Meal Plan April 23

Remember when I talked about filling my freezer with dinners to make things easier postpartum? My freezer is currently stuffed to the gills, so I need to make room in there. I challenged myself to use up as much as possible what I have on hand in this week’s meal plan. The only things I bought at the store for this menu were the salmon, romaine and avocados!
First I made a freezer inventory. I wrote down everything on a piece of paper, grouped by categories. Then I began brainstorming what I could cook from those ingredients. For example, a few leftover meatballs, chicken broth, red onion, spinach and white beans = minestrone! (I love minestrone because the recipe is open to interpretation and it always turns out tasty.) And so forth.

This menu plan uses up all the chicken broth, white beans, frozen broccoli, spinach, onions, meatballs, zucchini, cauliflower, corn and red peppers in my freezer which should clean off at least two shelves.
Turns out we’ll be eating meatless most nights this week but I’m fine with that. Here’s what I came up with:

- Meatball Minestrone with Baguette

- Cheesy Broccoli Quiche with Tomato, Avocado, Cucumber Salad

- Green Bean Casserole (I’m using the recipe from Pioneer Woman’s new cookbook, it’s made from scratch and there’s no cream of mushroom soup in it) with Loaded Twice Baked Potatoes

- Blackened Salmon with Roasted Mashed Cauliflower and Broccoli Balls

- Vegetable Pizza with Green Salad

- Corn and Potato Chowder with Cheesy Toast

Speaking of Pioneer Woman’s newest cookbook, Sadie and I made the Fried Mozzarella Sticks recipe for lunch today and they were sooooo good!

She’s been asking me to make these for her ever since she tried them at a restaurant, and I was pickled tink to find the recipe.

Come… to…. momma!
These were so good, I had to stand at the kitchen door with a flyswatter to keep the kids from eating them all before hubby got some!

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