Intentions

In my pre-baby days I was involved in a number of athletic endeavors.  I played on an indoor and outdoor soccer team, did yoga, rode my bike multiple times a week with Flick, ran, swam, skied, hiked, and occasionally even rock climbed.  Many of those activities had to take a back seat while I was sporting a very protuberant midsection.  In the months following Ellie's birth, it was easy to say "well, I am not doing (insert activity here) right now because I just had a baby".  In my opinion, this is extremely legit.  You birthed another human...you deserve some time off from having to do anything but take care of that little person.  I am reaching the limit of my "just had a baby" response.  I think it is different for everyone, but for my own personal baby experience, I feel like it is time to get back into some of those old habits that I miss so dearly.

Last camping trip before Ellie!

As a step in this direction, I pulled myself out of bed at 5:20 two mornings this week to go to a yoga class...a real yoga class.  Not my beloved prenatal classes where we talked about how we were feeling, swapped stories, and spent an hour and a half limbering up (might I recommend, Yo Mama Yoga to any pregnant Boulderites out there?  LOVE this place).  This was a legs and arms shaking, sweat dripping, Ujai breathing, mind centering yoga class (well, it was for me at least...thank you Radiance Power Yoga!).  It was difficult and really great all at the same time.  For the first time in about a year, I set an intention for myself to focus on during the class - being gentle and understanding of the new post-baby "me".  It is too easy to set high expectations and be disappointed or frustrated when we don't meet them.  When you are just starting out, or getting back into something after a long hiatus, give yourself a break!

This goes for cooking as well.  If you are a take-out kind of family and want to turn the corner and get into the kitchen, start small.  Maybe 2 nights a week you do a home cooked meal.  It is much easier to stick with something when it is reasonable and attainable.  Think of how good it feels to accomplish something and to be able to move on to the next level.  If you start too big and have to scale back, it is still 100% fine but can be a little self defeating.  Give it some thought, set your intention, and get after it!  I hope you enjoy the meals this week:

Coconut Curried Pork, Snow Pea, and Mango Stir Fry

                                   Cornmeal Crusted Catfish

Enchilada Casserole













Curried Couscous with Broccoli and Feta









Grilled Veggie and Hummus Wraps (again, no photo...I didn't realize I was missing this many!)

Well worth the wait

These days, the week prior to leaving on a trip is somewhere between circus and total chaos in our house.  Hence - the blog post just did not happen last week.  With a baby in tow it takes a minimum of 3 days to prepare for a vacation and when you throw in that baby being sick, work, school, mani/pedi (we were in a wedding - gotta have nice nails!)...time just really gets away from you!  Congrats to Mark and Tara on their beautiful wedding weekend and I hope that they are both relaxing on a peaceful beach in Hawaii....ahhhh.

When can we go?

I assure you that these meals were worth waiting for and you won't be disappointed if any end up on your table this week!

Let's start off with Italian Meatball Sliders.  We really loved these - this was a new recipe to us and it made enough for lunches during the week.  I couldn't find slider buns at the store so we just used smaller hamburger buns and they turned out just fine (we made the patties a little bigger as well).

Our meatless meal was Vegetable and Rice Burritos with Cheese.  These were nice and hearty for a veggie only burrito and we both agreed that this was a "keeper".  I was very careful not to over-stuff mine (for the sake of taking a picture) but Flick got a little aggressive with the fillings on his:

I'm way to full...

His required a fork and knife - mine came out well but doesn't stand out much against our burrito-wrap colored plates...a better photographer would have anticipated this and had an array of beautiful bright colored plates to display these tasty morsels on...we are a one-type-of-plate family:

Camouflaged

Antipasto Style Penne made for some delicious leftovers at lunch one day during the week.  I have made this both with the prosciutto crisped up and with it plain.  Both are fine but I definitely prefer it to be broiled a bit.  It is less stringy...I am a person who loves my bacon just to the edible side of "burnt to a crisp".  Limp bacon doesn't do it for me and I think prosciutto falls into that same category.

We tried Coconut Curried Pork, Snow Pea, and Mango Stir Fry this week.  This was a big hit with both of us - it is becoming apparent that we both really love curry dishes with a coconut milk base.  Mangoes are in season now so it is the perfect time to try this meal (so get after it!).  We have had this recipe in our book for ages and for whatever reason,  I have always passed over it.  I am so glad it is part of the rotation because it made for a delicious meal!  We served this over a sticky, long grain rice (I made a big batch and we used the leftovers in the aforementioned burritos later in the week).

