Menu Plan Flop

Seeing as I barely followed my menu plan for last week, hence no post about it, I decided to do a "what I ate yesterday" type post for today.  But back to last week for a second.  I managed to make 2 out of the 5 meals I had planned for the week.  Poor planning was the issue here.  LOL  I totally discounted the fact that Monday was Halloween and the kids really had no interest in eating much so instead of pork chops we ate egg sandwiches.  Noah had an out of town hockey game on the Tuesday so oven baked pizza for the road it was in place of the planned turkey sausages.  Wednesday I DID bust out the chicken I had planned.  Once again I stuffed the breasts with mozzarella cheese, basil pesto and roasted red peppers.  For a side I sautéed a package of sliced mushrooms with garlic then added 1 cup of water and a 1/2 cup of quinoa, covered and cooked it for 15 mins.  Voila!

I also made Thursday night's pasta dish.  Elbow rice noodles, homemade marinara and sliced chicken breast topped with smoked chipotle Tobasco sauce and freshly grated Parmesan cheese:

I had a touch of stomach upset Friday so while the fam ate their burgers, I had poached eggs on toast.  That's my #1 go to when I'm not feeling 100%.

On to yesterday's eats.  I bought some GF cinnamon raisin bread from the bakery over the weekend so I toasted up a few pieces and topped them with almond butter:

I'm on a late lunch hour this week (12:30-1:30) so I knew I'd need a little protein to get me through the morning:

I've still been going the the gym over my lunch, but on Tuesday there is a yoga class in there so I went home instead.  Once again, I was feeling some eggs!  I made 2 over easy eggs and popped them on top of GF bean bread and a slice of mortadella:

SO GOOD!  I really think I could eat eggs at least once a day and not get tired of them.  :)  Dinner was as per the menu plan; turkey, polenta & peas.

No natural light by the time we ate!  HAHA!  We had nothing going on last night so there was ample time to roast up a turkey breast for supper.  The polenta was super easy; 1 cup water, 1 cup milk, 1 tbsp butter....bring to a boil then whisk in a 1/4 cup of dry polenta (cornmeal).  Stir until thick, about 5ish minutes.  I also stirred in about a 1/3 cup of grated Parm  at the end.  And there you have yesterday's eats!  I also have a photo of today's breakie; 2 Nature's Path GF wildberry waffles topped with peaches that I sautéed with a little honey and cinnamon:

Delicious!!!

***To all my Canadian readers: CLICK HERE to be sure you don't miss out on your chance to win a brand new Kitchen Aid 13 Cup Food Processor!!!!  If you DO NOT do the facebook thing, never fear! Just skip those steps and answer the 2 questions in the comments section.  Make sure to leave a separate entry for both!!***  

Going to the Fair!

First off, THANKS to all of you who responded to my Christmas food drive “challenge”!!  It truly doesn’t take a whole lot to make a difference in another’s life.  A few of you asked if you could send one “big” photo at the end of all your food items and that is absolutely fine!  I can’t wait to put a post together showcasing everyone’s stash.  Also, feel free to jump in at any point!  Don’t worry if you’ve missed a week or 2…remember; every little bit helps.  For those of you reading about this for the first time, you can see the deets at either the link above or by checking out the new “Thanks & Giving” tab at the top of the blog.  Don’t forget to spread the word!!!
We finished off our Thanksgiving weekend by going to a fall fair in a small community down the road from us.  
My in laws had some horses there over the weekend and some other relatives of my hubby were involved in a tractor pull.
There was typical fair food of which we had none!  We all had late breakfasts and weren’t hungry.
We saw some super cute farm animals:
LOVE the Llama!!  There were rides, of course:
Are you surprised that DS made a beeline for the bumper cars?  Maybe you’ll be more surprised that he ended up at the hockey shooting area?
LOL!!!  And lastly, check out some of this prize winning produce!
Holy beet and pumpkins, eh???
Back to breakfast for a second…. Saturday night I put steel cut oats in the crock pot for no fuss meals this week.  I simply put 1 cup steel cut oats,  4.5 cups of water, 1 tbsp cinnamon, 1 tbsp of vanilla and a wee bit of salt in the slow cooker and let it go for 8ish hours.  A quick stir in the morning and it was ready to go!  I got 4 portions from the batch and here are the first 2:
I think I’ll be preparing oats like this more often.  What a huge timesaver on weekday mornings!!
In other news from the weekend I decided it was time to cook a zucchini from the garden that was as big as my arm.  I kid you not!
I diced the whole thing and saved half for another night.  The other half was sautéed with about a ¼ cup of thinly sliced pancetta (Italian cured bacon).  I ate a big helping of it at dinner along with some quinoa salad (recipe to come):  Here’s some other noteworthy food from the past few days! This was a very simple jambalaya.  I simply sautéed a red and yellow bell pepper, an onion, mushrooms, spices, a can of diced tomatoes, chicken breast and shrimp together in a big pan.  Then I served it over basmati rice.  SO GOOD!!

