Monday Menu Planning

With my cookbooks piled around me, Mondays are often the day when I begin to think about what we’ll eat this week. I think about food ALL OF THE TIME but Monday is usually the day where I make lists and choose recipes.

Earlier this fall, my beloved and I did a six-week detox. We were introduced to protein smoothies for breakfast and a whole new attention to what we eat. In said detox, we were required to give up some of the things that I love most. I am a miserable person without coffee and so I’m not eager to go back to depriving myself of some of the things I love most even if we are talking about doing Whole 30 this spring. Ugh. I really don’t want to do it. But, we’re getting married in 111 days and we both want to look amazing which means that we’re hyper-attentive to what we eat. Ignore the beers and bar food we ate last night. Weekends, according to my future husband, don’t count. But, on Mondays, it’s back to thinking about what and how we will eat. It’s time to be healthy again — which requires some planning.

I do love planning. Last year, when I started blogging here, I decided to purchase a domain but I didn’t plan very well at all. I didn’t think it through and decided to purchase a domain in my name when I knew full well that I would be changing my name in a mere 18 months. So, maybe you’ve noticed that things look a little different on my blog today. It’s got a  new domain and a new name because in just 111 days, I will have a new name. So, we’re cooking now. Not just because I love food and spend a lot of time in the kitchen but because soon and very soon I’ll become Elsa Cook. Get it?

I don’t intend this to become a food blog but want to play with the metaphors that the kitchen provides so that the liturgy I offer will become Ingredients for Worship and the various thoughts I might have about interim ministry and maybe even the writing I am doing will become Recipes for Ministry, but there will be other recipes too.

Tonight, as I already have the ingredients on hand, we’ll be making this recipe for dinner. I didn’t find as much inspiration in my cookbooks today as I might have thought I would but thanks to that miserable detox, I have a whole bunch of wonderful bloggers who put yummy, healthy recipes right in my inbox. Today, I got an email from Cookie + Katie about What to Cook This March and I basically want to cook everything on the list.

I wish I could tell you I am kidding as it might make this menu planning post more interesting but I’m not. Everything I’m cooking this week came from this one email. Thank you Katie. We loved this recipe last time we had it so it’s on the list for this week again and I’m eager to try this salad. I’ll make this salad for lunch for both of us. We’ll have this one night and this another. We have a whole bunch of these things already in our pantry so it’ll be a quick shopping trip tomorrow.

What are you cooking this week?