Onto our fish meal: Cornmeal Crusted Catfish.  I never really had catfish until living out in Colorado but have come to include it as a regular player in our fish dinner category.  We design this meal to fully embrace the southern-style preparation for this fish (served with baked beans, slaw, and corn on the cob).  On a night with more time, we have cornbread too and it is just divine.  If you are a little unsure of catfish - use another mild, white fish (orange roughy would work really well too).

Hopefully you find these meals to be well worth the week delay in posting them!  It was great to catch up with everyone at the wedding and thanks to all who are following the blog.  I loved hearing from you about it and it means a lot to me to know that you are enjoying the posts.  Can't wait to see you all again soon!  Enjoy!

Hand Held Meals

As I look through the meals for this week I realize that there are a lot of dinners that don't require much silverware (or plasticware, whatever works for you).  Happy hand held coincidence?  Who knows - I just pick whatever sounds best to me at the time I am pulling together my list.

We had 3 new dishes this week that were previously un-tested by the Flickinger clan.  I whipped up a Sausage Spinach Rice Bowl while Flick was out of town.  It was pretty good for a quick little meal.  I would say it is like a fast risotto - per the usual, I was pretty liberal with the cheese and I wouldn't recommend leaving out the red pepper since it will be lacking in flavor.  I also used regular brown rice instead of the pre-cooked kind (mostly because it is a lot cheaper but it does take longer).  I was able to get a lunch meal out of this so it is definitely good re-heated.

Sausage Spinach Rice Bowl

Also new to us was Bacon and Broccoli Mac n' Cheese.  I LOVE mac n' cheese...I don't think you understand, I mean I REALLY love mac n' cheese.  Kraft in particular - yep, that blue box with the orange powder....bring it.  I'll take it down.  This was slightly more sophisticated in that it was homemade and had some nutritional value (in the form of veggies and real cheese).  Flick was in charge of this meal and he seemed to handle it just fine - we made an extra big batch (and added more broccoli than the recipe called for) so this one is easy to multiply.

The Happy Chef

Bacon Broccoli Mac n' Cheese

Our vegetarian meal for the week was Grilled Veggie and Hummus Wraps.  Yum!  I consider our meatless meals to be a victory if Flick is really diggin them and he thoroughly enjoyed this one.  This is also the first of our 3 hand held meals.  It came together really quickly and is great on a nice night when you want to fire up the grill since the veggies all get some time on the coals.  We use our grill year round though so this will make an appearance no matter the season.  I neglected to take a picture of this one so you will have to use your imagination.

Easing back into the meat thing, our next meal is Almost Meatless Sloppy Joes.  This is a personal favorite of mine.  The recipe comes from a collection of recipes put together for Cooking Light by Mark Bittman - his piece in the magazine is called Less Meat More Flavor - we have gotten some very solid recipes c/o Mr. Bittman.  Back to the meal...Flick was the first to introduce me to sloppy joes, which finally brought the whole lunch lady scene from Billy Madison full circle:

My first sloppy joes were of the Manwich variety - and don't get me wrong, they are tasty as hell but these are slightly more refined (like the aforementioned mac n' cheese).  They are also delicious as leftovers so don't be afraid to make a bigger batch and re-heat for a nice little lunch or dinner later in the week.  The recipe calls for red beans but I used kidney and pinto in my last batch and they came out just fine!  We served this up with some chips and a salad but usually also have some cottage cheese on the side.

Almost Meatless Sloppy Joes

Finally, one of our all time favorite recipes - Cheddar Burgers with Red Onion Jam (aka: Michelle's Birthday Burgers).  Though it meant I could never bring cupcakes to school on my birthday during grade school, one of the benefits to a summer birthday is that it is conducive to grilling and hanging out on the patio - things which I find to be highly enjoyable.  A few years back, we had a couple of friends over for dinner on my birthday and Flick pulled together a batch of these burgers with mac n' cheese (the Kraft kind - see, told ya I love that stuff).  They were a hit - and continue to be one of our go-to summer meals.  I am so happy to have them back in the rotation for the season!  As I mentioned, usually we have these with mac n' cheese but since my sweet hubby divided a pound of ground beef between the two of us - we settled for some nice green beans with our 1/2 lb burgers.  Oddly, we were not overly stuffed when we were done...and apparently I was so excited for mine that I forgot to get a good picture before a bite was taken out of my burger.  The post-bite photo just doesn't do it justice so I am going to pass on posting it.  If you make them and take a good photo - pass it along!