B + B Tacos

A few weeks ago we went to Bryan and Betony's for taco night. An invitation for dinner with friends is always welcome, and if that dinner is tacos, I am all the happier. I have it bad for tacos.

An adorable thing I do while eating tacos is exclaim: "I think these are the best tacos I've ever had." The tacos are always the same, always equally good, but I just love them so much that I think every taco is the best taco I've ever had. Having said that, it is quite possible that the tacos we had at B + B's, might have actually been the best tacos I've ever had.

Here were the highlights:

• Taco beef cooked with taco seasoning, a jar of salsa, and a squirt of 1000 Islands dressing
• Hard tacos wrapped in soft tacos using refried beans as the glue
• Delicious homemade guacomole
• Thick, amazing sour cream
• Giant tacos loaded with awesomeness - I could only eat two but wanted ALL of them

Best tacos I ever had.

I thought about those tacos for days after, and then had to recreate them at home. We have re-done our meal plan to include two nights of these amazing tacos (leftovers for the win!) and we are looking into recipes to make our own refried beans. I might even have a go at soft tacos again, especially if I'm going to eat these every week...because obvioulsy I'm going to.

Here are the ones we tried at home. Forever thanks to B+B for their extensive knowledge of all that is delicious.

Refried beans on a soft taco (tortilla)

Soft tacos wrapped around hard tacos -- the best!

My filled tacos. This was day 2, so the guacamole was already all eaten

Holy crap these are so good! I want to eat them every day!

Mom's Mac and Cheese

We've added good old mac and cheese to our meal plan rotation. I wasn't in the habit of making it regularly because I thought cheese and milk were expensive. I have recently figured out that milk is cheaper than I think, and if there is a good cheese deal ($4 or less for 500g), a big pan of mac and cheese is only around $4.50. Pretty cheap considering the meal lasts two days and feeds two adults. It's also enough for late night snacks too. Mac and Cheese is also a great make ahead meal, either to freeze, or to make the day before if we know we won't have time to cook. I follow my Mom's recipe, which I've been eating for over 30 years now and still love.

Mom's Mac and Cheese (for 9x13 pan)

Ingredients:
4 cups dry macaroni
1/2 cup + 2tbs flour
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup + 2tbs margarine
3 cups milk
3 cups grated old cheddar cheese (about half a 500g brick)

Method:
Boil macaroni until desired tenderness. Drain and set aside.

In saucepan, melt margarine with flour (mixed w/ salt and pepper) over medium heat. 

Stir in milk. Stir constantly with whisk until thickened. Now, here is the deal with making the sauce: it takes about 7 minutes of constant whisking. I have no problem with the stirring, but my brain likes to chime in and convince me around the 6 minute mark that the sauce isn't going to thicken. Even though it does every time. My mom says she does this too. But don't worry if it happens to you. Your sauce will work out!

Once thickened, remove from heat and add grated cheese and stir until melted. 

Mix macaroni with cheese sauce until completely covered.

Pour into a 9x13 pan and spread out evenly.

Sprinkle with bread crumbs, butter, and spices to taste. I use Bulk Barn bread crumbs, but when mom makes this, she uses bread crumbs from actual bread. That she made herself. I was lucky growing up, eh? My store bought bread crumbs do the job, but mom's mac in cheese is just fantastic.

Bake in oven for 30 minutes at 350°F. And enjoy! Sometimes when I get it on my plate I smother it with Franks Red Hot. Pretty tasty.

Meal Planning Update - II

After three successful months of meal planning and eating at home for most meals, we fell off the wagon in April. But don't worry, we didn't fall too hard.

At the start of April we failed to make a written meal plan. Basically we thought we were meal planning pros who could just wing it. And actually, we mostly did. We have gotten into the habit of having food on hand and we (mostly) had enough ingredients for the meals we like to eat. The problem came with making meals that involved day-before planning (thawing and cubing meat, making sure we bought eggs, etc.). We didn't plan for certain meals so certain meals were skipped. It turns out we eat a lot of shake and bake chicken if we don't plan for variety. 

Also, despite having food at home, we were feeling super lazy in April. I think the way winter just

dragged on really affected our motivation. We also learned about the King Deals menu at Burger King, which only encouraged our laziness. They have a daily combo deal for only $5.30. Super deal! I happened upon it accidentally early in April and we ended up going four times in one week! We are silly like that.

April wasn't entirely without planning, as we decided to add home made sushi to the weekly schedule. It is one of my favourite meals, but I normally leave it for special occasions because I tend to make ALL the sushi. It takes me hours and I have to purchase and assemble numerous ingredients. I always make too much and eat too much, but I'm always soooo pleased with myself. John suggested I make smaller, human sized portions for us to eat. What a fantastic idea! I have made it twice since he suggested it and I couldn't be happier to be eating it weekly. I only make spicy California rolls (no hand rolls or smoked salmon rolls), but it is still extremely satisfying.

Now that April is over and the sun is back, we have written down our meal plan and are getting back on track. I've also expanded the meal plan to include a daily walk. Thankfully the weather has cooperated and I'm getting my walks in. Speaking of which, it is about time I get myself outside.

Reading What I Used To Eat

We are now on our third month of meal planning, and this month was by far the easiest to map out. As we created the newest plan we realized there are meals we want to eat more often (breakfast for dinner) and others we will no longer schedule every month (chili). Meal planning was once intimidating to me but now it is easy. I couldn't be happier with how it is going.

An awesome result of our meal plan is that we are saving money.  I have kept a budget for as long as I can remember and part of that is tracking my spending. I was curious how much money I used to spend eating take out/restaurant food in the months before I started meal planning, so I did some math. It turns out that I would spend about $75/month on take out. I realize $75/month isn't that much, but the majority of that spending was not planned. It wasn't special food or a treat. It was mostly "I need food and we don't have any" spending. With the meal plan in place we haven't had that desparate need for take out, so we saved money.

