Let me know if this sounds familiar… Before I made my list and went to the grocery store, I told/warned my husband we were going to start eating healthier (all this spawned by a rare trip to the scale). I had fabulous intentions to incorporate more quinoa, whole grains, and “healthy stuff”, while cutting carbs and unnecessary fats out.

I got home from the grocery store, and laughed at myself as my husband pulled out a jar of Alfredo sauce, the porchetta (which is essentially a stuffed, bacon wrapped pork loin), and corn pudding (damn Trader Joe’s and their delicious holiday side dishes). Soooo… I’ll start with portion control this week and move on to healthier foods next week. Maybe.

Dinner Menu Week 48

This is How We Do It:

Coconut Curry Chicken over Rice

I know it seems like we’re having curry a lot lately, but this one is a bit different from what we’ve been having. We’ll use the pre-marinated curry chicken tenders from TJ’s, and serve it over their frozen basmati rice (after cooking it of course).

Steak, Cauliflower Mash, Asparagus

Got a good deal on some top sirloin, so we’ll grill those up, roast the asparagus in the oven drizzled with a touch of soy sauce, and make a cauliflower mash out of the riced cauliflower in the produce section of Trader Joe’s. For that, just cook per package directions, then add milk and butter and blend with an immersion blender to create a mashed potato-like texture.

Shrimp Ceviche Tostadas

Use the Shrimp and Pineapple (Cheater) Ceviche recipe, and serve it over tostadas. That’s somewhat healthy at least.

Porchetta, Corn Pudding, Salad

This is pretty much all Trader Joe’s as well. The porchetta is already stuffed and wrapped, so we’ll just have to cook per package directions. And as I mentioned earlier, the corn pudding is one of their famous pre-made holiday sides which are always amazing. Then we’ll add a side salad to be healthy.

Broccoli Cheese Baked Potatoes

I bought some beer cheese sauce from my work, but you could make your own cheese sauce or go completely old school and use Velveeta. Again, adding broccoli makes it healthy, right?

Broiled Salmon, Dill Potato Salad, Artichokes

We almost had healthy with this one, minus the potato salad. We’ll use this recipe for the salad, this method for the artichokes, and we’ll broil the salmon somewhat like this from Primavera Kitchen.

What We Really Ate Last Week – Check out how closely we stuck to the menu

Sunday – Bahn Mi (this one might have been left over from Week 46)

Monday – Thanksgiving leftovers… still

Tuesday – Turkey, brie and cranberry crescent rolls

Wednesday – Spaghetti

Thursday – Big Salad

Friday – Leftovers

Saturday – Frozen Pizza