I have been a road warrior for much of my career, driving nearly 3 hours round trip for the better part of a few decades. I enjoy the time in the car because I get to listen to tunes, catch up with friends or family, or just sit in silence.
But during the pandemic, this has changed as I am working from home and not driving as much. What this has meant in terms of planning is I am able to execute some elements of the dinners I make while I am working. For example, if something requires roasting, I can do it during the hours I am on Zoom calls or writing in the family room. That means that dinner can be on the table much earlier than when I was commuting, which has certainly made things easier. But some of the planning still requires some preparation and the one thing that has remained a constant in that regard is my planning book.
What is a planning book, you might ask? Every fall, I buy a family planner. Mine is made by Amy Knapp and has pages devoted to menus, projects, and provides space for “to do” lists. It also has helpful stickers to remind you about medical appointments, practice and games for sports, birthdays, and meetings. It is a godsend and I have joked for years about my life unraveling should the book ever go missing. I think I would survive, but I am not exaggerating when I say it would be difficult!
My menu planning starts every Wednesday evening. After work ends and we have had dinner, I work on a list in my spiral notebook that encompasses what is needed to make the meals I would like to have during the week. Sometimes, this meal planning is based on whims. I really want more seafood this week. What can I make? Or, if I have a craving for a particular type of food, I might want that reflected. More often than not, however, I am usually looking at the calendar to determine what is happening. Do we have plans with friends for dinners out? Is there a holiday in the mix? What have the kids said they would like? Once the ideas are finalized, they are placed in the planning book and each night after I make one of the meals, I cross it off, so I know what I still have left to make. Yes – this is where the 25% Swedish heritage is probably coming to good use, since my dad was quite a list maker as well!
I have hundreds of magazines and cookbooks to peruse to get my inspiration flowing. I never make anything the way that someone else might. I review recipes with a practiced eye to use less expensive or more easily accessible ingredients. For example, crème fraiche is delicious, but it is expensive, so I sub sour cream unless I think it is necessary. I don’t always like some of the extra ingredients people suggest for some salads either. I prefer my own tastes to be reflected in some of the items I make. The only exceptions I make are related to baking which requires a preciseness that is very different from the way I cook. I quite happily make the toll house cookie recipe on the back of the wrapper of Nestle chocolate chips. This is the best recipe I have found for chocolate chip cookies and it is the original. If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it, right?
So where does inspiration come from? Growing up my family members made food from around the world. I felt like I was touring the continents every week by the way we ate, and I have tried to replicate that experience for my kids. Sometimes, I will eat out at a restaurant and attempt to recreate what I have eaten on my own terms based on what I have ordered. And my travels with my family growing up have been a very big influence. Certainly, I love Mediterranean food, which features quite heavily in the rotating menu each week. It is healthy, delicious, and unassuming for a weekday palate. But I get in a rut every now and then and spend time looking at my many books. I adore hot and spicy food to my son Ryan’s displeasure. I sneak in the hot and spicy peppers everywhere I can.
The chefs that inspire me are those with expertise on certain cuisines I adore including Lidia Bastianich who has written books on Italian regional cooking. I also love Nigella Lawson who admires unloved ingredients like anchovies and makes sure to include them in the foods she makes. I have waxed poetic about my love for Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa, whose cookbooks are beautiful and well crafted with something for everyone from the pickiest eaters to gourmets. No matter where I travel, I always pick up a book about the regional food and cooking. That means I have books on braais in South Africa right next to recipes for the best Argentine asados. My time growing up in the UK has made me a bit obsessive as well when it comes to British baked goods like flapjacks or sponge cakes and puddings. And of course, the biggest inspiration is my mom who was a talented bread baker and pasta maker. She constantly tried new things and made everything a little less intimidating when it came time for me to consider how I would feed my family.
If this sounds challenging, I assure you it is not. I am probably making it a bit more complicated in the explanation than the reality. I just write everything down to keep my head straight during busy weeks and to make sure I am clear on what I have planned.
The biggest suggestion I can offer is to consider purchasing items that you will always have in your pantry to require less shopping. For me, those items tend to be vegetable or chicken broth, spices like cumin, crushed red pepper or ground coriander and various types of rice, frozen vegetables, or pasta. Dry vermouth is an excellent substitute for white wine if you don’t have it. And heavy cream can help make a sauce a bit richer. I always have flour and cornstarch to use as thickeners. And finally, San Marzano tomatoes can be used to make marinara, or in chili or various stews. They are a godsend, and they are nearly always in my possession.
I assure you that my pantry and my cabinets are a disaster. I am not neat and orderly at all in my organization in that regard by a long stretch! My fridge routinely needs to be cleaned out since I almost always buy items I don’t use and forget about them. And since John and I are always trying to be good about the way we eat we make sure desserts aren’t in our reach for too long!
One final aside, I tend to go to at least two grocery stores per week to find what I need. The typical Safeway or Giant is where I can get most of my shopping done, but they don’t have everything I need, so I often need to make a separate trip to Whole Foods, Fresh Market or Trader Joe’s to find specialty ingredients. Sometimes, I make the drive to Baltimore for Italian groceries (I will write more about this at a later date) or I head up to Ellicott City for the H Mart to pick up Asian ingredients for the recipes I am making. I like the adventure and it keeps me attuned to new products and trends, which I enjoy.
I don’t know that everyone is going to emulate the way I do things, and I certainly wouldn’t expect it, but I do recommend finding yourself a good planner to keep your life organized! As a busy, working mom this has been the key to keeping everything moving, otherwise, I’m pretty sure it would all start to go off the rails rather quickly. But even if it did, I’m sure I would still get it done. That’s how most of us roll, right? Flying by the seat of our pants!
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