whatcha got cookin'?

I mentioned earlier that my 2016 resolution is to try making one new recipe a week. (I'm still doing a book a week—I have plans to write a post about that too!) I've mentioned this to a few people who are curious about this venture and ask me what I've been doing to keep up my goal so I thought I'd share some tips and some of my favorite recipes I've made so far this year. 

First of all, you have to have a good weekly game plan. This might be a no-brainer for some people but Robbie and I have been married almost eight years and before this year I'd never made a meal plan. Before we got married I subsisted primarily on quesadillas and black bean burritos and that didn't transition well into meal-planning for two. It was made worse by the fact that Robbie is an exceptionally good cook and really enjoys it, so I usually left him to it. I also started full time work and grad school soon after we got married so it just fell by the wayside for a while. Now I'm at a phase in my life where it makes the rest of my everyday activities easier if I just take some time to plan. I bought myself a tiny dry-erase weekly calendar at Target that hangs in our kitchen and I take great pleasure in filling it in and erasing it every week. It's the little things.

Outsourcing your grocery shopping is a great way to cut down some of your meal-planning tasks

The next part of your game plan should include deciding when you go grocery shopping. Once I picked a day to do it every week it just got easier. Living in a city where the grocery store isn't all that easy to get to means I really have to plan ahead of time if I don't want to keep getting overpriced canned goods at a corner grocery store. The main grocery store options here are Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, and Amazon Fresh (or some other food delivery service of your choosing). Or I can pay a $5 toll and drive into New Jersey to go to Wegman's, which everyone loves but I'm just as content with Trader Joe's (Monrovia pride?) and I've gotten used to their weird inventory after many years of shopping there almost exclusively. We did Amazon Fresh for a while when we had a free trial membership but the groceries are just so much more expensive and I prefer to choose my own produce and brands. At any rate, I realize that's not a concern for a lot of people but now you know how the other half lives—too many expensive bougey grocery options to choose from over here. Rhoda's pretty easy to shop with but I still do my shopping on Thursdays while she's at play school. Mostly because it's a set day where I have two hours to myself and it's enough time to get something done but not anything really ambitious.

So I realize that all that information is definitely not news to most people (grocery shopping for a family in an urban area is no joke) so let's get to the good part—where do I get ideas of what to make next? I am active on Pinterest and keep a fairly well-updated inventory of food I want to try making (here and here), and I also keep track of food that I've made (here) with some notes about things I liked/didn't like/changed about the recipe. My absolute favorite resource is Smitten Kitchen. I'm convinced that Deb Perelman can do no wrong. She is great at updating Instagram as well with seasonally appropriate recipes so you don't have to sift through a decade's worth of yummy-looking recipes on her blog. Since I spend a lot of time on Instagram I get lots of my food ideas from her updates and pin them for later. My other favorite resources are physical cookbooks—Cook's Illustrated, America's Test Kitchen, and Dinner: A Love Story (also a blog) have some pretty solid finds for average home cooks. You should have these in your arsenal if you're a regular mom who likes food that kids like but taste good for adults too (though Cook's Illustrated is arguably a bit more bougey).

Some of my 2016 makes that you should try (that I just realized aren't very vegetarian-friendly... sorry Kate):

• Millionaire Bars—these are basically homemade Twix and worth the effort. I made these at my brother's house over New Years and my SIL had all the ingredients in her pantry so we were like, why not? All the stirring and boiling wasn't as tedious because I was in a big kitchen and had better tools at my disposal. But like I said, none of that matters because the bars are so good. My mom, dad, Robbie and I polished off a pan of these in 24 hours and that might not have been the best way to ring in the new year.

• Tomato and Sausage Risotto—SO GOOD. Flavorful and relatively easy, even if you have to stir the risotto for a long time. Always worth it. Also worth it is not omitting the white wine in the recipe. As a non-wine drinker I usually end up omitting wine in recipes but then our friend told me that you can buy mini bottles of wine, which is great because 1) they're about the size you usually need for a recipe, and 2) you can refrigerate them after you open them and use them for a future recipe. Don't omit the wine, people.

• Great-Grandma Turano's Meatballs—Robbie loved this one. It's such a guy recipe. The sauce is so good and this meal could feed an army. If you only have three people in your house like we do, you can save the leftovers for meatball subs.

• Momofuku's Bo Ssam—this requires a little extra effort because some of the ingredients are kind of obscure (but easily attainable at your local Asian market... if you have one) but it's great for feeding a crowd. It just requires slow-roasting a huge pork butt in your oven for 6 hours and serving it with rice and lettuce. Pretty darn good. Leftovers also make great sandwiches!

• Belgian Brownie Cakelets—heaven.

• Lentil Soup with Sausage, Chard, and Garlic—I'm just really into Italian sausage these days. I blame/thank Philly for that. I subbed the chard for spinach in this one and it was tasty. Also I'd use all four links of sausage instead of the recommended two.

• Potato, Garlic and Leek Soup—I just made this last weekend when Robbie's sister came into town and it was a hit. I have a few similar recipes in my "I Made This" folder but this had a little more flavor and the pancetta bread crumbs were extra awesome.

• Mulligatawny Soup—you can probably tell we're a big soup family. I was super into this one. Robbie made naan from a recipe in Cook's Illustrated and it was a hit. Rhoda ate it without any resistance.

• Sizzling Fajitas—I also made these for a crowd, when the Selanders came to town and my friend Sui Lang popped by for dinner the same night (I think I doubled it for that many people). Huge crowd pleaser and not a ton of effort for big impact.

• Oven-braised Beef with Tomato and Garlic—SO EASY. I just made this on Sunday. Robbie doesn't love most pot roasts because they're dry, but this one was really moist and flavorful. The orzo was also a nice touch.

Those recipes really are just the tip of the iceberg but you can see a few other favorites on my Pinterest page, as I mentioned earlier. For those who are not as into meat treats there are lots of veggie-heavy hits on there that were in the rotation before 2016, like Chickpeas with Chard and Pan-Roasted Tomatoes, Grown-Up Grilled Cheese Sandwich (ok that's a REALLY good one), and Spinach and Chickpeas.

Also, in case you think you're not capable of picking a new recipe to try each week, I have to admit to you that I eat a quesadilla almost every day for lunch and we make pizza for dinner at least one night a week—pizza that doesn't even have veggies or anything redeeming on it as a topping. Also, my kitchen is about as big as a handicapped bathroom stall. I laugh at Pinterest posts that highlight "small" kitchens that are two or three times the size of mine, but that's what I get for living in 100 year-old houses. I'm cool with it.

I believe in you, reader. If you're in a rut, just try one new recipe a week so you're not so overwhelmed and do everything else you usually do the rest of the week. And if you have any good recipes you think I should have, PLEASE share them with me.