Another week, another menu! If you follow me on Instagram you probably figured out that we were out of town a few days last week. That means last week’s menu wasn’t what we really ate. I knew we wouldn’t be eating at home much so I thought it would be fun to create a menu of Autumn-inspired dishes. Did you enjoy it? Every once in awhile I share a “theme” menu rather than what we are actually going to eat. I hope you enjoy these because I have a few more theme menus coming up. But for now, let’s take a look at what is truly on the Piercy menu this week.

Dee’s Menu

Monday

I’m aiming to get back into the habit of “meatless Monday”, or at least “less meat Monday”. Ha!

• smoked gouda potato soup with bacon
• baked apples

Tuesday

Tuesday means tacos, right?

• black bean tacos
• lettuce, tomato, green onions, sour cream, cheese, hot sauce
• chips and salsa

Wednesday

David will be out of town but I think I’ll go ahead and cook something to share with my parents.

• spaghetti
• salad
• garlic bread

Thursday

David will still be out of town so I’ll either have leftovers or make a salad.

Friday

David will be back and we have an event to set up sound for which begins at 9:30 p.m. That means we have time to eat dinner at home if we do it relatively early. 

• lemon pepper chicken
• steamed rice
• broccoli
• salad

Saturday

This is going to be a busy, busy day. Between the two of us we have several events. We’ll just have to figure a way to squeeze in dinner somewhere. 

Sunday

I’m hopeful that we’ll have a warm day. If that’s the case I’d like to grill outdoors one more time. Then I’ll clean up the grill and cover it for the winter. 

• grilled burgers or hot dogs
• french fries
• baked beans
• fresh fruit

What’s cooking at your house this week?

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Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for supporting Life With Dee!

I am loving my Instant Pot. Not only is it a pressure cooker but it can also be used as a slow cooker. The best part is that it also has a sauté feature so I can brown meat in it first then switch to slow cooker. That means one less pan to wash…always a good thing!

This post is linked up at I’m an Organizing Junkie. Take a look for lots more menu ideas!

I thought it would be fun to create a weekly menu with a focus on Autumn-inspired recipes. Cabbage, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, pumpkin and other cool weather favorites are featured this week. Enjoy!

Autumn-Inspired Meals

Monday

Mondays are busy days for me around the house as this is the day I wash bedding, catch up on laundry, tidy up after the weekend, water plants, etc. That’s a perfect time for a simple Instant Pot recipe. 

• Cabbage, Potatoes and Sausage (Instant Pot recipe)
• Amish noodles
• buttered baguette

Tuesday

Autumn is the perfect time for chili! There are as many ways to make chili as there are cooks. Here’s a vegan option. I’ve paired it with a delicious Tex-Mex cornbread but if you want a completely vegan meal I’ve included a vegan cornbread recipe, as well. 

• Vegan Chili
• Tex-Mex Cornbread

(or Vegan Cornbread)

Wednesday

I’m not much of a breakfast person but I do enjoy breakfast foods for dinner occasionally. Add some homemade Apple Cinnamon Muffins and you’ve got a nice mid-week treat. Tip: Make the muffins Tuesday when you are making the cornbread. Might as well just have one clean-up session and since they both bake at the same temperature you can make your oven do double duty. 

• eggs (your choice of scrambled or fried)
• bacon and/or sausage
• Apple Cinnamon Muffins
• coffee, tea, orange juice

Thursday

Risotto isn’t hard to make but it’s a bit time consuming. Unless you have an Instant Pot! Add a salad and a chilled bottle of wine and Thursday just became special. 

• Butternut Squash Risotto
• tossed green salad with dried cranberries and balsamic vinaigrette 
• nice bottle of chilled white wine

Friday

Ahh…Friday. After a long week, dinner out may sound like a great idea. And sometimes that’s exactly what you need. But other times we want nothing more than to spend a quiet evening at home. Add a treat like this green bean casserole to a simple roast chicken and baked potato dinner and you’ve elevated boring to special. 

• oven roasted whole chicken
• Creamy Parmesan Green Bean Casserole
• baked potatoes
• tossed green salad

Saturday

As the days get chilly, comfort food becomes all the more appealing. Use the leftover bits of chicken from Friday night’s dinner and make a tasty chicken pot pie. Add homemade cranberry sauce and a salad for delicious, cozy autumn meal. 

• chicken pot pie (using leftover chicken from last night)
• homemade cranberry sauce
• tossed green salad

Sunday

Invite friends or family over for a “Taste of Autumn” meal. Light some candles, open a bottle of wine, turn on some music and celebrate a week done well. 

• Ham 
• Sweet Potato and Apple Casserole with Streusel Topping 
• leftover cranberry sauce
• tossed green salad
• homemade rolls
• Oatmeal Pumpkin Cookies

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Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for supporting Life With Dee!

