Tuesday: Giant Shell Pasta, Free Ice Cream & A Summer Sausage Experiment
This morning we kept breakfast simple with more freezer waffles, Costco bagels, and some of the fresh bacon I made yesterday. One of my favorite parts of doing a little extra breakfast prep is how easy the next few mornings become.
After breakfast, I took one of my kiddos to a routine well check with the pediatrician. Thankfully we made it there on time—which is never something I take for granted around Cincinnati. You can think a drive will take 20 minutes, and then traffic decides otherwise.
The appointment went well, and we were back home in time to get a good chunk of schoolwork finished.
Lunch
Lunch was one of my kids’ all-time favorites.
If you’ve been around for a while, you’ve probably seen me share our Giant Shell Pasta Bar before.
Instead of stuffing and baking jumbo pasta shells the traditional way, I simply cook a whole box of shells and lay out all the toppings buffet-style:
- Marinara sauce
- Shredded cheese
- Pepperoni
- Cooked sausage (this was part of the prep I did yesterday when I cooked sausage, ground beef, and made the summer sausage to cure overnight)
- Olives
- Any other pizza toppings we have
Each person fills their own shell like a little taco, dips it in warm marinara, and eats it.
My 11-year-old actually invented this meal years ago, so I can’t take credit for it—but it’s been a family favorite ever since.
I cooked the entire box of shells, and spoiler alert…several of the kids requested them again for dinner later that evening.
I had another taco salad and used up most of the leftover taco meat from Sunday’s lunch. I did my favorite dressing with avocado salsa, salsa, rice wine vinegar, garlic powder, salt, pepper, and a dash of honey.
Afternoon Treat
After lunch we headed to Graeter’s Ice Cream.
Every summer they do a coloring contest where kids can turn in a completed coloring page for a free scoop of ice cream.
Let’s just say…five kids walking in with coloring pages probably isn’t their biggest profit day.
Everyone happily redeemed their free scoop, and it made for a really fun little summer outing.
Beef Stick Experiment
When we got home, I baked the homemade beef summer sausage that I rolled yesterday.
This time, instead of making all traditional logs, I shaped part of the batch into individual beef sticks.
The idea is simple: instead of slicing summer sausage every time someone wants a snack, I can freeze the individual sticks and toss one straight into a cooler. By snack time it’ll be thawed and ready to eat.
With our lake trip coming up, I think these could be perfect.
The flavor was great straight out of the oven.
The shape…
Well…
They currently look a little more like fingers than beef sticks.
I think next time I’ll roll them just a bit thinner so they’re a little more uniform.
They’re chilling in the refrigerator now, and I always think homemade summer sausage tastes even better once it’s completely cold, so tomorrow will be the real test.
Dinner
My husband had another work event tonight, so dinner was all about keeping things easy.
Several of the kids requested the giant shell pasta again, so I simply reheated the cooked shells and all the toppings and let everyone build another plate.
I finished off some of the leftover chicken my mom had sent home from Sunday dinner.
Days like today are exactly why I like to keep cooked proteins and leftovers in the refrigerator. The only thing I really cooked today was a box of large shell pasta….everything else was leftovers or proteins I prepped yesterday.
Looking Ahead
We’ve done a really good job eating through everything I cooked over the past several days, so tomorrow it’s time to start replenishing the refrigerator again.
I’m planning to grill the chicken thighs I bought at Costco this weekend, and I’ll use up the rest of the leftover steak from Sunday night dinner tomorrow too.