Dinner Ideas or My Week in Kitchen

Actually, this is what I have prepared last week J.

Last week I prepared our meals using first item that caught my eye in fridge, freezer or pantry.  Basically, I was just improvising all week long. Most meals were sort of inspired by weather. It was all over the board, one day it was sunny and in mid 20s and next day the temperature stayed in single digits.

Bok Choy and Noodle Chicken Soup

Nice comfort food. With Long Asian egg noodles it is nice vegetarian lunch. Beside bok choy I have added julienned carrots and green onions.

Pork Tenderloin Schnitzel with Potatoes.

As usual, I used Panko instead of traditional bread crumbs for that extra crunch. Served with wedge of lemon and gherkin on side. Leftover schnitzel is great with rye bread as a sandwich.

Beef Rouladen with Rice.

I will post full recipe later today.

Green Beans, Red pepper, Hot Italian Sausage and Potato Sauté.

Nice peasant meal and simplicity itself. Start boiling potatoes cut into serving pieces. Meanwhile, sauté sausage with skin removed, add green beans and julienned red pepper and drizzle little white wine over it to create some steam. Cover and cook about 3 minutes. Mixed in boiled potatoes and serve. Because the sausage is so strongly flavored you don’t really need additional herbs or spices.

Thin Crust Pizza

I used my own pizza dough and sauce. For topping it was 4 cheese mix and toped with zucchini, red pepper, sweet onions, Cremini mushrooms and hot Italian sausage. Our favorite and I bake it almost every week.

Beef Congee

It never stops amaze me what you can do with just one half cup of rice, some stock and 1-1/2 to 2 hours of your time. For topping I used shredded flank steak marinated with soy sauce, white pepper and sesame oil, freshly roasted peanuts, green onions and arugula. Arugula was a substitute for coriander that I didn’t have. Congee has to be cooked very, very slowly, just a little bubbles coming up, or it will burn.

Salmon with Green Beans and Red Pepper.

This meal deserves its own post. I will post full recipe right after the Rouladen recipe.

Beef and Mushroom Stew with Dumplings

The stews are so difficult to photograph. Anyway, this is regular beef stew with about dozen quartered cremini mushrooms added just 10 minutes before plating. Short cooking time doesn’t shrink them and they don’t release all their juices. This stew had more mushrooms then meat and tasted great.