupted at work all the time. I guess I'll just be savouring tomorrow's bowl even more now.