Update with a week of menus and "recipes"

I haven't abandoned the blog, I am just living my life without so much time in front of the computer. I can't believe it has been a week since I posted ANYTHING at all!

Anyway, I am sorry and here is the rundown from last week.

Monday:
I was still feeling sick from the stomach bug and didn't have it in me to cook so I put something together for the kiddos and ate a bowl of cereal myself. The hubby also was fending for himself.

Tuesday:
I decided to make a pot of chili.

Chili which consisted of a can of Bush's Beans with Chili Sauce, a can of Black Beans, leftover taco turkey meat, a can of chopped tomatoes with green chilies, a little less than 1lb of ground beef (put into the crock pot raw), 2 T Chili Powder, and 1T ground Cayenne Pepper. I stirred it all together and cooked it in the crock pot all day. The boys had pasta with sauce and we topped the pasta with our chili.

Wednesday:
The weather was beautiful so I cranked up the grill and made kabobs.

Beef Kabobs:
I cut up a bottom round roast into cubes and marinated it all in Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing but sealed and froze half for another time in the future. I skewered the meat along with cherry tomatoes, button mushrooms, red bell pepper segments, and onion segments and cooked them on the grill until the meat was done. I served this along with saffron rice and come freshly cut pineapple.

Thursday:
Leftovers were the name of the game since we had so much chili and turkey burgers from this week already.

Friday:
We invited our neighbors over and I made hot dogs, mac-n-cheese, and fruit salad for the kids and put together a chicken pasta dish for the adults.

Grilled Chicken Pasta:
I took 3 chicken breasts and cooked them on my grill pan until they were done and seared with the beautiful grill marks on both sides. I didn't season the chicken at all. Meanwhile, I cooked 1/2 box of penne pasta. When the pasta was done, I steamed a package of raw pre-cut stir fry vegetables that were not seasoned. (They were on sale at my store and I got them for $1) Once the veggies were steamed, I removed them and made a chicken gravy again (see this posting under the information on how to make dairy-free cheese sauce) and added 2 T Garlic Seasoning to the sauce.
Once the sauce was incorporated and thickening, I cut the chicken into cubes and added the chicken, pasta, and veggies to the sauce in the stockpot. The beauty is that I used one pot and did it all. If you want to make the actual cheese sauce from the linked posting, that would be good with this dish too but we kept it just to a garlic sauce with no cheese. Another alternative is to use a can of cream of chicken soup and add garlic to that. As with most of my recipes, it is a guide, not a rule.

Saturday:
We went out to dinner at Fogo De Chao on Saturday night and followed it with a show at Center Stage in Baltimore. It was a lovely date night and meant no cooking for me again.

Sunday:
Surprising that I got away with cooking so little this week and am rewarded with a dinner of frozen pizza cooked by my husband. We spent the day at the beach with the boys and between the driving and hanging out in the sunshine, I couldn't face the stove.