Meals of the Week, July 15th - July 21st - 2024

Hello everyone!  Welcome to my weekly Meals of the Week post! Every Sunday I take the opportunity to share with you, my dear readers, all of the delicious main meals that I have enjoyed over the past seven days!

I started doing this about a year and a half or so ago now. (Time flies when you are having fun!) It occurred to me at the time that as a person living very much on their own I was in danger of my meal times becoming boring and unhealthy. I decided then that I was going to make more of an effort to cook delicious meals for myself as much as possible.

It is very common knowledge that ready made meals and frozen dinners, highly processed foods are very unhealthy and loaded with saturated fats, salts and sugars. Not to mention calories. In short, they are not very healthy. Neither is eating in a restaurant every night. (But who could afford that anyways!)

I determined that I would not be that person who relied on frozen dinners and food from a can. That I would cook as much as possible for myself and that I would try to do it healthy (most of the time) and economically. (As a Senior on a basic pension, this is also important.)

I decided also that it was something that I wanted to share with you all as well.  I reckoned that many of us were in the same boat.  Living on our own, single or divorced, or even as a pair of empty nesters.  There is no reason why eating on your own has to be boring or blah, and so each week I determine that my meals will be interesting, healthy, economical and delicious.

I think, so far, I am doing a pretty good job of it!  I do have a Sunday Dinner at my sister’s most Sundays, and I do eat out with my father on Wednesday nights. Other than that I cook all of my own meals. I have included recipes for the meals I have eaten out for you to enjoy as well. Just in case you want to try something similar to what I have enjoyed.

I enjoy a protein shake for my breakfast each morning, eat my main meal around noon or early afternoon and then at supper time I will have a bowl of cereal, a salad or a sandwich, depending on how I feel on any given day. 

And so without any more waffling, here are my Meals of the Week for the past seven days. I hope that you will be inspired to want to cook some of them for yourself. 

Note – One thing I am still struggling with is not eating on a TV tray in front of the television. If you have any ideas that can inspire me to do otherwise, shoot them my way!  Thanks!

SUNDAY, July 15th - Sunday Dinner at my sister’s

Usually on Sunday’s I go to my sister’s for a family dinner. This week was no different. She had cooked a chicken in the air fryer. It was delicious. We enjoyed this along with some boiled and buttered new potatoes and fresh garden carrots and green beans.  It was so good. No gravy was needed.

In its place I am sharing my own recipe for Air Fryer Roast Chicken.  This is fabulous.  Perfectly cooked, deliciously moist and there is no heating up of the kitchen.

MONDAY, July 16th – Grilled Steak with Onion & Blue Cheese Sauce

Sometimes you just want a steak and Monday was one of those days. I enjoyed a lovely pan top sirloin steak, grilled to perfection and served with a lush onion and blue cheese sauce.  This was a recipe that I had adapted from one of my Pioneer Woman cookbooks.  It was delicious.  It was also very easy to make.

You don’t have to use blue cheese. I think any good melting cheese that you enjoy would be good in this sauce.  Its a simple sauce.  I enjoyed this with some air fryer chipped potatoes and steamed broccoli and courgettes.

TUESDAY, July 17th – Roasted Almond Chicken with Lemon Mayonnaise 

I cooked a delicious, quick and very simple chicken dish for my supper on Tuesday.  Chicken breasts butterflied, seasoned and pan grilled. They are then topped with a delicious crunchy and nutty almond Dijon coating and finished off in the oven.  A creamy lemon mayo is whipped up for dipping pieces of this tasty chicken in.  Low carb, gluten free and delicious!

I enjoyed this with some leftover vegetables from the day before and lemon wedges for squeezing over top.  If you wanted to you could serve some steamed rice with this or even mashed or baked potatoes.

WEDNESDAY, July 18th - Dinner out with Dad

On Wednesday nights we always have dinner out at a local restaurant, The Big Scoop,  with my father and his friend Hazel.  Dad loves us being there with him and my sister and I both love spending this special time with him.  The food is hit and miss, but that’s not why we go. We go to spend time with dad.

This week they had the Haddock Burger on special.  It was pretty good.  It came with chips and coleslaw.  I shared my chips with my father who  just had chicken strips.

In it’s place I am sharing my recipe for a New England Haddock Burger. Soft toasted buns. Crisp crumb coated perfectly cooked fish. Rich tartar sauce. Plenty of sour pickles and lettuce. What more could you ask for in a sandwich? Not a lot!

THURSDAY, July 18th – Taco Baked Potatoes

I love baked potatoes or Jacket potatoes as they are called in the U.K.  In the U.K. you can buy them ready cooked and frozen.  McCain made them. I miss them.  (on a side note I also miss their frozen mash!) 

Jacket potatoes make the perfect canvas for a myriad of toppings.  In this case I make a simple taco meat topping (using ground turkey) which is ladled over the hot baked potato and then topped with your favorite taco toppings.  Simple and easy to make and incredibly delicious.  You could have some veggie sticks on the side or tortilla chips and dip. On this occasion I enjoyed just the potato with the toppings.

FRIDAY, July 20th – Chicken Strips with six different dips

I had some delicious Tempura Battered Chicken tenders that I wanted to use  and so I decided to make a selection of dipping sauces that someone might enjoy with them.  Six different ones. All very simple to make, most just by stirring a few ingredients together, and one that you do need to cook, but which is quite simple, quick and easy to make.

All of the dips are fabulous.  Do check out the post to see which one (s) that you might enjoy.  I would be lying if I said that I didn’t taste some of each one. I did.  I enjoyed these with some air fryer chips and  a tossed salad on the side.

SATURDAY, July 21st – Pizza Night!

Saturday night just felt like a Pizza Night. I don’t eat Pizza very often but it is something I really love.  I like to make my own from scratch dough, You cannot beat this recipe for Honeyed Pizza Dough. I always make my own homemade pizza sauce, which you can find here at the bottom of this page. Its a sauce recipe that I have honed and perfected after many years of trial and error.  You can freeze any excess dough and sauce that you don’t need or use. 

I had a simple cheese pizza with parmesan and mozzarella cheese on top.  This is called a Margarita Pizza.  Done in the oven as I don’t have a dedicated pizza oven, and served simply with a salad on the side.   I also enjoyed a nice little dish of my favorite ice cream afterwards.  Part of me was really craving a Root Beer Float, but alas I did not have any root beer in the house. It is probably a good thing! 

So there you have it, my meals of the week. As you can see, once again, I ate really well.  There was no waste and I got in a lovely variety of things.  Some healthy and some maybe not! Hopefully this will give you some ideas of how to plan some meals for yourself!

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