Every once in a while, which means not very often, I menu plan for more than one day. It’s more likely to happen around holidays or guests. The neighbor across the street just fired up their mega watt Christmas lights week before the official nutso season. Sigh. One extra week of guilt this year.
Menu planning for one person is either complex or just silly but every few months I have to cook a bunch of stuff all at once. I bought a whole chicken. No, not for Thanksgiving but for stock. Tomorrow I’m scheduled to cut it up, save the breasts and thighs for future use and simmer everything else for stock. Seemed brilliant at the time. That way I use up the veggies in the fridge. What a fine money saving strategy! While I’m at the stove it I’ll need to cook tonight’s Pico De Gallo salsa into a sauce that keeps.
That salsa uses up my all home grown tomatoes. A fitting end for the season. Better salsa than I usually make too. I’ll need that for Wednesdays dinner or Tuesdays. One of those dinners is the left over enchiladas made with left over roast beef. You can hear the penny squeal as it’s stretched can’t you?
The other dinner will involve some part of that chicken. Probably a single breast or thigh, stir fried with what’s left in the veggie bin. I don’t dissect a chicken often enough to be good at it but I’ve done it enough to not be scared of a dead bird. Two breasts, two thighs for the freezer and everything else for the stock pot. I don’t have a MSCE so I can cut up the chicken in the daytime.
On Turkey day, I’m thinking I’ll do something with that monster size bone in ribeye steak in the freezer. Some kind of “single mans prime rib”. I’ve got the cilantro I bought today for the salsa and the parsley and mint in the garden haven’t completely died so a chimichurri like marinade seems reasonable. There’s a spare jalapeño too. I feel a plan forming. Roasted garlic mashed potatoes with a butt load of parmesan - I just noticed some mold on the sliver of good Parmesan. Time to meet thy master. I’ve got green beans in the freezer and a lot (for one person) of Parmesan to use. No problem. A solution will occur. (Pepper flakes and some of that Hill Billy Bacon in the freezer perhaps).
It wouldn’t be Turkey day without stuffing and gravy. No holiday dinner is complete without a gravy or a sauce on top of a bread and veg pudding. I’ve got the veg and the bread and the herbs. I’ll have real chicken stock too but it goes best with poultry or pork, not a beef steak thing. Maybe I’ll cook a chicken breast and stuffing Wednesday. that will be Turkey day somewhere.
Left over stuffing can go into a pork chop (got one of those in the freezer) on Friday. Good plan until I change my mind. This time of the year, you need a plan to avoid shopping on the day before Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, or New Years eve. Too many people standing in line with 2 bottles of wine and a carrot cake, dressed to the nines and I’m holding a head of garlic, a stalk of celery and and a jalapeño. I feel so un-yuppie. Like I couldn’t plan ahead. This year will be different. Maybe.