So what to do with the money I used to just blow on take out? I bought a book series I really wanted to own. I am a very frugal person so most of the books I read come from the library. I am happy to borrow a book and return it, as I don't really have the desire to own everything I read. But there are some books I want in my house permanently. 1984 is one such title. The Harry Potter series is another. And over the past two months, with the savings from meal planning, I picked up Jim Butcher's Dresden's files.

Now I can re-read them whenever I want, John can start reading them too, and they look really pretty on my shelf! 

Meal Planning Update

We are half way through the last week of our month long meal plan and it has gone amazingly well. It has been so wonderful to not only know what is for dinner but to also have all the necessary ingredients on hand. Who knew a little organization could feel so good?

We have stuck to the plan pretty well, only changing a few things around when we realized that Sunday is too lazy to cook vegetarian, and swapping different meals within the week just because we felt like it.  Also, when we made Chili, the leftovers lasted longer than expected and we replaced Taco night with Chili taco night.  We are being really flexible yet sticking to the essentials of the plan. The only time we ate off the plan was last Friday when my in-laws unexpectedly picked up dinner for us. It is hard to say no to free food, especially on a Friday night when we were feeling lazy.

With the organized menu, we have increased our vegetables intake which was one of my goals.  Lots of salads and steamed veggies with dinner, and I am getting super into sweet potatoes. I mashed one today and ate it with a sandwich at lunch time. It was amazing! We have also ramped up our use of the bread maker, as I've been making tonnes of buns, loaves of bread, and weekly pizza dough.  Home made bread and buns are cheap, easy to make, and taste delicious!

In terms of cost savings, we actually spent more on groceries this month than we normally do. I think it is a case of spending more on the front end and over time it will be cheaper for us.  We bought some staple items that we won't have to buy monthly (a 10kg bag of flour, 2 jars of yeast because they were on sale, etc.), and my freezer is currently a stockpile of meats that will last well into February.  Just based on the amount of food we still have, I am predicting that February we will spend less than we normally do.

The plan for next month is to repeat the meals we had in January, accommodating for the minor adjustments we made.  I think this is a plan that will stick for us!

Pizza Friday

Friday is Pizza night on our meal plan and last night we may have made the best home made pizza we ever have! We changed up the dough recipe we were using, as we thought there might be fluffier options out there.  I searched around the internet and think I've hit on one that works.

The dough rises more than the dough we used to make, so John used this fluffier dough to make a thick edge around the pizza. He basted the edge with olive oil and spices and sprinkled it with sesame seeds. It ended up tasting like garlic toast which really helped to make this pizza a winner!

The best part is that there are leftovers today!! YAY!

Buckets Full of Green

Part of my new meal plan is scheduling salad.  Believe it or not, my mind doesn't generally think of salad when it is thinking of side dishes. French fries? Sidekicks? Whipped potatoes? Those things I can think of no problem.  But salad I have to schedule.

Along with scheduling salad, I also have to remember to wash my lettuce/spinach on the day I buy it, or it is pretty much a guarantee that I will not eat it. Cutting up vegetables for a salad is hard enough, so I become a whiny little girl if it is almost dinner time and I have to wash lettuce too. "Aw, do I have to?" Most likely I will just skip the salad if it is not easy to make. I learned long ago to wash lettuce the day I get it, and it will always be ready to just mix and serve. No whiny me needed!

I used to store the lettuce/spinach in large Ziplocs, but recently picked up some plastic containers and they are just perfect. 

Yay salad!!

Meal Planning

John and I are starting a new 4-week meal plan today. We already cook most of our meals at home, but we aren't really organized about it. For example, if we bought a box of hamburgers to have hamburgers one night, we would often times end up eating them for multiple days in a row. We don't tend to keep the fridge/freezer regularly stocked, so we often default to what we have on hand.

                                             John: "What do you want for dinner?" 

                                             Me: "Uh...Well, we have hamburgers. So...hamburgers?"  

It is really easy for me to eat hamburgers three days in a row.

A burger on the third day still tastes pretty awesome.

A downfall of not having enough food on hand, is that we often only have half the ingredients for five different meals, so we can't make anything without going to the grocery store first.  Living out of town, those trips eat into our budget with not only the cost of food, but the needless expense of gas and putting extra KM on the car.  Also, when we go to the grocery store to pick up only one or two things, somehow multiple bags of chips, and/or candy, and/or chocolate end up in the cart too! Hopefully our new meal plan will equate to less trips to the grocery store and in turn less impulse buys in the snack aisle.  

Hey! Who put you yummy things in my cart!

Another bad habit of not having enough food on hand, is I tend to freak out if it is going to take to long to a) buy groceries and b) make dinner.  On those occasions, it is just easier to pick up take out.  So having a meal plan will hopefully curb our take out spending as well.

Our current plan is to:

Eat Healthier:

-Eat a variety of foods we already like, while eating more vegetables
-Eat vegetarian two times per week
-Eat less chips, chocolate, candy (treats)

Save Money:

-Only buy groceries we know we will need for the month
-No wasted gas/KM on impulse trips to the grocery store
-Home made whenever possible; use the bread maker to make buns, bread, pizza dough, etc.

With our freezer, fridge, and pantry FULL of food, we are going to try to stick to our plan for the next four weeks and see how it goes. I am so excited to not have to say: "What should we have for dinner?"  I already know what is for dinner for the next 28 days! January 10th? Shake and Bake chicken legs with steamed broccoli, carrots, corn and a side of mashed sweet potato. Jan 23rd? Tacos.  Mmmmmmm......