The weekly menu

This post is laaaaaate…ok, so I’m just going to do both the past two weeks in one post because I am so behind.  I have good excuses – my little man was sick all last week and then he got better and then had an allergic reaction (during a dairy trial) and then all of a sudden it was his birthday!  So I now have a two year old.  Crazy stuff.  How about some food peppered with my random thoughts?

Holy crap this was a long time ago.  We went to our friends’ house for a super bowl party and I brought a lactose free spinach artichoke crab dip.  One of the people who hosted the party is also lactose intolerant, like myself, so he was stoked.

I looked up a bunch of recipes but then ended up kinda doing my own thing…I used Green Valley organic lactose free sour cream, goat chèvre, mayo, frozen kale, canned crab, canned artichokes, garlic infused olive oil, parsley and lemons (from the garden) and I don’t remember what else…but it was delish.

And since our friends are super freakin’ awesome they made sure the meal was allergy friendly for P (their daughter has peanut/tree nut allergies too).  We drubbed on tacos with the works and P took down more tortillas with avo than I did!  Sometimes it’s very obvious from whom he inherited his appetite.  😉

BBQ chicken in the crockpot (breasts plus sauce plus time equals zero effort) paired with a brussels sprout Caesar salad.  This was an easy one because the hands on cooking time is pretty much negligible.  I massaged the raw shredded brussels with dressing in advance so they would break down, much the way I would with a kale salad.  And the chicken shredded in 2 minutes because that’s what the crock pot does to it.  Magic.

Oh, and there was quinoa too.

And home-made ice cream for dessert.

I chopped a bunch of candy bars and then stirred them into the same coconut base I always use (canned coconut milk and sugar) and boom, ice cream bliss.

It only lasted us three days!

This meal was nom nom paleo’s asian almond chicken salad and it was stellar.

I tweaked it because I couldn’t get my hands on kohlrabi or jicama, so I just used apples instead.  Gave a good crunch and some sweetness, so I think it was a nice touch.  I doubled the dressing after I made it though because I could tell it wasn’t going to be enough at all.  I want mega dressed salads, thankyouverymuch.

Mmmmm…highly recommend.

Next up was this spicy pork and mustard green soup from last year’s Bon Appetit.

I made it last year when I was doing the “cook the cover” challenge and it remains one of the best BA recipes ever.  In my opinion.  Kyle’s too.  So so good.

It’s kinda a shock I have pics of this dinner at all because it was made in very bizarre conditions.

See what happened there?

My poor sick boy, who hadn’t napped for longer than 30 minutes all day, fell asleep in my arms while I was stirring ground pork.  He was so miserable he refused to part with me for even a second so I thought maybe I could prepare dinner while holding him…but no.

In the end I turned off the stove and sat on the couch to soak up the snuggles (while praying I didn’t poison us all later with half cooked ground pork).  His mama nap didn’t last long and when he woke up he wasn’t much better off (still sick and miserable).  He had no interest in eating dinner, but I convinced him to have some coconut milk and then we just skipped straight to his bedtime routine.  A steamy bath and sleep did him good and the next day he was still sick but remarkably improved.

Moving on.

Not gorgeous by any stretch of the imagination, but these were super yummy fried crab cakes.   This is what happens when you buy bulk cans of crab meat, I guess.

The recipe is another from nom nom paleo (Krabby Patties), which I prepped the night before (as in the night P fell asleep in my arms as I was cooking) because I feared the next day would be a repeat.  So I chopped and mixed everything on the late night to ensure I wouldn’t have a repeat situation the next day.  And that made the cooking process so so simple.

I fried them while feeding P and purposefully gave more to Kyle because I had a baby shower to attend that night (with LOTS of yummy food).

I don’t recall which night it was, but we also ordered sushi instead of sticking to the menu because I was exhausted and just didn’t have the energy.  I think it was a Monday night because I usually get home later on those days because P and I go to a parent co-op nursery school together which ends at 4:30.  Of course we stay and chat for way too long after though (all his friends/my friends are in the same class).  So yeah, sushi for the win.

There were skipped meals, as you can see, which I intended to push to the next week but then a bunch of things came up.

We had to re-book a hospital tour (because it was originally supposed to occur on the day that P was super sick) and the time of the tour was smack in the middle of dinner.  And since the hospital is not in Davis, it made sense to eat out that night.

And then my parents decided to visit (they’ve been on vacation) so they treated us to Thai take out.

And then my sister came to visit and I winged it because I was feeling lazy.

But aside from that, there were a few planned meals that we actually did end up eating…

“Al fresco” style but indoors because it’s still not summer.  I already shared this in the weekend post.

Burrito bowls are always a good choice.

Especially because P likes (and tolerates) all the same components.  Multiply the beans on his tray by 5 and you will have a better picture of what he really ate.

And then there was this kale and quinoa salad with citrus dressing.

FYI this is what retired chem goggles are best used for (eye protection while chopping onions).  I texted this photo to a girlfriend because I had mentioned it was what I did in a recent conversation we had.  She told me the blog world needed to know about this so here’s the evidence.  You can thank me when your eyes are tear free from now on.  🙂

Citrus is something we have in spades at the moment so I was happy to get some of them juiced for this dressing.

Fantastic recipe.  P ate the sautéed onions too (before I added the almonds, obviously).

Kept it simple the next day (pulled chicken from the freezer) to cook and shred and add to (another) brussels Caesar salad.  What can I say?  I like salads.  And Caesar salads.  And Brussels sprouts.

Here’s the Thai take out scene from the night my parents were in town (which we also made into a semi-informal birthday party).

Before we got the Thai stuff out, P ate his own dinner…then we sang happy birthday and he blew out his 2 candle and ate a birthday cupcake.

I had a trial run making allergy free cupcakes and it was a success so as long as it works with a full batch I’ll share the recipe later.

He very much liked them.

The take out is from KetMoRee, which I had never tried before (Kyle had) and we got a mix of meat and veg dishes and some were pretty dang spicy!

Not too greasy and decent portion sizes, so I think we would order from there again.

I’m going to be winging it for the rest of the week because we are at the hospital for the tour tonight, and then we have Kyle’s parents in town for the weekend (and it’s my big boy’s party).  Happy almost Valentine’s Day for the people who care about that business.  XXX

Oh and I’ll be back later to share more about the dairy trial (that failed) too.  Needless to say, patty cakes has not outgrown at least one of his allergies (the mildest one as per his 9 month old blood tests).  So yeah.  Sad face.