What's for Dinner {Sept. 2019}

Raise your hand if you feel like life is busy.

Raise your hand if you feel like planning dinners is hard. 

Raise your hands if you end up scrambling every night trying to figure out what to feed your hungry, and possibly cranky family (otherwise known as hangry. . . ha ha!). 

I promise you are not alone. 

I struggle with this so often.  It might not seem like it, but I do.  Taking the time to menu plan takes time and energy when I would rather be working on something else or binge watching White Collar episodes or  the latest Hallmark movie.  But, I know that when I do, our week is smoother, my kids eat healthier, my youngest tries new foods, and we enjoy some family time around the table (or we watch some classic TGIF shows on Hulu).  Either way, I know that taking the time to menu plan makes my life way smoother. 

Now that school is in full swing, I am starting up these monthly "What's for Dinner" posts to share some recipes that we tried out and loved over the past month.  One of the most commonly asked questions on Facebook among my mom friends is "what are some new recipes?"  Here are some that have been tested out in our kitchen during the evening chaos hours.  Some are recipes that are so easy, I can make ahead of time and take them to soccer practice and picnic there, while Ethan practices. 

But, first a few notes about our food habits:  In our home, there are some food allergies, like dairy, soy, and a recent discovery that Ethan is allergic to salmon (he's really heartbroken over this, because he really loves fish!).  While I bake a lot, we tend to keep most of our meals along the Whole 30 model because we don't need to eat bread and sugar all the time and we are guaranteed the recipes don't have soy and dairy in them, which means our whole family can eat.  There are nights, where we make Trader Joe's orange chicken or cook up some salmon and the kids eat chicken nuggets and that's okay. 

So, here are a few recipes that we cooked up this week. I'm getting hungry just thinking about them! Most of these, we've had before and we love!  They are easy and simple and we love them! 

:: Egg Roll in a Bowl

We love this recipe from 40 Aprons.  It's so easy, super inexpensive to make!  I always hope for leftovers, but there never are.   Ethan loves this and gets so excited when I make it.  This was a great recipe to make to eat at practice and was perfect for fueling Ethan for a quick dinner before practice.  One bowl and you are full.  You won't even miss the wrapper, I promise! 

:: Steak, Spinach, Sweet Potato Bowls

We've made this a few times and we love it!  The marinade for the flank steak is worth it enough and roasted sweet potatoes. . . I am now drooling over this post!  Jon likes his without the avocado drizzle, but I think it's what really makes the dish.   The combinations of flavors are really out of this world!  Plus, its easy to deconstruct and make it kid friendly, too! 

:: Simple Sesame Noodles

This recipe has always been a favorite, but I has stopped for quite awhile because I hadn't learned about coconut aminos, but once I did and Weston tried them it became a game changer because he LOVES these so much!  So, these make it on our meal plan a lot because everyone is happy with this!  I might pair it with some grilled chicken or some Aidells Teriyaki Meatballs to make the meal complete. 

As I write this, It is almost lunch time and this post is making me so hungry!  Other things that made it onto the table were:

:: homemade pizza
:: Trader Joe's Orange Chicken
:: grilled chicken and roasted veggies
:: Spaghetti
:: Stir Fry  (we love Nom Nom Paleo's Stir Fry sauce)
:: Sheet Pan dinners with Aidells Chicken and Apple Sausage and lots of veggies

We even planned a night to grab Chick Fil-A on the way to practice, because this mom gave herself a night off.

If you are looking for more inspiration, I post all my meal plans and some of our dinners to my Instagram stories and save them in my highlights.  You can find them under "Meal Plans" and "What's Cookin?"

You can also find monthly "What's Cooking" posts in the archives.   I'm thinking I might have to go look at them again because I had forgotten about some of our favorite recipes!

I hope this helps bring inspiration to your meal plan!

Happy Cooking!