Menu Monday on Tuesday

If you've spent any time reading my blog, it won't surprise you to know that I love to cook and eat. Cooking for my family and friends is definitely one of my hobbies. 

I thought about starting a recipe journal for 2013 to record what meals we eat, where I found them, and whether we liked the meal or not. Then I remembered I had a blog and that this might be a better place to record those things. I'm going to try to stay somewhat current on my Menu Mondays, but I will be late more often than not. I'm starting out the year on a good foot, considering it's already TUESDAY, but whatever! Here's what we ate this week.

December 31, 2011 :: New Year's Eve

We stayed home, made a nice meal, watched a movie, and went to bed early! See also: we are old. Ha! We started with bacon wrapped water chestnuts as an appetizer and then enjoyed one of our favorite salads: romaine, orange pepper, hard boiled egg, and blue cheese with Garlic Expressions vinaigrette. We rounded out the evening with grilled steaks, Molly's Twice Baked Potatoes, and grilled onions. For dessert, we each had a chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwich from Trader Joe's. This was a great meal, but how could it have been bad? We went to bed fat and happy!

January 1

I was feeling pretty sick on New Year's Day, so I had a bowl of noodles with butter and garlic salt for dinner. It's one of my favorite easy meals! Tyler ate the leftovers from New Year's Eve.

January 2

Skinnytaste's Pasta with Butternut Sauce, Spicy Sausage, and Spinach

The only thing I did differently was that I sliced Trader Joe's Spicy Italian chicken sausage into links and browned it in olive oil (instead of crumbling it). This wasn't our favorite because it didn't have a ton of flavor. However, I attribute it to the fact that I used peeled and chopped frozen squash from Trader Joe's instead of fresh. We definitely want to give this another chance when squash season rolls around. I served it with roasted brussel sprouts and Sister Schubert's mini baguettes. Griffin loved it, especially the sausage!

January 3

Trader Joe's Spinach and Kale Bites with Tomato Basil Marinara and whole wheat thin spaghetti

About a month ago, the sample lady at TJ's was putting out these spinach and kale bites in their tomato basil marinara sauce. Griffin and I both loved them, so I picked them up and served them over thin spaghetti. I baked them in the oven according to package directions, then kept them warm in the sauce while I cooked the pasta. We had this with garlic toast and we loved it! It was a great, low calorie meal that was packed with flavor. If you have a local TJ's, you can find these bites in the freezer section! 

January 4

Ina's Winter Minestrone with Garlic Bruschetta

We always have a pot of soup on Friday nights. I left out the celery because I absolutely hate celery. It was a flavorful, easy soup that we really enjoyed! I halved the recipe and we had plenty to eat plus leftovers. I made the garlic bruschetta and it was the perfect accompaniment to the soup. This was a definite winner!

January 5

Erin's Bow Tie Fiesta

I have seen so many people rave about how good this is and I'm not sure why it's taken me so long to make it! I sent Erin a text asking her a question about making it ahead of time, and when I told her I'd never made it before, she told me she was ashamed of me-- haha! And RIGHTFULLY SO! I am so sad it's taken me a sweet forever to make this because it is SO DANG GOOD. I'm not even going to tell you how much of the pan we ate. The only thing I left out was the jalapenos. We ate it with homemade guacamole and chips. No, the chips were not homemade. Ain't nobody got time for that. (I love Sweet Brown; go look her up on YouTube if you don't know who she is!) This would be the perfect meal to take a new momma.

What about you? Any great meals you've enjoyed lately?