Monday: A Breakfast Tray, Leftover Chicken Alfredo & 24 Grilled Sliders

Got up this morning and made a fresh batch of bacon for the kids.

Chris also went to Costco yesterday and restocked our bagels, so I immediately sliced those and got them ready for the freezer.

I’ve said this before, but if you’re buying the Costco bagels and your family isn’t eating all of them immediately, slice them before you freeze them.

Then you can pull out exactly what you need and put them straight into the toaster.

And after being out of town twice last week and basically limping our way toward the Costco restock this weekend, it felt very good to have food in the house again.

How I Keep a Four-Year-Old Busy During School

People ask me all the time how I keep a four-year-old occupied while I’m homeschooling everyone else.

And the answer is: sometimes I don’t.

She’s four.

But this breakfast tray is one of those little things that works surprisingly well for us.

Instead of just making Daphne breakfast and putting a plate in front of her, I’ll put all the components onto a tray and let her make breakfast.

Today she had things like:

A bagel.

Cream cheese.

Sprinkles.

Cereal in a little cup.

Milk in her little pitcher.

A piece of sausage.

Then she can spread the cream cheese, add her sprinkles, pour the cereal, pour the milk and eat everything at her own pace while she’s also working on a craft or hanging around with us during school.

I forgot to take the picture before she’d already gotten into everything, but that’s kind of the point.

She’s busy.

It’s all food I was going to feed her anyway. I’m just changing the presentation so breakfast becomes an activity.

And nine times out of ten, this buys me a solid 30–45 minutes.

Of course, now that I’ve said that, it probably won’t work tomorrow.

But today it did.

Leftover Chicken Becomes Alfredo

For lunch, I had chicken drumsticks I’d brought home from dinner at my parents’ house last night.

So I pulled the meat off the bones and used it to make one of my easiest leftover lunches:

Quick chicken Alfredo.

This isn’t a complicated Alfredo sauce.

I put a big pat of butter into a pan and add some heavy cream, Parmesan cheese, garlic powder and pepper.

Let that warm together, then add already-cooked pasta and already-cooked chicken.

That’s it.

Sometimes I’ll throw broccoli right into the pan too, but today I just served vegetables separately.

I also had the rest of some naan crackers from Costco, so I warmed those in the oven and added them to the table with fruit and vegetables.

Leftover chicken.

Leftover pasta.

Leftover naan.

Completely new lunch.

And Then I Grilled 24 Sliders

For dinner, I moved on to the ground beef Chris brought home from Costco yesterday.

And I made 24 sliders.

Because if I’m going to stand at the grill and make burgers, I’m not making six burgers.

I’m filling the grill.

I formed all 24 patties and grilled them, then toasted buns and sautéed onions.

We also had potatoes left from dinner at my parents’ house last night, so those got reheated too.

The kids built their sliders however they wanted.

I skipped the bun and turned mine into a burger salad with lettuce and all the burger toppings.

Easy dinner, and—more importantly—we now have leftover cooked burgers in the refrigerator.

The Refrigerator Is Starting to Look Useful Again

This feels much better than Saturday when we were basically looking into the freezer and asking what forgotten food could become dinner.

We have fresh bacon.

The Costco bagels are sliced and frozen.

We have leftover cooked burgers.

The ground beef is handled.

And tomorrow I’m dealing with the chicken breasts we bought at Costco.

That’s the next protein that needs my attention.

I also have a Walmart order coming tomorrow to fill in some of the everyday things we’re low on—breakfast sausage, hot dogs and those other easy staples I like having around.

This is basically how I rebuild the kitchen after we’ve been traveling.

I don’t need to cook ten complete meals.

I just need to get a few useful proteins cooked, get the freezer and pantry staples restocked, and suddenly we’re back in business.