Recipe Roll #4

Welcome to another week of tried and true meal ideas, straight from my menu.  I hope this inspires you to get in the kitchen and cook ...

If you need a little help staying organized, make a Menu Display Board and take a few minutes to fill it out every week.  A little planning really cuts down mealtime stress and kids love to read it!  I've included a free download on the link above to make it easy.

Enjoy!

Tuesday we had Braised BBQ Beef Sandwiches from Simple Recipes.

This was AWESOME!! I used my homemade Kansas City BBQ Sauce mixed with Sweet Baby Rays and it was perfect. I served on Udi's Gluten-free hamburger buns with tangerine wedges on the side - Yum-O!! Thankfully, there were enough leftovers for Matt and Morgan to both have lunch on Tuesday or I think I would have had a fight. :)

Wednesday we tried Vietnamese Summer Rolls from Veggie Belly.

These looked great and sounded great ... and the funny thing is, this recipe is very similar to Veggie Sushi (which we love), but we didn't care for these. The vermicelli was ok. I think the flavour that comes with sushi rice makes a difference.  It was really overpowered by cilantro as well, which again, we usually love.  I only used a little and it didn't seem to matter.  Oh well!  Win some, lose some ...

Thursday we tried Coconut Lime Chicken from Menu Musings of a Modern American Mom.

It was really good ... subtle coconut richness mixed with mild curry. Matt usually isn't a fan of curry, but he really liked this. I served it over cilantro rice (2 cups long grain white rice, 2 cups water, large handful chopped cilantro, 2 gf all-natural bullion cubes ... throw everything in the rice cooker) with fresh cut red peppers and carrot sticks on the side.

Friday we had friends over, so I made a version of Pastitsio from Rita May Recipes.

I did three things differently ::
#1 - I used my own version of meat sauce ...

I browned stew beef in my Dutch oven, then braised it in my Homemade Pasta Sauce in the oven at 350 degrees for about two hours, stirring occasionally, until fall-apart tender.

 #2 - I used rice flour in the White Sauce.
 #3 - I used Trader Joe's Gluten-free Corn Pasta.

It turned out really yummy! We had olives and fresh veggie salads on the side ... and my friend brought the most delicious brownies made with almond flour. Good times!

Saturday we had my recipe for Loaded Chicken Sausages.

Sunday, as I've mentioned before, we usually have small group Bible study so I made Rice Flour Banana Bread from food.com to take, along with a little Copy Cat Texas Roadhouse Butter from Tammilee Tips.

It turned out pretty good!  I haven't had much luck with gluten-free baking, so I was pleasantly surprised to see this one actually turn out.  It was very easy and required only normal ingredients - no gums or specialty starches.  It did call for sugar, so I substituted organic evaporated cane juice and it was perfect.  I will definitely make this again when I have spotty bananas.

 
The Texas Roadhouse butter is rockstar.  I know it's not the best for you (high in calories, fat, sugar, etc.) ... but it takes the bread from yum to YUM!  A worthwhile splurge. :)