Monday Breakfast – French Toast with Strawberry Butter, page 12 Kids Cooking
We had a family dinner for Baba’s birthday on Monday but we thought we would try another breakfast recipe. Kaitlyn wanted to make the French Toast with Strawberry Butter and Daddy left for a business trip to China, so I decided it was a good morning for a family breakfast. This recipe was much more appropriate for the age of my girls. Kaitlyn helped gather all the ingredients, washed and cut the strawberries, measured the ingredients, blended the butter and made the egg batter. All I did, other than supervise, was dip the bread slices and cook the French Toast. I was a bit hesitant about the strawberry butter but it was better than expected. The strawberry flavour on the French Toast was very good but the excess butter felt unnecessary. I would have preferred a light strawberry sauce but it was definitely a more kid friendly recipe.
Tuesday – Aloha Shrimp Stir-Fry, page 92 Healthy in a Hurry
The girls love shrimp and frequently ask for it so I thought this would be a perfect recipe to try. Overall this one was pretty good, and it only took 10 minutes to prepare – I actually had to make white rice instead of brown or it wouldn’t have been ready in time. I was surprised how hard it was to find uncooked large shrimp that were peeled and deveined. I had to purchase ones with tails on and pull the tails off but it wasn’t a big deal. The only substitution I made was that I used defrosted frozen mixed stir-fry vegetables. This probably made it a bit faster to prepare. Next time I make this I will add more cornstarch, the sauce didn’t thicken very well. A nice light dinner.
Wednesday – Speedy Pasta in a Pan, page 44 The Family Dinner
I love getting comments on my posts or responses from my tweets so I was thrilled when The Family Dinner responded to my tweet:
May we next suggest: speedy pasta in pan, black bean cakes, peanutty noodles?All so good! RT@KEMmommy: CookBook Trials – http://t.co/bpY8TYL
I had already done my meal plan for the week but I modified it to inlcude the Speedy Pasta in a Pan. It was a good day to do this recipe because I had a couple of hours at home in the afternoon so I could prepare the dish and then after spending an hour at the school I could just cook it for the last 15 minutes. I also doubled the recipe to have another dish for another night so this was a bonus. This time I made the basic recipe and it was good, however it would be much better with sausage or vegetables added. I also may reduce the amount of mozzarella cheese on the top of the dish. My girls loved it. They rarely ask for seconds but today they both did.
Thursday – Personal Pizzas, Kids Cooking
Some time between Thursday and the weekend I have misplaced copy of Kids Cooking so I can’t tell you the page right now. It has to turn up somewhere. These pizzas were made on english muffins, and we decided to use whole wheat. The kids enjoyed them and they were easy to make but again they were nothing special.
Friday & Saturday
Friday night we were at the dress rehearsal for the dance recital until 7:00 so instead of left overs we drove through Little Caesars and picked up pizza. Saturday we went to Gramma & Grampa’s for dinner
Sunday – The Family Dinner: Organic Chicken Legs (page 42) & Chocolate Pudding Fast (page 213)
Gord was still in China so we had Gramma & Grampa over for dinner. I learned a valuable lesson – read your recipe many times very carefully. I some how missed that I needed to cook the chicken in the oven for 45 minutes. I had the roasted potatoes, asparagus and carrots done a good 30 minutes before the chicken but amazingly everything seemed to work out. Normally I don’t like chicken drumsticks but these weren’t bad. I went to the poultry counter at the market and asked for chicken legs and they gave me drumsticks, so I cooked a lot more than the 4 that were called for. The tomatoes, onions, and garlic were a great sauce but I think I will try it with chicken breasts next time.
We always have homemade desert on Sundays and we were planning on making the brownies in the Kids Cooking books but since we couldn’t find the book we had to improvise. I found a recipe for chocolate pudding in The Family Dinner which I had all the ingredients for in my pantry & fridge and my girls love chocolate pudding. I have never made homemade pudding before (not sure why) so I wasn’t sure what to expect. Normally our pudding comes out of a box or plastic container. I was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was and I thought it tasted pretty good. Kaitlyn liked it but Eileen did not like it. I used semi-sweet chocolate and hence it was not overly sweet. I am going to find some good milk chocolate and try it again.
Next week we are using mostly The Family Dinner in our menu plans with a couple additions from Healthy in a Hurry. Hopefully Kids Cooking shows up soon.
Mommy's Lessons 