I am loving my Instant Pot. Not only is it a pressure cooker but it can also be used as a slow cooker. The best part is that it also has a sauté feature so I can brown meat in it first then switch to slow cooker. That means one less pan to wash…always a good thing!

This post is linked up at I’m an Organizing Junkie. Take a look for lots more menu ideas!

Happy Thanksgiving to my Canadian friends! I’m pretty happy to be starting a new week and I have high hopes that it will be a great improvement over the past couple of weeks. At least I have a really fun event to look forward to on Friday. So let’s take a look at what’s on my menu for the upcoming week:

Dee’s Menu

Monday

I have a meeting at 5:15 so I’ll want something that can be ready when I get home. Slow cooker to the rescue!

• Crockpot Chicken Creole (I’ll take pictures and share in a blog post soon.)
• steamed rice
• salad

Tuesday

We have a food and music event this evening. 

Wednesday

I have choir at 7 p.m. I like to cook something with minimal cleanup on these nights, as well as something I can easily make extra of to take to my parents. 

• spaghetti
• salad
• broccoli
• garlic bread

Thursday

Believe it or not, we don’t have anything planned this evening. Sounds like a good night for a special meal. 

• Skillet Creamy French Mustard Chicken
• mashed potatoes
• glazed carrots
• salad
• crusty, homemade artisan bread

Friday

We are going to a Steely Dan concert (yay!!) and will spend the night afterwards since the show gets out pretty late. We’ll eat dinner somewhere before the show. 

Saturday

We will be attending a dinner for the volunteer fire department David serves on. The hosts are providing hamburgers and hot dogs. Someone else is bringing dessert. I’ll probably make potato salad and/or baked beans. 

Sunday

The usual – Mexican food after church. Our “Music in the Park” events are over for the season so we can eat dinner at home at a normal hour. If we have leftovers from lunch we’ll eat those. Otherwise I’ll do something simple like sandwiches or quesadillas. 

What’s cooking at YOUR house this week? 

~~~~~

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for supporting Life With Dee!

MEAL PLANNING RESOURCES:

Menu Planning Simplified

Do you want to eat a healthy, organic, grass fed diet but don’t think you can afford it? My friend, Victoria of A Modern Homestead, explains how they do it on less than $200 a month. Click here to find out how:

This post is linked up at I’m an Organizing Junkie. You can find lots of menu inspiration there!

We’ve got a difficult week ahead so I’m keeping our menu simple this week.

Dee’s Menu

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for supporting Life With Dee!

Monday

We are attending a candlelight vigil at 7:30 for a friend who died this past week. We’ll need to eat early so I’m keeping it simple.

• Sweet Italian chicken sausages in marinara over pasta
• tossed green salad
• steamed broccoli

Tuesday

I’m attending the preview of the used book sale at our local public library at 6 p.m. We’ll eat after I get back. I’ll cook the lentils in my Instant Pot before I leave and then set it to keep warm. If I have everything else prepped before I go then all I will have to do is fry the tortillas when I get home. 

Important note: At the time of this posting, the Instant Pot is a “deal of the day” on Amazon. You can get it for only $69.99 which is a great deal!

• lentil tacos
• lettuce, tomato, cheese, green onions, etc. 
• Mexican rice

Wednesday

We have a very, very sad funeral to attend about 2 hours away. Right now I don’t know what our dinner plans will be. 

Thursday

It’s the final “East End Eats” music and food truck event for the season. We’ll eat there. 

Friday

I think David and I may go to a nearby town for dinner and live music (something WE don’t have to plan or set up the sound for – ha!). 

Saturday

I want to take advantage of our nice weather so I think we’ll grill some burgers and if the mosquitos aren’t too bad we may eat on the patio.

• grilled cheeseburgers
• French fries
• baked beans
• coleslaw

Sunday

We’ll eat lunch at a Mexican restaurant after church and save half for dinner. 

WHAT’S COOKING AT YOUR HOUSE THIS WEEK?

~~~~~

Once a Month Grocery Shopping 

How to Create a Weekly Menu Plan

Every Sunday I sit down with my calendar and plan a menu for the upcoming week. I try to plan easier meals for busy nights. I take into account the food I have on hand, especially perishables. I also try to plan a variety of tastes, textures and nutrients. Some weeks are better than others, of course, but over time I aim for delicious and relatively healthy dinners.

One thing I should mention is that for the past month or so, I have been making smoothies for us for breakfast each weekday. I’m still experimenting but there will soon be a post about getting started with green smoothies. My goal is to give us a healthy dose of fruits and veggies every morning to start off our days. I’ve recently started making myself a second smoothie for lunch. As we enter cold and flu season I’m determined to cram as much nutrition into my daily meals as possible. As an asthmatic, a cold is never “just a cold” for me. It always leads to at least one round of steroids, something I try to avoid.