We also “baked” cookies yesterday and I admit that I totally cheated!

LOL!  The kids had a blast.  Even if we only had Christmas colours to decorate with.
And finally, more treats.  We placed an order with the high school bakery for ginger cookies and a pumpkin pie:
All delicious.  Also, we stopped by the bakery on our way home from the fair and chose a few treats:
The donut was for DS, the lemon cupcake for my hubby, the brownie for DD and the raspberry coconut square pour moi.  The cookies went into the kids lunches today.
And that’s all I’ve got for today!  Off to watch The Biggest Loser!
Bye for now!!

Highlights

Hi!!  It seems like I’ve been gone from the blog so long.  “Busy” has been my middle name the past few days and I can guarantee  that I’m exhausted today.  I don’t have the energy for a huge post and wouldn’t do that to you anyways, so I present you with some highlights instead…
Wednesday
It was a typical day at work.  I did have a pretty decent lunch, though! 
Cottage cheese, blueberries, a peach and honey. 
I also picked my first spaghetti squash of the season from my garden.
I steamed half and topped it with salsa, a wee bit of sour cream and kidney beans for a great meal!
I bought these 2 chocolate bars that were just begging to come home with me: I’ve only tried the 64% with cacao nibs and its to die for!
Thursday
This was actually my Friday.  Amen!!  My belly was a little off all day so I decided to buy some chicken soup from Tim Horton’s instead of eating the tomato/tuna salad I had packed:
I kept dinner light, too with scrambled eggs and a toasted Ezekiel muffin with zucchini jam: We went to Costco after dinner to pick up a few pies for the hockey fund raiser Friday night.  Each family was required to bring dessert so we took the easy way out! 
Friday
DD had an appointment downtown Toronto so that’s where I spent my day.  Looks like a mall inside, doesn’t it?  After her appointment we grabbed some Starbucks and walked around outside for a bit.  I had a grande iced decaf Americano with a shot of vanilla syrup:
DS was pretty sure he was gonna “pet” one of these pigeons: Yeah, right!  :)  On the way home we stopped at Chudleighs apple orchard to see what varieties were available.   The one I love, honey crisp is due out at the end of September along with the kids fave, McIntosh.  I did, however, get my second fave: Friday night was the hockey party.   My babysitter bailed in the 11th hour so we ended up renting a room at the hotel that the party was held at.  One of the dad’s is the manager so anyone who wanted to have a few drinks got to stay at a reduced rate.  We stashed the kids with movies and what such and proceeded to have a blast.  Don’t worry, we checked in on them frequently.  I  knew dinner would be a late one so I had a microwave dinner before we left to tie me over: These are just a few photos from the night:
The evening was a huge success and a good time to boot.  All the parents on the team DS is playing on this year are fabulous people and I’m so happy to have made a new group of friends.  YAY!!
Saturday
I was happy to find a big pot of oats in the breakfast area the next morning!  I topped them with raisins and honey. Lunch was pretty great, too.  Kale freshly picked with tomato and tuna all dressed with some fig balsamic dressing: We went to a BBQ at the neighbours place last night.  I didn’t take any pics because I got the distinct feeling the the hostess woulda been offended.  I did take these over, though…
HA! I’ve consumed more alcohol this weekend than I have in 10+ years!!!
Today
We all slept in this morning, but had to be in the next city over by 11:30 for 4 hours worth of soccer.  Ugh…  At least it was a gorgeous day out!  We stopped for a very late lunch at Subway before coming home.  I think DS was famished even though I fed him hardboiled eggs throughout the morning!
I had a veggie & Swiss on a flat bread; This is my second go with the flat brad and I’m not convinced yet.  They just seem too gummy.  We also got cones at McDonald’s for the drive. We spent the rest of the afternoon chilling in the cool rec room watching Eclipse.  The fam loved it, BTW!   I’m going to go scrounge up something for dinner.  Then I’ll be relaxing some more.  Don’t want to start the first full week back to work tuckered out!!!
Don’t forget to enter my CSN Stores giveaway!!!
Bye for now!!