This Week At Our Table | Week 03

I love the idea of this series, and hearing your feedback, you do too — thank you! You won't see a difference but I'm going to roll out the posts a little differently, after I make the meal each night I'll pop in here and add links and notes each day, instead of working through a whole week at at time, or linking the recipes when I haven't tried them yet. This week is a week of all new to me recipes —

*While the recipes are listed Monday - Friday for visual ease, we grocery shop on Tuesdays and start this plan on Tuesday. I plan five meals — not seven — because we generally end up ordering one night and I will use the Monday before shopping to pull together something with what's left in the fridge and pantry.

Smothered Burritos with Green Chili Sauce — I expected a take on an enchilada — and it was, but in a different way than we normally make them. I imagined a green salsa / tomatillo type sauce when I read green chili sauce— but as you start making it you realize it's actually a queso, and that changed everything. In the best way ever.

Nothing major for modifications and I only made them for preference and ease — I used a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store that I shredded. While the burritos are cooking, I rotated them so they browned all around, and I skipped the oil. I love how they brown and toast without oil, they take on an almost nutty flavour. Have you ever made baked quesadillas? More on that in a minute! Once they were baked I did pour some of the cheese sauce over and pop them back in the oven for a few minutes ( without the grated cheese ) and then kept some of the sauce for everyone to add to their discretion. Discretion turned out to be smothered :) I served with rice, Bush's honey beans ( you'll have to trust me on this one! ) lime crema and cilantro. A pico de gallo would be another great addition. 100% adding this one to the meal binder, I'll definitely make it again!

Baked quesadillas — the simplest and yummiest — a flour tortilla filled with grated cheese, folded in half and popped on a parchment lined baking sheet. Bake at 425 until it starts to puff and brown. That's it! We love them with pico de gallo, beans as above, lime crema and rice if you'd like a bit of a filler.

Chicken Chow Mein — This was good! We've done quite a few different takes on noodle dishes, and I really loved the flavour of the sauce on this one. It was definitely there, but a little more subtle and I loved that. Sometimes when a dish is all one note I get tired of it quickly, does that make sense? This one was not like that. I changed a few minor things — the recipe mentions 1 carrot and 2 cups cabbage — I did 5 carrots and half a cabbage. I wanted lots of veg and some crunch in the noodles. The Chow Mein Sauce I did up the quantity because I want to make sure there's good coverage, and it absorbs into the noodles too so a little more is never a bad thing. Here's the recipe I followed for the sauce > 6 tbsp oyster sauce, 5 tbsp soy sauce ( I use Bragg Liquid Aminos ) 2 tbsp sesame oil, 3/4 cup chicken stock, 1 tbsp corn starch and 1 tbsp granulated sugar.

We love having noodle dishes in these oversize bowls + having chopsticks is a lot of fun for a different take on a weeknight dinner.

Steak au Poivre Sandwiches — these were good! Ha ha I'm realizing I'm writing that after every meal, but I'm writing it on different days so it doesn't feel repetitive until I read it back :)

We bbq'd the steak and just made the sauce without the pan drippings. I used bourbon because we had that on hand, and my sauce didn't thicken after it reduced so I added a tbsp of corn starch and it was perfect. We put the peppercorns in the mortar and ground them with the pestle. The way the recipe reads ( when you print it and don't read it from the site first haha ) — doesn't mention pickling the red onion in advance, I could have done a quick pickle but we just did thinly sliced red onion. It was great. Used russet potatoes and made home fries. Great combo!

Coconut Curry Shredded Beef — I followed the recipe on this one, using one of the Costco roasts we had in the freezer. I did just put one can of coconut milk in while it was cooking thinking I'd check the flavour when it was done and add more as needed. I halved half of a white onion and put that in the broth for flavour while it cooked as well.

The roast cooked beautifully, but the curry flavour was not that prominent. I had a heavier beef broth / salty cooking liquid at the end, and a lot of it. I cooked it down a touch, added the second coconut milk and some corn starch to thicken it a bit. Served with a cucumber salad, naan, cilantro and sliced red onions. The nice thing with the sauce is you could make your bowl heavier on the broth if you like it that way or just use the sauce lightly. It was good and the whole family liked it, I just didn't love how time consuming it was to get the sauce to come together at the end.

Cucumber Salad — Slice or chop cucumber how ever you prefer to eat it, mix olive oil, fish sauce, sesame oil, mirin and rice vinegar in a bowl and add your cucumber, I'll usually add a good dose of pepper to balance the salt. Yum!

Chicken Bacon Ranch Burgers — We bbq'd chicken breasts and had bacon, tomato, cheddar, lettuce and ranch dressing out to top the burgers, but we also had buffalo sauce and a mild bleu cheese so that was out as an offering as well — and I was in the mood for all of it! Toasted brioche buns were a great compliment.

In the summer I love to make Katie Lee's homemade ranch for burgers but this time I used our favorite Hidden Valley Ranch packet ( have you tried these? This is the best ranch for veggies and dip! )

Katie Lee's Ranch Recipe — 1 cup mayo, 1/2 cup buttermilk, 2 tbsp each fresh minced chives and parsley, and a 1/4 tsp each garlic, salt and pepper.

See you next week!