Weekly Meal Plan

Do you ever plant a vegetable in your garden and then wonder if it will grow or not? For me, planting artichokes in the garden felt like a real gamble. Really? Artichokes? Actually, we didn’t even plant them in our garden. They are very nice looking plants and we put them in our front yard flower bed.

Only one of the plants did really well and we got to dine on the best artichokes ever. I think they tasted better because we grew them! Thankfully, the plant gave us 4 artichokes so we could each have our own. No one is big on sharing their artichokes in our family. Who am I kidding? No one is big on sharing any food – especially milkshakes.

After we cut the first round of artichokes, we had one little one continue to grow but it stayed very small. It wasn’t worth cooking it but it did make a very pretty flower. As the artichoke dried, the hairs at the end turned purple. It sat on a plate in our dining room and became a flat-flower-arrangement.

As the purple stems or hairs dried out, I pulled them out and saved them. I think they’re artichoke seeds but we’ll be able to tell next year when I try planting them. They’re in an envelope drying out until the end of next winter.

Weekly Meal Plan

This meal plan is from Monday, August 20, 2012 to Sunday, August 26, 2012.

Monday: garden eating (this turned out to be omelets with eggs from the backyard chickens and vegetables from the garden)

Tuesday: pinto beans, shredded pork, and fresh corn salsa

Wednesday: pinto beans, shredded pork, and fresh corn salsa (leftovers)

Thursday: Mediterranean quinoa salad

Friday: oven roasted broccoli (not the most exciting meal but it was on sale and then we had milkshakes for dessert!)

Saturday: pan seared fish, quinoa, green salad with garlicky dressing

Sunday: shrimp scampi and green salad

My son made dinner on Thursday and he ended up cooking the quinoa before he left for soccer practice that took place from 4pm-6pm. He had daily-doubles (practice twice a day, once in the morning and once in the afternoon) last week and was really trying to get out of cooking his weekly meal. We held strong and encouraged him to do most of the cooking before he left. It all worked out for our 15-year-old who devoured a lot of extra meals this past week.

My daughter made dinner on Sunday and put together a family favorite of shrimp scampi with lots of lemon and garlic. She made a fresh green salad and her famous dressing (she’s still not sharing the recipe!) but I had to cut the greens from the garden. She was just too busy to do it all. Yes, 13-year-old-girl-drama was involved.

What’s for dinner at your house this week?

Go Gingham related links:

More meal plan ideas are here
Roasted garlic spread that’s another great dip or spread
Simple summer salad with tomatoes and cucumbers – oh, and onions and fresh dill
Very easy and tasty white bean dip