Chorizo Nachos and Raspberry Angel Food Cake

Cost: $12

Prep: 15 minutes

We decided to redo the nachos that didn't go so well last week. We had leftover sausages from last night, and this time, I added enough cheese!

The only problem was that when we bought the cilantro, the store had actually labelled Italian parsley cilanto. Oops. So, the salsa was simply tomato, onion, sugar, and lime..not so great.

Because of our excursion to the raspberry patch today, we have (had) three pounds of raspberries in the fridge. We bought a little whipped cream and an angel food cake to compliment a few of these. What a great dessert. Raspberries are my favorite, but the ones sold in stores taste so wrong. Has anyone else ever noticed that? There is something about raspberries either eaten straight off the bush or saved for later that has so much more flavor than the packaged and shipped store-bought counter-parts.

Fajitas

I am wondering if I should exclude posts when it is something I made all the time?

There is not much to say.

Quiche Lunch

Cost: $8

Prep: 20 minutes

The meal shows how flexible I am: something came up so I made our dinner for lunch! One thing I haven't commented on is brought to light by this post. My husband and I are both teachers. That means the three of us are at home for three meals a day for two months. Now, I don't go all out for lunch every day, but we can't eat grilled cheese and condensed soup every day.

So, tonight, there are plans to go to have a campfire, so dinner needed to be cooked. To make it more "lunchy", I added a handful of chips. Lol. No. I did that because I am pregnant and really want chips.  I am being honest.

I made mini-quiche. I needed to take something as an appie to our get-together tonight as well, so I managed two jobs at once.

I used organic non-sweet pastry shells as the crust. Inside, there was a bunch of yellow pepper, cheese, and crisp crumbled bacon. Add some milky whipped egg, bake 20 minutes, and you have lunch (or an appy, as I am bringing these cold to a baby shower soon too).

As an extra bit of health, I steamed some green beans and we had a hearty serving of these on the side.

Chorizo Nachos and Fresh Salsa

Cost: $8

Prep: 40 minutes

Another perfect summer meal, as this only needed to be ovened for about 10 minutes!

Matt made us a GIANT bowl of fresh salsa--the picture is of our large salad bowl and a serving spoon.. This is one of the best things he knows how to make, and is perfect for any summer day. It takes a lot of tomatoes, but when tomatoes are on sale, we eat as much of this salsa as we can. The other ingredients are simple: onion, cilantro, lime juice, bit of sugar. At times we add jalapeno, but not recently as we don't want to upset Charlie's belly.

For the nachos, I thinly sliced up the left over Chorizo from yesterday, as well as green olives and yellow peppers. The only downside to this meal was that I did not add nearly enough cheese to the Que Passo chips. The cheese was very finely grated, so I should have put a lot more than I did. I cooked it on parchment paper, which saved on clean up, as there basically was none.

Still, a bit of protein from the cheese and sausage, starch from the chips, dairy from the sour cream, and tons of veggies because of how much salsa we ate, I think this is a pretty decent meal.

Teeny-Weeny Quesadillas

Cost: $5 (or less)

Prep: 15 minutes

This was an easy meal with the purpose of using up leftovers. Some of the quesadillas had steak from our patio night and some had chicken from fajita night.

We used very small tortillas, and each little segment is about 2 or 3 bites. I think this would be a good little contribution the next time we go to a potluck.

Steak Dinner on a Lovely Patio

And it was our patio! Because summer is finally here!

Cost: $8

Prep: 30 minutes

Today was the first day that was night enough for us to take our dinner outside and dine on the back patio. It gets a bit too much sun though, and was actually maybe a little too warm still to eat as early as we do.

But, we perservered and ate our dinner, enjoying the novelty of eating "side".

My jobs were done inside. I steamed green beans and nuked some potaotoes that were then finished on the bbq. I also collected and cut some fresh herbs from our garden to eat with said potatoes.


That's it. That is all the cooking I did.

Matt marinated and barbecued the steaks--which were flipping fantastic. He also grilled some red pepper.

The meal, although it was dense, felt like summer. I love this part of the year! Our summer in Victoria is so mild (although above 25 degrees is still too hot for me!) when it finally arrives. I feel lucky to live here!

Fajita Buffet

Cost: $10

Prep: 15 minutes

We had a very busy today.

Charlie drove the car for a long time.

Then Charlie practiced on his bike for a while.

Then he chewed on a gross frozen banana for a while because he teeth really hurt :(

So, when it came time to eat, we ate simply. I whipped up some chicken (leftover from the other night when Matt barbequed a bunch of breasts) with peppers, onions, and seasoning.

We are these on little tortillas with salsa, sour cream, and mozzarella cheese.

BBQ Chicken Breast and Broccoli Alfredo

Sole Curry

Cost: $5

Prep: 30 minutes

We tagged team dinner tonight, and the prep went QUICK. Matt has been being a huge help in the kitchen, which is awesome, as it has been running very smooth.

