Monday 14 December 2009

Calling all you Delia's / Nigella's and of course Kirsties....

HELP REQUIRED

I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO bored with the 'evening meal' chore in our house...

there is soo much that this one wont eat or that ones does not like that the weekly Cottage Pie, Jacket Potatoes, Fajita Wraps and 'something' with chips is now running rather thin.....

I NEED IDEAS PLEASE....

Any ideas that you ladies have or tried and tested family meal ideas....

Thanks

4 comments:

ittybittyandpretty said...

if you have a love for smoked salmon this one is a treat.
salmon and potato stacks
grated 500g potato and squeeze excess water out. add an egg and a packet of cheese sauce mix (dry) and salt and pepper to taste. shallow fry spoonfuls of potato to make small cakes (like fritters) drain and then layer with salmon. we like to make 3 stacks. top with a sour cream sauce that has had a squeeze of lemon juice and a handful of chives snipped into it.
my girls age 3,5 and 7 love it and actually could make it without my help except for the cooking bit!
mmmmm
xxrosey

Tilly said...

Just dropped in to wish you a Happy Christmas!

I know exactly how you feel, I'm sick of the sight of baked beans! My Nipper's really faddy but likes pasta with a cream or cheesey type sauce. I usually stirfry some veg and 'hide' it in the sauce and then add small pieces of ham or chicken. Pop some cheese on top and bake for about 30 minutes in the oven.

Tinyholder said...

Homemade fish cakes are really easy to make, or how about trying to introduce veg and vitamins by whizzing it up in a sauce for pasta, noodles etc? We were talking about this the other day. My mum used to not let my sister and I leave the table until we had finished our dinner. It did work. Both my sister and I now eat absolutely everything - I even eat weird and wonderful authentic Chinese and Burmese food. What about roasted butternut squash or aubergine? I bet kids would love that.

Caroline said...

Hi,
Just browsing your blog and I found this log. It brought me back in time, before we move to Singapore: full time job, almost no help and 3 kids with lots of activities therefore no time to cook. First I established some kind of routine: Tuesday = pasta (swimming training), Friday = pizza with salad(football training, ballet class). Kids loved it, it gave them some markers during the week. Then we did a list of dish we loved: pasta with salmon and prawns, stuffed pasta with mushrooms, pasta with meat balls and tomatoes etc... enough ideas for 5 weeks of menus. The benefits were:
1. the kids were involved in the choice and therefore more likely to eat what was presented,
2. that made my shopping chore much easier and in addition I reduced the cost of shopping knowing exactly what I would need for the week;
3. I cooked a batch at the beginning of the week for 2-3 meals, and then a second one mid-week.

In addition, I've started a book where we put all the recipes we tried and liked, we add comments of when we had the dish and it is a nice memory for all of us.

Here is one recipe from our book, very easy and fast to prepare and ideal for winter:

1 chopped onion
1 crushed garlic
2 chorizo sausages sliced in big chunk (or left over of any other sausages)
1 can white beans
1 can chickpeas
1 can chopped tomatoes
1 small red chilli (optional)
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
chopped basil

In a large pan, brown the onion and garlic in olive oil (5 min). Add chorizo and cook 5-6 min. Add the beans and peas (rinsed and drained), with tomatoes, chilli and balsamic. Cook for another 5 min. Then add the basil just before serving.

Hope you will enjoy it. I have plenty more.

Caroline