weekly menu

Everyone knows that Josh loves to cook way more than me. When he's in the kitchen, he's in his happy place! In the past 4 years of marriage, I've joked that I'm the sou chef who does the cleaning, puts things away while Josh cooks, and does the grocery shopping. Now that he works crazy hours, I'm flying solo in the kitchen! I'm a total amateur when it comes to cooking, but I'm learning quickly to keep us on a budget. We're ok with this since we haven't been blown away by the food up here...and they definitely don't have Tex-Mex. So I've decided to post our menu from the previous week on Mondays. I've linked the recipes if you're interested in trying them.

P.S. sorry, I'm not a food photographer. Just saying.

Bone-in pork chops with apple walnut relish with crash hot sweet potatoes

This one was a little challenging for me! I juggled both dishes at one time plus a curious toddler, which I don't recommend. (until I get better at cooking) The pork was so tender and we loved that the recipe was paleo. The sweet potatoes were great too. Definitely a keeper!

Lemon garlic tilapia with crispy gnocchi with tomatoes and goat cheese

The tilapia was ok. I followed the reviews and sautéed the garlic and used fresh parsley. The top reviewer also said to bake at 400 for around 10 minutes. I think next time I would try foil packets because the sauce didn't really stay on the fish well. The gnocchi was amazing! I bought the whole wheat version at our grocery store. Josh kept saying how much he loved it after each bite. Score!

Ultimate baked chicken fingers with honey mustard sauce

We will definitely make these chicken tenders again! SO delicious. I made the honey mustard sauce from another recipe for us to dip them in and to use as a salad dressing. It was super easy to make and so flavorful! It's got a great kick to it.

butter breast of chicken with summertime spaghetti squash

We made this last night. I loved that Josh was able to cook with me. I followed another blogger's advice when breading the chicken. She says to dredge one side of the cutlet in the flour, put the same side in the egg bowl, and place it in the panko dish. Then you press down so the crumbs will stick and put the piece of butter on the "naked side" and roll the chicken up. The chicken stays put without needing a toothpick. (For some reason we had a lot of panko left over. We will use less next time.) Three awesome end results: the chicken is moist, we loved the lemon, and the outer crunch is fun. YUM!

The spaghetti squash was great too! Especially since it's so much better for you than real spaghetti. We already had a jar of pesto from the gnocchi so I just used that.

Peyton refused to try either dish. BOO. I tried to stand firm and play the tough love card. But ended up making him a PB&J later on.

Jell-O Zoo Jigglers...what? How'd this get on here ;)

We picked this kit up at Wal-Mart last week. The kid loves it. It's now our new bribery tool to get him to eat his dinner. You get desperate when you have a picky eater.