Day 13: Lot's o' Planning & Prep!

OMG! What a crazy night last night! I accomplished more in the kitchen in 2 hours than I ever thought possible! So here's the deal: I've got a class for work this week from 9a-6p, Monday through Friday. That revelation means two things: (1) I need to plan my meals for the week in advance and they all need to be portable, and (2) I need to set hubs up for success to be able to feed the kids healthy foods while I'm away.

WHEW!

I had a lot of items on my agenda, including:

• make berry sauce to flavor plain yogurt for the kids
• make homemade applesauce
• make hardboiled eggs for egg salad sandwiches
• make homemade whole-wheat bread
• make breakfast casserole bites

Seriously! That was a lot of homemade goodness to accomplish all at once! But I was very pleased with what I was able to accomplish.

I started by making berry sauce. This sauce can be used to flavor plain yogurt (along with a touch of honey), to make strawberry milk (if you're into that sort of thing - we're not) or as a tasty ice cream topping. It was quick and easy to make! Just some fruit, water and a touch of maple syrup simmered for about 10-15 minutes, then tossed in the blender, then strained to remove seeds. I used strawberries and blueberries and it turned out quite lovely!

After I finished the berry sauce, I put it into the fridge to cool. Once it was cooled, I mixed some of it into plain yogurt with about a tablespoon of honey, then let LO give it a taste. She loved it! I used the yogurt to fill up this ice pop mold and popped them into the freezer for a cool and tasty (and healthy!) treat. This is a big improvement from even the Simply Go-Gurt "healthy" yogurt option I had previously purchased for the kids. Here's the ingredient list (whoa!):

Cultured Pasteurized Grade A Low Fat Milk, Sugar, Modified Corn Starch (for Thickening), Contains Less than 2% of: Kosher Gelatin (for Thickening), Tricalcium Phosphate, Vegetable and Fruit Juice (for Color), Potassium Sorbate (Added to Maintain Freshness), Natural Flavor, Carrageenan (for Thickening), Vitamin A Acetate, Vitamin D3.

I also threw some eggs into a pot to boil so I would have some hardboiled eggs for a quick breakfast and also to make egg salad. Yum!

Next up was homemade applesauce. I was happy to have some help with the apple peeling...

Then I tossed the peeled, diced apples into a saucepan with about 2 tablespoons of water and a teaspoon of cinnamon. That was it!

This is a major improvement from your typical store-bought applesauce. Check it! These are the ingredients in Mott's cinnamon applesauce:

INGREDIENTS: APPLES, HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP, WATER, CINNAMON, ASCORBIC ACID (VITAMIN C), NATURAL FLAVOR

Seriously? My applesauce didn't need any HFCS and boy was it super tasty! I put the applesauce in these super-cute silicone ice pop makers for the kids. I can't wait to hear what they think about 'em!

The next thing on the list was Lisa's breakfast casserole bites. I made these several months ago and recall them fondly. They were quite tasty! I was sure these would be a hit with the family.

LO helped me by cutting up 3 slices of bread, which go in the bottom of the foil-lined muffin tins. Then  I whisked together 8 eggs with 1/4 cup of milk and poured the mixture into each muffin tin, and topped each with bacon and shredded cheese (LO took care of shredding the cheese while I cooked the bacon). These baked up yummy and smell delicious! And no surprise, they tasted awesome as well!

Mmmmmm! Bacon.

I continued my prep work by washing some fruit, including both red and green grapes that I removed from the stems and put into ziploc bags. I took the pound of walnuts I purchased and put them into individual snack bags as well.

Whew! It was a lot of work last night, but it was so worth it! The only thing I wasn't able to knock out was the homemade whole-wheat bread. I didn't have a great recipe to try and I knew I didn't have enough time to get it done, so I decided to knock that out one day this week (hopefully).

All the prep work was a huge success! I took 2 eggs and made a little egg salad this morning, and also took 2 bananas, an apple, as well as some grapes, some walnuts, and some amazing Kashi Cinnamon Harvest cereal (each in individual snack-sized ziploc bags) along with a large bottle of water to my first day of training. I came home with food leftover!

For dinner tonight, I made a little personal pizza using a whole-wheat tortilla, some crushed tomatoes, mozzarella cheese and some pepperoni (before I realized pepperoni is slightly processed). ;) It was super delish and very filling!

The kids had a great day and managed to keep our real food game plan for lunch and dinner with daddy! Yay!!

Here's hoping we have another 4 days of success all around!