What are you making for dinner?

DigSunPap

Brie said:

DigSunPap said:

Tonight I fancy pasta. Still feeling the hangover from a busy Saturday so wanting to get some carbs in! Anybody got any suggestions for what sort of pasta? I usually go for carbonara or bolognese but looking to change it up.

The OH often likes to have just pesto - which is nice.  Or he does carbonara - again nice but not my favourite even if he does do a great job of cooking it. 

One of my go to sauces is to fry up some onions, garlic, add chunks of courgette and chorizo or keibasa and a tin of chopped tomatoes and let it simmer.  Herbs.  Love a nice thick sauce on wholewheat fusilli.  You could add mushrooms and or peppers too if you have some.  

The second one sounds amazing a may have to give that ago. Strangely - as a 1/4 Italian I cannot stand pesto! Have no idea why just have never liked it, I feel as if it is too rich. What is even weirder is that I like all of the ingredients that go into it. Definitely going to give your chorizo fusilli dish a go I think.

Brie

DigSunPap said:

Brie said:

The second one sounds amazing a may have to give that ago. Strangely - as a 1/4 Italian I cannot stand pesto! Have no idea why just have never liked it, I feel as if it is too rich. What is even weirder is that I like all of the ingredients that go into it. Definitely going to give your chorizo fusilli dish a go I think.

as you're 1/4 Italian should I have suggested zuchinni instead of courgette!!??

fyi - I used to make too much of this as it was so lovely reheated for lunch the next day...

JIL

Tonight I had to do some bits with my mum who has dementia and unfortunately thinks she had a shower a couple of days ago.  She is now nice and clean. 

Before I left I put a chicken in the oven with a greek bean and potato recipe I found online. ( fry a couple of shallots, herbs, add a tin of tomatoes, green beans and potatoes) bake in oven. I added a few olives and feta before serving.  It was actually nice for something so simple. 

goldfinches

Sorry about your mum @JIL that must be very hard on you and your family.

I had the rest of the tin of beans with an egg and a decaf coffee. 

Brie

@JIL - unfortunate that we end up reversing our roles and looking after those who raised us.  Been through this with both my MiL (who lived with us and claimed she did a basin wash every morning despite not going near the bathroom for any reason whatsoever....) and now my own mom is thinking she as pristine as she's been all her adult life - even when she's not.  

Your bean salad sounds nice....I'm now wondering if I can do something with the mange tout in the fridge.  Intention is to have the frozen lasagne I got last week and OH wants to wander off to the shop to buy a garlic bread to go with it. (which means he actually wants to go out to buy some cigars....)

Ellie79

I am consciously posting and asking to join in with the thread. I have to be more accountable for what we spend (a big bill had to be paid and will be paid off over the next 3 months, and it has taken a huge chunk of my pay). My freezers and cupboards are chocka block and I used to be so good at a food challenge - surviving on very low pay and an aspiring foodie, so, I am hoping that posting here, reading people's ideas, and engaging in a bit of related chat will help me see this as a learning point rather than as a negative and something that is going to keep me awake for many nights. Whilst I am less poor these days financially (apart from the next few months) I am very time-poor and have some other issues in that my OH is visually impaired and therefore most of the cooking and planning falls to me. He is very good at certain things but not at making something out of nothing that so many of us do. Unfortunately, we are out at a pre-booked meal tonight, so instead I will be heading to the freezer to locate something for tea for the next few nights in an attempt to push my food shopping back by a few days each time. So tonight - out but tomorrow, who knows! 

Brie

Welcome @Ellie79!!

If time is part of the problem maybe batch cooking is the answer?  Add to that if you have clear instructions on how to cook/reheat anything on it your OH could cope ok?  MiL's sight was going and I put large labels on the ready meals we bought for her with simple instructions written large in black marker - "Lid off, 350, 20 minutes". 

Of course it depends on how confident the OH is too.  I have the most amazing Mexican food book, (recommended by a friend 40 years back....) by Elena Zelayeta.  She became blind as a young adult but went on to run restaurants and raise a family - the book just oozes confidence!!!  I was astounded when she talked about completely deboning a chicken and similar things - stuff I can do but I'm very dependent on seeing where I'm slashing with a knife!  (and I have the stab marks to prove how clumsy I am!)  She claimed the only time she really ran into problems was when someone put her shopping away for her and she mistook sugar for salt.  I still love making her huevous rancheros - made it so often now I don't even get the book out!!!

Ellie79

Thanks @Brie! He cannot see any instructions sadly, so I would have to then text him the instructions, which is time consuming at best. He can cook and will cook but it's really the putting of ingredients together that stumps him. I am not so good at batch cooking, I have tried but I just really don't enjoy the reheated food. I have some issues around that, so yeah, I am the problem here! I have been trying to tackle them and it is working, ever so slightly. If it was up to me I would live on omelettes, bacon sandwiches, and soup when my MH is not too good (like now). My OH mistook a bottle of vodka for a bottle of wine once, he turned up clutching said vodka and said I am going to pour us a glass, I wasn't sorry for the arrival of the vodka but very glad that I managed to stop the wine glass full from happening!

Brie

Ellie79 said:

Thanks @Brie! He cannot see any instructions sadly, so I would have to then text him the instructions, which is time consuming at best. He can cook and will cook but it's really the putting of ingredients together that stumps him. I am not so good at batch cooking, I have tried but I just really don't enjoy the reheated food. I have some issues around that, so yeah, I am the problem here! I have been trying to tackle them and it is working, ever so slightly. If it was up to me I would live on omelettes, bacon sandwiches, and soup when my MH is not too good (like now). My OH mistook a bottle of vodka for a bottle of wine once, he turned up clutching said vodka and said I am going to pour us a glass, I wasn't sorry for the arrival of the vodka but very glad that I managed to stop the wine glass full from happening!

Could you put together 5 sets of basic instructions and then let him know that drawer 1 in the freezer is instruction 1, drawer 2 is 2 etc?  Then if he has some sort of read/write software on his phone or tablet he could follow that?  

It is a bit of dilemma most of us don't have to face.  Well except for mixing up the vodka and wine....especially after the first couple.....

Ellie79

That sounds very organised! I shall see what I can do. I have next week off so I will try and fix something... Yes, there are a few times it leads to very funny incidents, such as the vodka. At least it wasn't water...