This week I’ve let the kids decide what we will be having for dinner! It’s turned out surprisingly well! They picked 3 dinners each and I’ve added a roast chicken on Sunday.
They have gone for a couple of pasta dishes and lots of dinners that have bread in some form. Funny, they get bored of bread in their lunch boxes, but they love eating it with dinner! What would your kids pick if they chose dinner for a week?
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This Week’s Dinners
- Spaghetti Bolognese The kids argued for a while whether it would be meatballs or bolognese, but bolognese won this time! I made a big batch of sauce so I have two more family dinners in the freezer ready for when I have less time or inclination to cook.
- Chicken drumsticks, garlic bread and salad I will take the skin off the drumsticks and shake them in some seasoned flour before spraying with a little oil and baking. The garlic bread is shop-bought for convenience. The kids aren’t great with many raw vegetables, so the salad will be one I know they’ll eat: grated carrot and spinach.
- Macaroni Cheese Find my recipe here
- Lamb Koftes, pitta bread and salad I mix some ground cumin, dried mint, salt and pepper into 500g lamb mince before shaping into 8 koftes and grilling or barbecuing. I’m going to make the pitta bread myself… I just have to find which notebook I’ve written the recipe down in! I’ll try chopped iceberg lettuce and cucumber for the salad.
- 15-Minute Pizza This is a recipe I got from Jamie Oliver’s YouTube channel. The dough for the bases is very quick to make and I’ve also used it to make scrolls. Find my post on it here.
- Lunch Board This is where we empty the fridge of all deli meat, cheese, pickles, olives, and dips and put it all on a board in the middle of the table with some bread and crackers and veggie sticks. This is one of my quick dinner standbys.
- Roast chicken and vegetables I buy the biggest chicken I can (about 2kg), then I have leftovers for sandwiches and salads for a few days.
Food Prep and Baking
Carrot sticks – as usual.
Coconut Choc Chip Slice – This is so quick to make. I made some for afternoon tea on Sunday and there’ll be enough for a couple more snacks and a couple of lunch boxes.
Banana bread – Finally making it today! Mostly for lunch boxes and afternoon snacks, but it could be a breakfast option, toasted and spread with butter, with some fruit.
Brown Rice – I’ve cooked 2 cups of brown rice, then divided it into servings in resealable snack bags and frozen it. I’ll use it in rice salad bowls for lunch for the next few weeks.
Wholemeal bread rolls – My son has gone off sandwiches in his lunch box, but bread in a different shape usually works!
See my post on Meal Planning in 5 Steps here.
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