Day Four hundred and ten

Cornmeal griddle cakes with strawberry syrup (recipe: Cooking for Isaiah).  Another awesome recipe from this cookbook.

And an extra stack of them for the freezer.

Dinner: Eggplant spinach parm, sauteed yellow squash, salad, and fruit salad.  This is one of my favorite dinners, and I realized I've never shared my recipe. Here it is:

Slice one large eggplant into one-inch slices, and bake at 450 in a single layer on a greased baking sheet, 10 minutes on each side. Meanwhile, combine 1/2 cup of part-skim ricotta, 3 tablespoons of Parmesan cheese, one egg, a little salt and pepper, and a handful of parsley and basil in a bowl. Spray an 8×8 baking dish with cooking spray, and cover the bottom with your favorite marinara sauce. On top of the sauce, layer as follows: half of the eggplant, ricotta mixture, three cups of raw baby spinach, more sauce, remainder of eggplant, and more sauce. Top with two tablespoons of Parmesan and a handful (about 1/2 cup) of part-skim mozzarella. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes. To make it extra authentic, use your own homemade sauce, and don’t measure any of the ingredients as you go along. This came together quickly, my kids loved it, and I doubled the recipe and froze an extra tray of it for a future dinner. Serve with a green salad, and mangia!

School lunch: Sliced grilled chicken, crackers with a cheese stick, cucumber, and pineapple.

Day Four hundred and nine

Dinner: Italian minestrone (crockpot; recipe; it goes w/o saying that we used ground turkey rather than beef) with the crusty boule bread (dough from the freezer; recipe) and salad.

School lunch: Rolled deli turkey, mozzarella stick, crackers, salad, and orange slices.

Day Three hundred and fifteen

Pizza dough, rising (recipe: Gluten-free on a shoestring).  This was our second attempt at gluten-free pizza, and we did like the crust a little better. The consistency of the dough was more similar to regular dough than the almond flour.

Pizza (sauce with butternut squash puree).

Dinner: Gluten-free pizza, salad, and fresh strawberries.

Gluten-free sandwich bread (recipe: Gluten-free on a shoestring).

Day three hundred and two

This is a mystery lunch.  I'm a month behind in posting photos, and I can't recall what this one is.  It's clearly sauce with mozzarella cheese on top of it, but I just can't tell what's under it.  Brown rice pasta?  Anyone?

Dinner: Chicken in a teriyaki glaze (Recipe: Double Delicious), brown rice (with pureed cauliflower; Double Delicious), sliced apples, and salad.

My daughter wanted me to take a pic of her plate as well, so here it is.  :)

Day Two hundred and eighty-three

Dinner: Leftovers of last night's chicken tetrazzini, along with a salad.   Our cucumbers have been coming up rapidly from the garden, so we'll use any excuse for a salad.  :)

Day Two hundred and forty-eight

Dinner: Whole grain spaghetti with mozzarella (my daughter's request), grilled chicken, salad, and watermelon.

Day Two hundred and forty-six

Dinner: Whole grain mac and cheese (crockpot; recipe: Make it Fast, Cook it Slow) with pureed cauliflower (ala Sneaky Chef); salad; turkey hot dogs; fresh blueberries, raspberries, and watermelon.

Day One hundred and forty-nine

Breakfast: Banana blueberry strawberry oatmeal with a drizzle of maple syrup and cinnamon.

Lunch: Garden vegetable soup, baked grilled cheese, and pineapple. I realize this is an awful picture, but I was in a rush and didn't get to take a better one.

Dinner: Rotisserie chicken, whole grain penne with sun-dried tomato alfredo sauce, salad, and grapes.

Day Eighty-six

Dinner: Cannelloni. My parents got these for us from Stew Leonard's, and it was a perfect quick dinner to bake in the oven on a busy evening.

Cookie swap: Lemon sugar cookies (recipe from my friend Kelly). You wouldn't know it, but there were ten dozen here. Fortunately, nine dozen were given away in the swap, so we're not responsible for eating all of them. Even more fortunately, I made all of the dough the last week (when I went to the other cookie swap), and stored it in the freezer, so tonight I didn't have to do more than slice and bake. Whew.

Day Fifty-nine

Granola (recipe: Fix, Freeze, Feast). The last time I made this granola, I froze a few bags for the freezer. All I had to do today was bake it for 30 mins, and voila.

Dinner: Pizza with broccoli, and salad.

Day Fifty-two

Breakfast: Whole wheat crepes (recipe: Sneaky chef) with chocolate syrup, banana slices, and a sprinkling of flax seeds; and a blueberry-strawberry yogurt smoothie.

Dinner: Turkey nacho bake (ground turkey, beans, taco seasonings, diced tomatoes, and a scoop of butternut squash puree). Usually the chips go at the bottom when I make this, but my friend Melissa brought this to a party recently with the chips on top, so I thought I'd try that to see if the chips got less soggy. It worked! Thanks, Melissa L!


Dinner: Turkey nacho bake, salad, avocado, and grapes.

Day Twenty-four

Five jars of yogurt, sitting in a water bath until they reach their desired firmness.


Pumpkin bread... one loaf for after dinner and tomorrow's breakfast, and the other for the freezer. (Recipe: Family Circle; modifications were whole wheat pastry flour substituted for white flour, and oats instead of nuts).


Dinner: Spaghetti squash parm. I'll be forever indebted to Danielle B. for introducing me to this meal. It's my older daughter's favorite.

Dinner: Spaghetti squash parm, salad, ciabatta rolls (leftover from yesterday), and an eggplant spread for the rolls. Thanks to Karen S. for the white eggplants!

After dinner: Sliced apples and pumpkin bread

Day Twenty

Dinner: Turkey sloppy joes (with pureed sweet potato; similar to a recipe from the Sneaky Chef), Whole wheat rolls (made these last wk for another meal, and froze the unbaked extras); Asian salad, corn on the cob, and honeydew.  Here's my version of the recipe.

Day Fifteen

Breakfast: Whole wheat banana sweet potato waffles (recipe: Sneaky Chef) and fruit salad.

Dinner: Pizza (from Sam's Club) enhanced with fresh broccoli and mushrooms, a side salad (thanks to Karen S. for the cucumber from her garden!!), and sliced apples.

Dessert: White chocolate cranberry oatmeal cookies (recipe: Annabel Karmel). My daughter wanted to have a "birthday party" for her hedgehog puppet.

Day Twelve

Vanilla yogurt. Very easy to make, using the Frugal Girl's cooler method.

Dinner: Big Salad. Romaine lettuce, chickpeas, sliced egg, zucchini, cucumber, carrots, and red peppers.