Tasteful Tuesday

How do you get dinner on the table? Do you stress all day trying to come up with what you are eating? Do you just pull it together last minute? Do you end up throwing a bowl of cold cereal at your kids? Do you make a menu plan days, weeks or a month ahead? I have to admit that I am guilty of all of these scenarios. Since the holidays are coming and they are stressful enough without unnecessary worries, let me suggest the menu plan. If you already do this, ignore my ramblings. If you don't already do this, there are many ways it can be done. You can plan your month in advance or you can make it more simple and do it for every two weeks or you can do it weekly. I prefer to make a plan for every two weeks and usually I just plan dinner and sides. However, lately I have been making a plan for breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks. I try to go shopping for all the basic ingredients once and then fill in one other time for things like milk and fresh ingredients. Since I like to try new recipes, I try to plan for one or two days where I can try something new and the rest I fill in with tried and true recipes. I have found that having a plan makes it so often times I can throw dinner together while the kids are still at school and then I am able to enjoy them more when they get home. It makes my life less chaotic. By making my plan and getting the basic shopping done, I can switch meals around as I change my mood but know that I still have all the ingredients I need. I am not always good at my menu planning but once you have done it a few times, you can just recycle them if you want. Here is a sample of my most recent dinner menu:
Sunday: Sis. Moses's Baked Beans, salad, roll; Monday: Waffles, Buttermilk syrup, fruit salad
Tuesday: Leftover beans, salad, roll; Wed: Vegetarian wraps, veggie tray; Thursday: Taco soup, salad; Friday: Ravioli, salad, garlic bread; Sat: Fish Tacos, chips and salsa, veggie tray, Sunday: French dip sandwhiches, fruit, salad.
What I usually do is make my plan on a Sunday, go through the recipes and make a list of ingredients I need to buy. It takes about 1/2 hour to do this each week but saves me hours of time later. Alright, enough about menu planning and onto the recipe!
I am not really a huge fish fan. But I do know of it's health benefits and so I try to squeeze it in every once in a while. Mostly we like salmon, and we only like it one way. But, we do like these fish tacos. This time I used ocean perch and it was really good. If you aren't a fan of fish, give this a try at least once. It doesn't have a really fishy taste and is very tasty!

Fish Tacos

1 lb white fish (whiting, tilapia, ocean perch)

2 Tablespoons butter

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/4 teaspoon garlic salt

flour tortillas

shredded lettuce

Mango Salsa (recipe below)

Taco Sauce (recipe below)

Cube fish. Melt butter in frying pan. Place cut fish in pan and sprinkle with cumin and garlic salt. Cook 4-5 min or until fish is white and flakes easily with fork. Meanwhile, warm tortillas. To serve, put fish in tortilla and top with lettuce, mango salsa, and lots of taco sauce. **my kids really like this with just fish, lettuce, and ranch dressing, Mike and I love it with all the other yummy stuff.

Mango Salsa

1 1/2 cups chopped mango

1 red bell pepper, diced

2-3 green onions, sliced

1 jalapeno, diced

1 lime, zested and juiced

Mix all together and chill.

Taco Sauce

1/2 cup plain yogurt

1/2 cup mayonaise

1 lime, zested and juiced

1 jalapeno, diced

1/2 teaspoon oregano

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Mix all together and serve on top of fish tacos.