Meal Planning

Meal planning can be a chore, but also a ton of fun if you find the right resources to work with! IT is so nice to come home in the evening, knowing exactly what we're having for dinner, rather than running around to put something together, and usually - missing a key ingredient.

I am on vacation now, but still on a different schedule (7 hours difference) so I spend time in the middle of the night ssearching the web for all sorts of things.

If you are brand new to meal planning, I suggest you follow these few steps, and search for Meal Planning ideas on the web!

1. Make a list of meals your family enjoy eating.

2. Make a list of ingredients needed for all of these meals.

3. Make a weekly (two-week, three-week or monthly) calendar where you can plug in the meal ideas. If you only want to plan dinners you will have plenty of room. If you want to plan every meal, you need to make sure you can fit it in the calendar space as well as label the different meals with the meal time. Example: Monday: Breakfast - scrambled eggs and bacon, Lunch - Mac and Cheese with Broccoli, Dinner: - Grilled chicken, Orzo salad and mixed veggies.
You can be as detailed as you want, or just jot down enough for yourself to remember.

4. Plug the meals you want to have over the next week(2, 3 or 4 week)period. Keep in mind that some days are busier with activities, and you might want to do lighter meals (or take out) on those days. Even so, jot it down if you plan on it. Keep in mind - there is nothing wrong with having breakfast for dinner (cereals, boiled eggs, pancakes etc), and sometimes doing so makes for a less stressful evening!

5. Then hang the meal plan on the fridge. Every night before going to bed, check the meal plan for the next couple of days to see if you need to thaw anything out.

Of course, I could go into more detail with this, but for right now, this is a start. There are many web sites out there that have many ideas and printable meal planning sheets for you to use. I have my meal plan laminated so that I can re-use it rather than throw it away. If you make it all on the computer and print the whole filled-in meal plan out, you should keep it and just use the same schedule later on. Makes for less work in making the plan when you already have a schedule you can put into a rotation!

Happy planning!

All Recipes!

Whenever I am wanting to try out a new recipe, or just need somethign real quick to put together for an event, I always check out All Recipes at www.allrecipes.com. It is an amazing resource for cooks!
I love that there are reviews, altered recipes and so on, so that I can pick the right version of a recipe for me and my family.

I even plug in my own recipes so that I can find them whenever I am away from my home and cook books.

Check it out!

Friday June 24th, 2011

Breakfast: skipped it this morning as I had to run errands right when places opened.

Lunch: Bacon pancakes.

Dinner: Lapskaus. Vegetable beef stew of sorts.

Thursday June 23rd, 2011

St. Hans celebration and grilling by the shore!

Breakfast: Bread with jelly

Lunch: Ham and cheese rollups again

Dinner: GRilling by the shore. Hot dogs, potato salad, chips. I also had a pork chop and some shrimp scampi offered to me by one of the better cooks I know - my oldest brother Leif. Yum!

Wednesday June 22nd, 2011

Breakfast: Yogurt and fruit

Lunch: Sandwiches wtih cheese and red bell pepper

Dinner: Pasta and sausage casserole.

During the famous Norwegian "coffee meal" we ate some chips and cookies as well as ice cream cake.

Tuesday June 21st

Breakfast: Cheese sandwiches with ham, microwaved until perfection. Yum!

Lunch: Ham and cheese rollups.


Dinner: Frozen Pizza with beef. Sour cream sauce for topping the pizza. Lettuce salad with chicken and lots of corn. Nothing makes a salad better than corn! Yum!

Monday June 20th

Breakfast; bowl of ceral and yogurt

Lunch: Sandwiches and buns from Meny

Dinner: Grilled hotdogs and pork kabobs at Bukkøy, and had a spring salad and a regular lettuce salad with chicken. Very good, but too much food!

Sunday June 19th

Breakfast: cheese sandwich, banana and grapes

Lunch: cheese sandwich again

Dinner: Chicken noodle casserole. Very yummy! My littlest girls loved it, which was good. They both had 2nds.

Late night meal: Kebab plate from Viking Grill. Very filling. My mom and I decided we should have just split one!

Saturday June 18th

Breakfast: Cheerios, yogurt and a banana

Lunch: Risgrøt - Rice porrige. Very good!

Dinner / midnight meal: Rullekebab at 12 in the morning! Rullekebab consists of kebab meat, lettuce salat, some sort of dressing, all rolled up into a large tortilla bread and wrapped in aluminum foil.

Friday June 17th

Breakfast: Yogurt with granola and a banana

Lunch: Sandwiches with cheese and ham, microwaved until cheese melted. A sprinkle of Piffi on top. Very good.

Dinner: Joika boller and mashed potatoes. A good basic Norwegian food. The kids loved it too, which is always a good thing.

Dessert: Ice cream for me and popcicles for the kids.

Thursday June 16th

Breakfast: Yogurt with granola

Lunch: Pytt-i-Panne (pictures to come). It was an ok dish, but I probably won't eat it again if I don't have to. At least not the kind of Pytt-i-Panne we had.

Dinner: Deep dish frozen pizza with ground beef and cheese. I altered my side of the pizza and added cooked onions and tomato slices. Very good!

Snacks: Ice cream for dessert

Wednesday June 15th

Breakfast: My usual cheese sandwich, but this time with red bell pepper on top. Yum!

Lunch: More sandwiches

Dinner: Grill out with family at a summer party. One hamburger with bun, heart shaped waffles with sour cream and strawberry jam and a pop.

This is catch up time, so no pictures to post right now.

Dinner June 14th

Tuesday June 14th

Breakfast: Two sandwiches (in Norway we all do open faced sandwiches). One had Norvegia cheese and cucumber, and the other had Leverpostei - which would be most like Braunsweiger in the US I guess.

Lunch was open faced sandwiches again. This time with cheese and jelly. Yeah, go ahead and laugh! But it tastes good:)

Dinner was Karbonader (meat patties) with brown sauce, new potatoes, mixed vegetables and tyttebær (kinda like cranberries). Very yummy! Kaia loved it and ate more than her big sister!

Monday June 13th

Breakfast today was a yogurt and a sandwich with Norvegia and cucumber! Nomm!

Lunch, just a few snack foods here and there.

Dinner was betasuppe with dumplings. Betasuppe is a vegetable soup with meat balls and often times bite sizes of hot dog or sausage. Very yummy, and perfect on a rainy day like yesterday. It was of course served with fresh bread and butter!

Dessert was ispinne again (I love Norwegian ice cream!)

Evening meal was another sandwich with cheese.

Sunday June 12th, 2011 - Meals in Norway!

Sunday on the ferry to get to Haugesund from Stavanger I ate a wonderful Komle also known as Raspeball, kompe and many other names. The first link has the Wikipedia info in Norwegian, the second one in English.

It did not taste as great as I remember it tasting before, but it was still good.

When we arrived at my parents'house, my mom and dad made smoked pork chops, boiled potatoes and mashed rutabaga! Yum!

For dessert we had ispinne and it was real good too!

As a before bed meal I just had a Cheese Sandwich on Norwegian bread. I LOVE Norvegia cheese!