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Good morning, and happy Sunday! This week included the Super Bowl, more snow days, and a Valentine’s outing. You’ll find all of the highlights from the past few days, along with each of our dinners, in today’s roundup of Our Week in Meals.
For those of you who are new to the blog, Our Week in Meals is where I share a little bit about what we’ve been up to over the past week — as it relates to our dinners each night. This series gives you a glimpse “behind the scenes” at some highlights from our life, shows you how I balance a busy schedule with feeding my family, and offers a few new ideas for your own weekly meal plan.
Now, let’s back up to last weekend…
Our Sunday was off to an early start with Aunt Bee’s 3-ingredient biscuit recipe, bacon, last summer’s blueberry jam, and coffee before church.
We went to Spencer’s indoor soccer game in Charlottesville mid-day, and then I headed up the street for a walk with the dog to take advantage of the sunshine.
Since it was Super Bowl Sunday, we set up a bunch of game day snacks to enjoy for supper. The spread included crispy baked chicken wings,
this easy buffalo chicken dip recipe (the kids’ request),
my 4-ingredient spinach dip, this easy guacamole recipe, and tortilla chips and fresh veggies like carrots, celery, and cucumbers for dipping.
Let’s chat books, shall we? I can’t wait to tell you about Good Dirt, the latest novel from Charmaine Wilkerson. This story was so beautifully written, I’m practically speechless. I just loved it. It’s a multi-generational saga in which the daughter of an affluent black family pieces together the connection between a childhood tragedy and a beloved heirloom. The book is equally as good as Wilkerson’s first novel, Black Cake, if not better!
The boys returned to school on Monday morning, and Keith and I got out for a walk before starting our work days.
Other than dropping off some Valentines at the elementary school, it was a quiet day at the house. Keith took Spencer to a late soccer practice that evening, so we had dinner in shifts. On the menu: shipwreck casserole over white rice…
along with a baguette,
and a house salad with candied pecans. I had an extra 1/2 lb. of Italian sausage in the freezer, so I used that in the casserole with the ground beef and it was great!
Another snow storm rolled through Virginia on Tuesday, which meant multiple days of cancelled school…again. This has been a crazy winter for us!
Fortunately, we got outside that morning before it really started coming down. In all, we had a total of about 6-8 inches.
Dinner was easy and delicious. I thawed some leftover garlic and herb pork roast from the freezer and used it to assemble Cuban sandwiches — ciabatta rolls with the sliced pork, ham, Swiss cheese, dill pickles, and yellow mustard all toasted in the oven until hot. On the side, I baked frozen French fries and pulled out the extra spinach dip and veggies from Sunday night.
Not surprisingly, the boys had another snow day on Wednesday.
Casey and I walked the dog up the street, and then I took Gibbs to an appointment in Charlottesville that afternoon.
We had 15-minute shrimp ramen with peanut sauce for supper,
which I served with ramen noodle coleslaw and egg rolls from the freezer.
Thursday and Friday were teacher workdays and parent-teacher conferences at the schools, so the boys got a couple of bonus days off this week!
Keith and I went for a walk on Thursday morning, I worked on recipe photos, and then I headed over to the elementary school for a visit with Spencer’s teacher.
Fortunately, the sun came out mid-day and it warmed up nicely, which melted almost all of this snow within a few hours!
We had dump-and-bake Cajun chicken pasta for dinner, along with sauteed zucchini and store-bought yeast rolls.
We kicked off Valentine’s Day with the boys’ annual well-check appointments at the doctor’s office in Orange early on Friday morning. Of course, we celebrated with Dunkin afterwards. Valentine’s donuts and a chocolate lava iced coffee…
A touch of spring for the pantry…
…a walk with Teddy before lunch…
…and a golf lesson for Gibbs that afternoon.
We had reservations that evening for the Valentine’s Day dinner buffet at the Farmhouse Restaurant at Graves Mountain Lodge. We’ve done this for the past 4 years, and it never disappoints! The buffet included many different salads, stewed tomatoes, corn pudding, country green beans, herb roasted chicken, prime rib, roasted pork loin with apple compote, Southern fried shrimp, and homemade rolls with Graves apple butter. Plus a variety of desserts, like my chocolate cake.
And that brings us to the weekend! I spent a rainy Saturday working on new recipes in the kitchen, while Keith ran errands and handled chores around the house.
At the kids’ request, I made cast iron pan pizzas for dinner, which I paired with a classic Caesar salad.
So there you have it, friends — another week of easy dinners! I hope that you’ve found something new to add to your own table in the days ahead. Thank you for being here, and have a wonderful Sunday!