Tonight, Matt whipped up a curry while I did the fish, rice, and dessert.

The curry had peanut butter, coconut milk, garlic, ginger, red pepper, green pepper, onion, baby corn, and an assortment of spices.

The fish, sole, was lovely, but way too small a serving. Charlie loves fish, and there just wasn't enough for him considering I seem to have only bought just over 100 grams.

Anyway, it was a decent meal with lots of leftovers. We ate very sour fresh strawberries for dessert, after which Charlie did his adorable baby sign and little word "more", which sounds more like "mohr".

Pizza!

Cost: $9

Prep: 20 minutes

We made pizza for dinner tonight. Well, Matt and I made pizza for dinner, and Charlie mostly stood starring at us while drinking watered down apple juice.

Matt and I had variations of the same pizza. Matt had barbeque sauce base with turkey pepperoni, onion, and peppers.

Mine had a tomato sauce base with turkey pepperoni, onion, peppers, and green olives.

One thing I like about this dinner is the leftovers. Charlie and my mom ate Matt's (oops!) leftovers the next day for lunch, and Matt ate mine the day after that (I am still buying a salad every day for lunch).

Tacos

Cost: $8

Prep: 20 minutes




It's tacos. Deal with it.

Soft ones to boot, yo.

Scallops a la Mom

Cost: $10

Prep: 45 minutes

Although this is one of the costlier and more labour intense meals I make, it is also one of the most delicious.

The scallops were not a bad price, as it was a buy 1 get 1 sale. One bag was $9.99, so each bag works out to about $5.

Here is how I made it:

I looked up alfredo sauce. I got out the closest ingredients I could. I did whatever I wanted.

I melted a large pat of butter. I added a cup and a half of milk. I crushed in lost of garlic. It simmered.

I melted in some onion cream cheese. I spilled in much more parmesan than I intended to use. I stirred.

It simmered.

Then, I boiled water. I added some Cattelli Smart pasta (the only box that was in the cupboard, much not have been on sale for a while). When the pasta was 2 minutes away from being cooked, I added 1 large finely chopped red pepper.

Then, I poured the sauce into a jug so I could cook the scallops in our single frying pan.

I had rinsed and dried the scallops this time, but it didn't seem to make a difference.

I heated the pan again with a bit of olive oil, then cooked up the scallops and put them on top the pasta/sauce.

Then I mixed it together and ground some fresh pepper on top.

I don't usually let Matt in on how I make his favourite meals. It gives him more incentive to keep me around.


But, oh well, this one can slip. It appears to be one of Chuck's favorite meals too. He especially loves the scallops. He has advanced (and expensive) tastes--his favourite food, after all, is cocktail onions...

LATE

Cost: $7

Prep: no idea

It is almost 8:30 and I am just sitting down to eat. Tonight we had parent/teacher interviews, so I am getting home MEGA late.

Matt made pizza though, for him and Chuck, and then he put one on late for me so it was still warm when I got home. How kind!

Now, I'm tired and hungry, so off I go to dine.

Matt's Pizza Dinner

Cost: $10 (for 5)

Prep: none  (for me)

Tonight, I got to sit with two of my girlfriends and chat while Matt made us a pizza dinner. It was fairly simple, but very tasty. We bought multigrain crust kits from Thrifty's (on sale for $5 for the two). For toppings, we had onion, peppers, olives, and pepperoni topped with mozzarella and parmesan.

For dessert, we had a blueberry coffee cake that was clearanced from Thrify's for $3. There is still one piece left, but we made pretty good work of it!

Leftovers for tiny quesidillas

Cost: $6

Prep time: 15 minutes

Tonight for dinner I made tiny, little, adorable quesadillas. I pulled out my awesome quesadilla maker. It was a bridal shower gift from my aunt and has a ton of use.

I used up whatever I could find in the fridge (1/2 a tomato, green pepper, red pepper, olives) and the leftover chicken from yesterdays roast chicken. I had bought the Smart 16 brand tortillas, and these worked really well for smaller sized bites.

Kitchen Sink Pasta

Cost: $9

Prep: 15 minutes (mostly chopping time)

This was a hard week. Between freezing our booty's off and strike action and a baby cutting four teeth, we were very tired. AND Matt was  even later than usual with a rugby game today.

So, the plan for tonight simply said "pasta and veggie?". Thanks, Kyla. Great planning.

At least we had bought the pasta. It was a Olivieri variety, cheese and asparagus ravioli. It was way too salty, so I am glad I mixed a lot of veggies in.

I fried up and crumbled on four strips of bacon. I finely chopped 1/2 a tomato, 1/2 a green pepper, and a whole orange pepper.

I boiled the veggies with the pasta for the final minute, so they were tender. I mixed parmesan (bad idea--too salty) and a bit of butter in with the hot pasta.

While I cooked, Charlie sat in the recycling and ate a whole lime.

He gave the meal his seal of approval: placing some on his head.