Meal Planning

Portobellos Frites and Shaved Brussels Sprouts
I think the only thing I need to buy for this is portobello caps.

Brown Rice Idli and Sambar
The normal white idli was fine last week and we ate all of it, in spite of a few hiccups with the batter jamming the venting piece of the Instant Pot so that it never sealed all the way.  Now I know how to work around both those issues.  I bought red and white poha at the Indian store last week and will try making idli with the red poha and cooked brown rice in place of the white and see how it goes.  The sambar is ridiculously easy since I just put together vegetables and red lentils and spices and boil/simmer until the potatoes and red lentils are cooked.  I bought frozen drumsticks (a vegetable I had never heard of before scouting sambar recipes) from the Indian store because the fresh ones didn't look green like the ones I've seen in pictures online so I wasn't sure if they were going bad.  Those will be a new addition this week.  I also found an unsweetened plain non-dairy yogurt by Kite Hill that tastes just as good in sambar as the dairy yogurt I've been using, though it's fattier than the dairy version by quite a bit.  Maybe I'll actually bother making the no-oil pakoras this week to go with all this.  I skipped them last week because it was just too much when I was having trouble with the Instant Pot.

Homemade Pizza
I made some tofu pepperoni yesterday that didn't turn out quite how it was supposed to -- the texture is very crumbly on account of the super firm tofu -- but the taste is good.  If I make it again, I'll add vital wheat gluten and water when I put all the ingredients in the food processor to see if that fixes the texture problems.  I'm going to try to use up some of what I made yesterday on homemade pizza since crumbling like sausage shouldn't be a problem on pizza.  I'll make my pizza vegan with arugula and mushrooms and things of that nature.  I'd like to try getting some shredded Daiya in place of the cheese to make Sim's vegan too.  She's eaten homemade vegan pizza before and ate all the leftovers, but she can tell she doesn't love it as much as dairy cheese pizza.  I previously bought mozzarella from Miyoko's Creamery, which is great cold but melted into a drippy oily substance.  If I skip the cheese altogether like I do on my own pizza, she will notice to an extent that I think it will interfere with getting her to eat it.  Vegan cheese seems like a good compromise.

I'm also going to make vegan bacon from the plain tempeh I bought using a recipe in the 21-Day Vegan Kickstart app by the PCRM.  I'll do this tomorrow and Sim and I can eat Vegan Cream of Broccoli soup and vegetarian club sandwiches.

The same app also has a mango sorbet I want to make Wednesday as dessert after the Indian food.  I bought frozen Atulfo mango slices when I was at the Indian store that should work well for this.  The entire ingredient list is frozen mango, agave nectar, and lime juice, so this should be easy.

The same app also has a chocolate mousse recipe made from silken tofu that I want to try on Friday night.  I just have to find silken tofu.  The store in town doesn't carry it.  I might have to go to Whole Foods again; I'm not sure.

Thursday is another fast day for Sameer, so we'll do soup and sandwiches again or leftovers from the other days.

I also want to try making the leftover cooked brown rice from idli production into rice pudding from the 21-Day Vegan Kickstart app.  In place of maple syrup, I'd like to use homemade date syrup from The How Not to Die Cookbook and in place of raisins, maybe bananas.  Maybe cooked bananas.  I want to make a bananas foster sort of flavor.  The base recipe looks simple enough that I don't feel the need to try it before I mess with it this way.

Meal Planning

Swiss Chard with Pickled Golden Raisins and Pistachios (Vedge, pg. 102) and Spaghetti & Meatless Balls with Marinara

Nut-Crusted Tofu and Veggie Sides

Sambar and Idli and Veggie Pakoras (The No Meat Athlete Cookbook, pg. 165)

The nights Sameer typically fasts, we'll have soup and sandwiches.

Meal Planning

Vegan Cream of Broccoli Soup and Vegetarian Reuben Sandwiches

Celery Root Fritters and Remoulade (from Vedge, pg 130) and Seared French Beans with Caper Bagna Cauda (from Vedge, pg 97)

Vegetarian Turkey Cutlets and Fingerling Potatoes with Creamy Worcestershire Sauce (Vedge, pg 80) and Shaved Brussel Sprouts

Meal Planning

Tofu & Vegetable Stirfry with Brown Rice

Spaghetti & Meatless Balls and Shaved Brussels Sprouts

Brinner
For this, I'm going to make vegetarian sausage/egg/cheese biscuits with fresh buttermilk biscuits.  We also have hash brown patties in the freezer.  This will be a Friday night junk food dinner.