So if this week’s dinners seem a bit skimpy on produce keep in mind we’ve had several servings of fruits and veggies earlier in the day.

Dee’s Menu

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for supporting Life With Dee!

Monday

We have a music event to attend at 7. David has to be there about an hour early to set up the sound system. They have great food at this location but we’ve eaten out a lot lately. I’m going to prepare a simple meal at home before we go and then we might share a plate of their wonderful black bean quesadillas or nachos later that night. 

• fettucini alfredo – I make my sauce from scratch. It’s simple and tastes so much better than from a jar.
• tossed green salad

Tuesday

David and I have a meeting in town at noon and we plan to have lunch together afterwards – a nice little treat! And speaking of treats, I think tacos always fall into that category. I grew up eating tacos often – it’s one of my mom’s specialties. While we also love lentil tacos or black bean tacos, tonight I’ll be frying up some grass fed beef which I have in the freezer. It’s very lean so there’s virtually no fat to drain off. I season it with garlic salt, black pepper, chili powder, onion powder, a dash of cumin and of course…Creole seasoning. Or mix up some Homemade Taco Seasoning. I like to season at least twice during the cooking process because it adds to the flavor profile. So I start with just a little of each of these seasonings when I put the meat in the pan then add more when almost done. And do I need to mention that at our house tacos are made with corn tortillas I fry one at a time in coconut oil? None of those hard shells from a box in my house!

• tacos 
• refried beans
• lettuce, tomato, green onions, grated cheese, sour cream, hot sauce – all the usual taco toppings!
• corn relish 

To make corn relish, heat a couple of teaspoons of olive oil in a skillet. When hot, add two cups of fresh or frozen corn and cook for a couple of minutes. Add one clove of garlic (minced) and one jalapeno (finely diced). Cook for another minute and remove from heat. Add one medium tomato, seeded and diced, and the juice of one lime. Salt and pepper to taste. This is delicious on tacos or with any Mexican dish.

Wednesday

I have choir rehearsal at 7 p.m. These are the nights when it’s awfully nice to have a slow cooker meal. I can toss in the ingredients early in the day and then relax knowing dinner is taken care of. Plus, there are fewer dishes to deal with. 

• “Croc Moroc” – This is an Moroccan-inspired slow cooker recipe I came up with years ago and ran across in my files this past weekend. My son gave it this name – ha! I’ll take pictures and share it in a blog post sometime soon.
• rice – Even though I have an Instant Pot which will cook rice, I kept my old rice cooker. So often I’ll want rice along with whatever I’m cooking in the IP. In fact, I’ll be using the slow cooker setting of the Instant Pot for the “Croc Moroc” this night.
• salad

Thursday

I hesitate to say this because it seems something always comes up but it looks like we don’t have anywhere to go this evening. Sounds like a good time to make a favorite of mine:

• chicken and waffles
• fresh fruit salad

Friday

My mom used to make sweet and sour pork chops often when I was growing up. It was a huge favorite for the whole family, as well as a family friend or two who weren’t averse to a last minute invitation to join us for pork chops. I can recall her making two big baking pans full of them and there were never any left over. She used Contadina brand sweet and sour sauce which I really like but am unable to find here in Oklahoma. I’ve been known to bring several cans home in my suitcase when visiting relatives in California. TSA always ends up searching my bags when I do this. Go figure. Since I can’t get that brand here, I make my own sauce. (Note: I shared the link for the Contadina sauce simply so you can see what I’m referring to in case it’s available in your area. It’s WAY too expensive to buy on Amazon – $11.45 for shipping!)

• sweet and sour pork chops
• rice
• steamed broccoli
• salad

Saturday

We are attending baby shower barbecue this evening. They are providing the hamburgers and hot dogs. I will ask if they’d like me to bring homemade potato salad. I haven’t made any in quite awhile and it’s a good excuse to make a big batch of it. 

Sunday

This is World Communion Sunday and I’ve been asked to bake challah bread for it, as I have for a number of years. My recipe makes two huge loaves so we have one for ourselves. It makes delicious French toast so I think I’ll make some for a light supper. As usual, we will eat out at our favorite Mexican restaurant after church.

I’ll be baking the challah bread Saturday. If I’m on the ball, I may go ahead and bake some pumpkin bread while I’m at it!

What’s cooking at YOUR house this week?

~~~~~

MEAL PLANNING RESOURCES:

Menu Planning Simplified

Once a Month Grocery Shopping 

How to Create a Weekly Menu Plan

Do you want to eat a healthy, organic, grass fed diet but don’t think you can afford it? My friend, Victoria of A Modern Homestead, explains how they do it on less than $200 a month. Click here to find out how:

This post is linked up at I’m an Organizing Junkie. You can find lots of menu inspiration there!