Monday: Leftovers, Baking with My Son, and an Easy Asian-Inspired Chicken Dinner
This morning the kids had bagels, bacon, and cereal before we jumped into a full morning of school. During the summer we also do piano lessons on Monday mornings, so it was a busy start to the day. I also sent two kiddos outside to pick raspberries before it got too hot!
People OFTEN ask how we keep the 3 year old busy while we homeschool. This morning I pulled out this little hammer/nail/fairy toy and she LOVED hitting each nail into the cork board. I don’t let her play with this on her own…for safety reasons…but she really liked sitting next to us and playing with it.
Lunch
Lunch was all about finishing off leftovers.
I took the rest of the flank steak from Saturday night, sliced it really thin, and gave it my favorite quick reheat: a blazing hot skillet, a little butter, and just enough time to get some color on the edges.
I also reheated the last of the roasted potatoes from Friday in the air fryer to crisp them back up and cut up plenty of fruit and veggies to go alongside them.
For myself, I made a burger bowl because I wanted to use up some of the cooked burgers from Friday night. I layered lettuce, tomato, cucumber, pickles, and all my favorite toppings, chopped up two burger patties, warmed them, and added them right on top.
It was perfect.
By the end of lunch we had cleaned out quite a few leftovers. The flank steak is officially gone, and I think we only have two burger patties left. I’m guessing those will disappear tomorrow as a snack.
Afternoon Baking
This afternoon my 13-year-old and I decided to bake together.
He enjoys cooking, but baking is definitely his favorite. I think part of the fun is that everyone gets excited when cookies come out of the oven.
We made homemade Chip Wheelies—that’s what we call homemade ice cream cookie sandwiches.
Today was cookie day.
Tomorrow we’ll make homemade ice cream, sandwich it between the cookies, roll the edges in sprinkles, and freeze them.
One tip if you make these: intentionally underbake the cookies just a little bit. That way, once they’re frozen, the cookies stay soft enough to bite into instead of becoming rock hard.
My oldest comes home from Europe later this week after being gone for two weeks, so I thought these would be a fun treat waiting for her.
Dinner
Tonight I was craving something different.
I knew I wanted to grill the chicken breasts I’d bought at Costco, so before anything else I prepped them.
One grilling tip that has made a huge difference for me: try to make all of your chicken roughly the same thickness.
Chicken breasts almost always have one thin end and one thick end. I cut off the thinner portion and butterfly the thicker portion so everything cooks more evenly.
For the marinade I kept it intentionally simple because I plan to use this chicken in several different meals this week:
- Olive oil
- Salt
- Pepper
- Garlic powder
- A little smoked paprika
- A tiny splash of balsamic vinegar
- A little Italian seasoning
I grilled all of that while I worked on the side dish.
Easy Asian-Inspired Vegetable Rice
I had leftover rice from our flank steak dinner on Saturday, and I decided to turn it into something completely different.
I sliced up whatever vegetables I already had in the refrigerator (my goal was 2 cups of veggies for 1 cup of cooked rice):
- Mushrooms
- Carrots
- Red pepper
- Broccoli
- Onion
I heated a stainless steel skillet until it was nice and hot with about a tablespoon of olive oil and sautéed the vegetables.
Once they started getting some color, I seasoned them with:
- Rice wine vinegar
- Liquid aminos (or soy sauce if gluten isn’t an issue)
- Ground ginger
- Honey
- Garlic powder
- Salt
- Pepper
Then I pushed the vegetables to the side, added the cold cooked rice, and repeated those same seasonings so the rice was evenly flavored.
It’s almost like a fried rice, but lighter. I don’t really fry the rice—I just warm it through with all those flavors. It reminds me more of an Asian-inspired rice pilaf.
I served it with the grilled chicken, a sprinkle of sesame seeds, and everyone who wanted it added a little extra soy sauce or liquid aminos at the table.
It was so good.
As I was eating, I realized edamame would have been fantastic in it too. Edamame adds a surprising amount of protein, so next time—or even when I eat the leftovers tomorrow for lunch—I’m definitely adding some from the freezer.
Keeping It Adaptable
The best part was how easy this meal was to adapt.
Some of my kids don’t enjoy the seasoned vegetable mixture, so before I started seasoning everything I simply set aside some plain broccoli to steam and left some of the rice plain with butter.
They had:
- Grilled chicken
- Buttered rice
- Steamed broccoli
The rest of us had the full Asian-inspired version.
Same ingredients.
Very little extra work.
Everyone was happy.
Looking Ahead
Tomorrow doesn’t need to be a big cooking day.
I still have:
- Plenty of grilled chicken
- A couple of burgers
- One package of Teton Waters Ranch Polish sausage
- A ham in the refrigerator
- Lots of Dinner Insurance in the freezer
I may pull out some taco meat tomorrow, or I may not.
We’ll see what the day brings—that’s the beauty of my rolling three-day system.