I sat down to post this week's menu, and realized that I never posted last week's menu! Drat! Oh well, at least I have five year's worth of menus already posted for you to choose from. ;)

This is week is the first week in a LONG time that everyone in my family is home every night during the week! Nice! I'm pretty excited about it. Just as an update, our family was successful at our races at Disney two weeks ago. Corey and I can now claim to be half-marathoners, and Eric ran a full marathon! We are pretty proud of ourselves.

Enough of that, though. Here's this week's menu. Enjoy and have a great week! Be sure to follow me on Facebook to get fast updates from the blog. :)

Sunday - Chicken and Dumpling Casserole, Green Beans, Salad

Monday - Chili Ranch Grilled Pork Chops, Broccoli, Salad, Strawberries

Tuesday - Ott's House Casserole, Green Beans, Salad

Wednesday - Baked Tilapia with Horseradish Sauce, Rice, Broccoli, Salad

Thursday - Hamburger Soup (from freezer, Salad, Orange slices

Friday - Leftovers

Saturday - Roast Beef, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans, Salad

For more menu ideas, visit orgjunkie.com.  

This is a great no-meat meal that my whole family loves. The lime and cilantro give it such a fresh taste! You can just use plain rice if you don't want to go the expense of making the saffron basmati rice, but it is very tasty and a nice treat.

Ingredients:

For the rice:
1 pinch saffron threads
olive oil in a mister bottle
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1 cup basmati rice
2 cups chicken stock

For the beans:
1 can low sodium black beans, rinsed and drained
1 can low sodium pinto beans, rinsed and drained
2 limes
1/2 t. cumin
3/4 t. chili powder
2-3 T chopped cilantro

Toppings:
fresh salsa
sour cream

Directions:

To make the rice:

Put the saffron threads in a small bowl and crush them a bit with the handle of a knife (or use a pestle if you own one). Pour in a 1/4 cup hot water and soak the saffron for 5 minutes. This helps it release its flavor.

While the spice is soaking, rinse your rice in a colander. Spray the bottom of a 3 quart saucepan with olive oil. Add in the chopped onion and saute on medium heat until the onion softens and starts to caramelize. Add the rice to the pot, mixing with the onion, and stir for one minute.

Pour the saffron liquid evenly over the rice mixture. Make sure you get it all out of the bowl - saffron is expensive! Add the broth and bring to a boil. Turn down the heat, cover and simmer for 20 minutes or until the liquid is absorbed and rice is cooked through.

To make the beans:

While the rice is simmering, pour the beans into a small pot. Squeeze the juice from the limes over the beans. Add the cumin and chili powder. Heat through, stirring occasionally. Right before serving, stir in the chopped cilantro. We like a lot in ours.

Serve the beans over the rice. Top with fresh salsa and sour cream.

One of my favorite treats at Silver Dollar City during Christmas season is a serving of their ham and beans with fried potatoes and corn bread. I had never made ham and beans at home before, and decided it was about time I try. I'm so glad I did, because it was very easy, and my recipe is even better than SDC! :)

Ingredients:
1 ham bone (I get them from Honeybaked Ham)
1 lb. great northern beans
1/2 lb. pinto beans
2 t. onion powder
1/2 t. pepper

Directions:
Rinse the dried beans and remove any residual material. Soak overnight in 8 cups of water (at least 8 hours). Drain soak water and rinse beans.

Add 8 cups of hot water to rinsed beans in a large stock pot. Add the ham bone, onion powder and pepper to the pot. Simmer covered for 2 hours until beans are tender and ham is falling off bone.

Remove the ham bone and pull off meat. Chop into bite-sized pieces and return meat to pot (discard bone). Stir and serve.

This makes a huge pot of ham and beans. The leftovers freeze well.

This is an exciting week for the Matzat family. This weekend, we travel to Florida to run the Disney Half Marathon (Corey and me)/Marathon (Eric)! We've been training very hard the last few months for this race, and we are so ready to be finished! :) Because we will be gone over the weekend, I'm going to go ahead and post the menu for the next two weeks. I'm not posting anything for the days we are gone. Our housesitter is on his own for cooking. :)

Here's this week's menu. Enjoy and have a great week! Be sure to follow me on Facebook to get fast updates from the blog. :)

Sunday - Steak, Baked Potatoes, Green Beans, Salad

Monday - Ham and Beans (from freezer), Sinfully Sweet Cornbread (from freezer), Salad

Tuesday - Homemade Pizza (needed to use up some extra sauce and mozzarella I had in the fridge), Salad

Wednesday - Creamy Chicken Breasts (didn't get to them last week), Rice, Green Beans, Salad

Thursday - Spaghetti, Broccoli, Salad, Garlic Muffins (carb loading for the race )

Friday - Sunday - Eating in Florida - Housesitter on his own!

Monday - Turkey and Gravy (from freezer), Mashed Potatoes (from freezer), Green Beans

Tuesday - Grilled Fish Tacos (just grill some Tilapia and slap it on a tortilla!), Strawberries

Wednesday - Southwest Beans and Rice (recipe later), Salad

Thursday - Leftovers

Friday - Taco Salad, Applesauce

Saturday - In N Out Burgers, Green Beans, Salad

For more menu ideas, visit orgjunkie.com.