I haven’t posted my weekly menu plan for ages!  Ds15 liked to plan breakfasts day by day last year (she was the cook, so whatever she wanted was fine with me!), but as a result, I got out of the habit of sitting down each week to write out my menu.  However, with the changes in our family schedule this year as all of the kids have gone to school, the kitchen is again primarily my domain – dd16 asked if she could prepare dinners, but she’s happy to make whatever I plan.

Whenever I make my weekly menu plan, I take a look first at whatever I have in the house, and then plan based on that.

Dh got an amazing bargain on butternut squash on Friday – three cases of butternut squash for just 15 shekels (about $4)!  That is insanely cheap; to me it’s practically free food.  This was an especially great buy for us, since dh has been on the GAPS diet for over a year and a half, and butternut squash is one of his staples.  Some of them were soft and needed to be used right away, but most were totally fine, and fortunately, winter squashes can stay for a long time if stored in a cool place, so I don’t need to rush to use them up.  The pressure to use them isn’t because they may go bad, but because I don’t have much storage space!

At the beginning of the week, I soaked and sprouted a bunch of lentils and white beans.  And yesterday I was delighted to find chicken giblets on sale for just 5 shekels a kilo, so of course I bought all that was left (about thirty pounds), and cooked them today to package in various ways (whole, sliced, diced) to put in the freezer.   I use them as a stand in for any kind of chicken – they’re so versatile.

We’ve switched to a more Israeli way of eating, with our main meal being lunch – most of the kids are home by then, so we usually eat all together.  Lunches usually have salad and/or cooked vegetables, but I don’t plan that in advance.  Our breakfasts are heavier than what seems to be typical here, since it seems most people don’t give their kids much of a breakfast before they leave to school (they eat a 10 am meal in school instead).  Usually what we send for the kids for their 10 am meal is homemade bread/biscuits/pancakes/muffins, fruit, and vegetables.

Sunday – breakfast – (sorry, didn’t write our menu down until today, so the blank spaces are when I can’t remember what we had); lunch – shnitzel (breaded chicken breast), corn on the cob, butternut squash, pickles, and salad; dinner – kasha (buckwheat), soup

Monday – d – vegetable soup, rice

Tuesday – b – coconut rice with milk; l – homemade sesame chicken nuggets, baked sprouted lentils in tomato sauce, coleslaw; d – vegetarian chili

Wednesday – rice pancakes (with leftover rice from Tues. breakfast); l – butternut chicken pasta; d – chili casserole (doubled chili on Tues night with this in mind, with cornbread batter baked on top)

Thursday – b – colcannon or butternut quick bread; l – lentil shepherd’s pie with mashed sweet potato topping (will use the other half of lentils I sprouted); d – CORN – clean out refrigerator night

Friday – b – polenta; l – parmigian express

Avivah