For Tuesday and Thursday -- Sameer's fasting days -- we'll probably have leftovers and/or sandwiches.  We also have chik'n tenders in the freezer.  I can serve that sort of thing with a couple vegetable sides.

Meal Planning

I have a lot of stuff in my fridge and freezer that needs cleaning out.  Here is what I'm making this week.

Chilli-Garlic Noodles
I still have some milder chile garlic paste to use up, so I'll use that here.  I also have chopped green bell pepper in the freezer and, oddly enough, some chopped green onions I probably thought were bell pepper and stashed in the freezer.  Not sure how those will hold up in reheating.  I'll probably just toss them and buy new ones.  I need green cabbage and green onions for this dish.

Vegan Irish Sausages and Colcannon

Tofu & Vegetable Stirfry with Brown Rice
This will use up the tofu in the fridge, some of the chopped bell pepper in the freezer, and I'll see what else I have on hand already.

Garden Pretzel Sandwiches and Vegan Cream of Broccoli Soup
I'm not keen to do pretzel sandwiches again so soon, but I need something Sim can eat in the car today between her eye appointment and swim lessons.  Hopefully I can convince her to have some soup or something healthy after swimming.

Veggie Burgers and Cheese Fries and Green Salad
Not the healthiest of meals, but it'll do for a Friday night and I already have fries and burgers in the freezer and a fresh batch of homemade ranch dressing in the fridge.

Meal Planning

Sameer is traveling for work this week, so Simran and I are doing easy meals we like that aren't his favorite, like sandwiches.  Sides of the vegan cream of broccoli soup and/or crudites with hummus every night.  I don't have a plan for one of the nights Sameer is gone.  We'll do chik'n tender or quesadillas or something easy like that.

Vegan Cream of Broccoli Soup and Vegetarian Turkey Club 

Easy Vegetarian Reuben Sandwiches

Garden Pretzel Sandwiches

Avocado Grilled Enchiladas with Red Chile Pesto

Meal Planning

Hearts of Palm Cakes on Curried Lentils (Vedge, pg 125)
I'm making this because it sounds good (I like hearts of palm) and because I already have most of the ingredients.  I think I'll make this Monday.

Baked Potato Poutine with Porcini Gravy (Vedge, pg. 162) and Shaved Brussels Sprouts
I've always wanted to try poutine.  Sameer talks about it a lot too.  He might not like this because, like so many other recipes in this cookbook, it features mushrooms, but I love mushrooms and it sounds appealing to me.  It'll take some work since I have to make mushroom stock before I can make the poutine, and I have to make porcini powder before I can make the stock.  He and Sim can eat some frozen chik'n tenders or other leftovers if they don't like this.  We already know the brussels sprouts are exquisite -- I've made them twice in the last week.  This will be a Friday night "junk food dinner" meal.

Chilli-Garlic Noodles
I haven't made this yet from last week's meal plan.  I just need to buy more green onions.  I guess I'll do this Wednesday.

Vegetable Manchow Soup and Burgers
I'm going to make this soup today.  I want to use up as much of the vegetable stock I made last week as possible.  For the burgers, there are a lot of random little patties wrapped in wax paper in my freezer and sealed in ziploc bags that are presumably black bean burgers or soy burgers I made.  There are also Ezekiel 4:9 whole grain buns in there that need to be eaten or thrown away at some point, so I'm using up buns and burgers from the freezer.  There are plenty of other burger fixins in the fridge.

Tuesday and Thursday will be soup and sandwich type days since they are Sameer's fasting days I don't like cooking a full meal for just Simran and me since it yields way too many leftovers and she complains about almost everything I make anyway.  I don't expect her to enjoy the manchow soup tonight, so I'll make a batch of vegan cream of broccoli soup on Tuesday for us to feed off for the rest of the week.  The sandwich portion of the meal could also turn out to be a veggie dog, a quesadilla, or chik'n tenders since I'm planning to get rid of more leftovers and freezer meals this week and don't want to buy ingredients for specific fancy sandwiches.