Menus and grocery lists, January 7, 2014

You've got to ac-cent-tchu-ate the positive

e-lim-inate the negative

Johnny Mercer

If the first week of the year, when our attention is steered at high speed round a curve so tight, 

it makes hairpins look like straight pins.

It seems that just as the last page closes on the last cookie, cheesecake, fudge or fudge swirled cheesecake with a cookie crust recipe in the last magazine of the year, 

the next issue opens with news that you really ought to feel
guilty about indulging in so much of that horrible stuff
 and get to work working it off.

Sure, it's as good a time as any to grab a fresh start or turn over a new leaf or chart a new course. But which old race is restarting, and what was wrong with the old leaf anyway, and is this new course even on the map, or should we pull over and ask how to get to where we're going? The thing is, "anywhere but here" might be an interesting direction to head in if one has a full tank of gas and nowhere to go, but lots of good and hopeful plans shipwreck

when you navigate by negatives.

Lots of us know, from discouraging experience,  that this time of year comes loaded with 6 full barrels of motivation by detestation. You know, it's the New Year, and so one is supposed to take stock and take a long look in the mirror- either

A. An actual (shudder) full length mirror that reflects your whole body.

B. A metaphorical Dorian Gray mirror that reflects the condition of one's soul (shudder shiver)

C. The metaphorical mirror of mockery that reflects your unachieved life goals (shudder again)

D. The numerical mirror otherwise known as the bathroom scale (ok, now this is getting really scary)

E. All of the above 

And having braved the terrors of any or all of the above mirrors, one is supposed to change something. Or lots of things. Or lots and lots of things, depending on how the mirror-gazing and the stock-taking panned out. And all too often, one adds a few pages to the well-read volume titled "things I hate about myself", and reaches for a cookie and a comforting beverage. And things stay pretty much the way they are.

Because while self-loathing may be satisfying way to spend a rainy afternoon,

it's pretty lousy at motivating change.

Hate a thing hard enough and long enough, and you will probably become (or remain) the very thing you despise. Because hatred, which is well known to have absolutely zero sense of humor,

still knows how to get the last laugh.

So, if you're going to start the New Year by walking the plank onto the deck of the ship of good intentions bound for ports of positive change, you're more likely to get there if you like what you know about where you want to go, and give the heave ho to hating who and what and where you're coming from.

Lucky for me, I had some help.

Sure, the year started with all the usual lists of lesses and mores: 

-more vegetables, less meat (goal: One vegetarian meal and one fish meal a week)

-more exercise, more reading (goal: learn to read while using a treadmill. Goal: get a treadmill)

-more healthy snacks, less sugar (goal: invent a carrot that tastes like a chocolate cookie)

What I didn't expect was the gift from my mother that got the first meals of the year off to such a fun and nutritious start- look what she grew!

No, not the guy! That's my daughter's boyfriend,
modeling the two head-sized heads of cabbage
I brought home from my mother's garden.

here they are serving as table decorations while I pondered what to do with them, along with a platterful of the cutest little turnips, also courtesy of that rich East Texas soil:

Lucky too, that when I happened to say out loud "What in the world can I do with all this cabbage without boiling it till all the vitamins give up or coating it with mayo?" I was in the company of my good friend Esther, who pointed me to dlife.com, the website that helped her steer straight away from the looming threat of diabetes.

And that's where this week's dinners get their start:

Wednesday: Cabbage soup 

I love the look of this dlife recipe!

Well, except the caraway seeds. I can peck at most nuts and seeds with all the enthusiasm of a true bird-brain, but maybe not caraway seeds. Maybe fennel or dill or thyme instead. 

I'll use the food processor to shred a whole head of cabbage for this soup, and ziploc the leftover shreds for fish tacos over the weekend.

Esther recommends slicing some low fat smoked sausage or kielbasa into the soup, and that sounds great to me, though I may decide to make this meal meatless.

Sausage doesn't really count as meat, does it? 

If the idea of dinner without carbs makes you sad, try toasting some rye bread or making some wholewheat cornbread to serve alongside.

Thursday: Baked Teriyaki Chicken and Pad Thai

Two ways to go here- either give a try to this fast and easy homemade teriyaki, or pick up a rotisserie chicken. Recipe calls for chicken thighs, but we may go for leaner chicken breast, if I can find it on sale somewhere. The pad thai includes chicken in the recipe, but we'll be leaving that out. Can't find rice noodles for the Pad Thai? That's okay- use ramen noodles (without using the seasoning packet) or angel hair pasta instead.

 Friday: Baked salmon and roasted cabbage steaks

 Thanks again to the ladies at the old workplace, who tell me that rubbing slices of cabbage with garlic and olive oil and baking it is all the rage because it's easy and it tastes great. It at least looks fun, doesn't it, and I'll hop like a lemming on any rage that is all about good health and good taste. We'll start what I hope becomes a routine that I'm going to call Fishy Fridays with a simple baked salmon. Since I've yet to consistently cook a piece of fish I like that is not fried, I've linked to a basic tutorial on baking salmon that includes some ways to jazz it up. A few extra pieces of salmon will make Sunday's fish tacos no work at all. 

Saturday: Thai coconut soup 

The home audience has requested a soupier approach to dinner, and soupy he shall get. Any leftover chicken will shred itself into this soup, and I'll leave out the ramen in the recipe and serve a little (hopefully brown) rice on the side instead. 

Sunday: Fish Tacos 

Everything comes together in this easy, nutritious dinner- the leftover salmon, the leftover rice,  the rest of the shredded cabbage, (though it's not in the picture, cabbage is, for some reason, super tasty on fish tacos). With all of this stuff already done, I might stir up a batch of the legendary Rodrigo Sauce  to top it all off. 

So there's a week of menus that set the direction for the rest of this year- heavy on the veggies, light on the meat, and a fish or two for good measure.

I hope your week measures up to all your best intentions-
I hope that no matter where you're starting from,
the who that you want to be
and the whats that you wish for
become so clear
that you can steer straight toward them.
I hope the journey of this year 
faces you forward, 
and teaches you how to carry
the things that can't be left behind.
And even though things may get scary,
though your destination seems hopelessly distant,
I still wish for you, now as ever,

a bon voyage, and a glorious adventure.