Meatless Meal Plans

I shared a little about why I decided to have an overhaul of my diet plans in my other blog. I am convinced that it was no coincidence neither was it by chance that I felt deeply within me that a drastic change in my dieting habits was necessary.

With that, I am following the principles laid down in the book, "What the Bible Says About Healthy Living", I've worked out a weeknight dinner meal plan for the entire month of May. I do not believe in a complete vegetarian diet would be the key to healthy living but I am making a deliberate effort to be mindful of the ingredients I choose to cook with. While I have set out to a meatless diet for weeknight dinners, on the weekends we will consume meat mainly chicken and fish and occasionally beef. It will be based on the following principles -

• Eat only substances God created for food. Avoid what is not designed for food.
• As much as possible, eat foods as they were created - before they are changed or converted into something humans think might be better
• Avoid food addictions. Don't let any food or drink become your god.

As for what in specific I choose to and choose not to eat, you might want to read in detail from this link.

Here's our weeknight dinner meal plan for the month of May.

I took about a day to carefully select the recipes and work into the meal plan ensuring that it's something my family would find palatable yet adhere to going meatless. Some of the recipes can be found on the internet (which I will leave a link to them) while others were picked out from some of the recipe books I have in my own collection. Most of which would be adapted or adjusted according to with as little processed ingredients/seasoning as possible.

Here's our grocery haul for this week (mainly ingredients for our weeknight dinners). The overall total was kept within a budget of $50. I must say, going meatless helped with keeping our budget low.

Our dinners this week
Monday

Long Bean Omelette (can't go wrong with this dish, it's the family's favourite)
Nonya Vegetable Stew (packed with loads of vegetables; I have switched to mushroom sauce instead of oyster sauce in the recipe)

Tuesday

Fried Bee Hoon (one of my favourite one-pot meal!)

Wednesday

Vegetarian Tofu (simple but tasty)

Broccoli & Cauliflower Stir-fry (easy peasy dish done just by frying it with minced garlic)

Thursday

Meatless Fried Rice (Fill us well and satisfied!)

Friday

Stir Fry Chinese Mustard Green and Stir Fry Bean Sprouts with Miso Tofu Soup
(I've made a slight tweak to Friday's meal, as I've some ingredients left over which was meant for my lunch meals of the week. Not wanting to keep them over the week, decided to just use them up).

Update:
We've survived five evenings of fully meatless dinners and I must say it was tempting to want to swap one of the dishes to a meat dish *hah* but I reminded myself just keep to it and we can do it! 

I've also made it a point not to consume anymore food after 8pm, yes, not even fruits or a healthy snack. I (just me alone) fasted from 8pm all the way till the next day 12noon and within this period I just drank water. This fast kept me alert and I was able to accomplish a lot more things within the day before the kids were home from school, it was amazing! I've also noticed that I have lost a few cm all around my body!!! Oooh I am so loving my new diet and I know I can get use to it! 

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Here's another inspiring story by a fellow blogger friend who's embarked on the healthy eating and healthy living journey for the past few months. Read her story and pick up a new tip or two, she's got loads of wonderful information to share!

Our Dinner The Past Two Weeks

When the week has been peppered with public holidays or no-school days, I do get thrown off my routine, which explains my lack of updates on my grocery hauls and dinner plan updates. Not that I didn't do any grocery shopping or didn't prepare any dinners, just that I haven't got the luxury of time to fill in the details into this space.

So this is a consolidation of what we had for dinner in the past two weeks. Once again, I am a no frills person, so dinners have as usual been simple, easy & fast to prepare.

Hope this gives you some ideas as you make your dinner plans.

Our $60 worth dinners two weeks ago -

Monday - Taiwanese Braised Pork Rice served with Bok Choy

Tuesday - Pan Seared Fillet in garlic cream sauce served with fries and baby french beans

Wednesday - Fried Kway Teow

Thursday - Ayam Pongteh and Stir-fry vegetables

Friday - Soba Noodles

Saturday - Potato Beef Soup and long bean omelette

Last week, our dinners costed $50+ -

Monday - Claypot Chicken Rice with Watercress Soup
Tuesday - Chicken Macaroni Soup
Wednesday - Minced Pork Tofu and Spinach & Eggs Medley
Thursday - Steamed Fish in Japanese sauce, Lotus Root Soup and stir-fry vege
Friday - Tauhu Goreng with premade peanut sauce

I was really heartened to learn that another mommy (click on the link) shared her $50 budget dinners and you'll be inspired too!

Grocery Haul This Week at $60!

The total cost of our groceries for this week's dinner is slightly higher than last week's as I've worked in pork and beef dishes into the meal plan (so fresh pork and fresh beef are the ones that increase the cost).

I have in our dinner meal plan this week as follow -
Monday - Taiwanese Braised Pork Rice with Green Vegetables
Tuesday - Pan Seared Fish Fillet in Garlic Cream Sauce with garden greens
Wednesday - Ayam Pongteh and Stir-fry spinach
Thursday - Fried Kway Teow
Friday - Beef Carrot & Potato Soup with Long Bean Omelette

In the course of grocery shopping, the thing that caught me was the cost difference between fresh meat/seafood vs frozen meat/seafood. A pack of frozen 4 slices of Tilapia fillet cost only $8.90 (sold in FairPrice), while a fresh Tilapia fish easily cost approximately $6.00. A pack of frozen sliced beef (approx 200gms) cost $4.90 while fresh sliced beef cost about $6.00. It's no wonder the cost of my grocery bill this week is slightly higher than last week's in spite of us having beef in our menu last week.

But to go for frozen food or not it's a personal choice. I've enjoyed frozen food lately (just started buying more frozen meat/seafood) and haven't find them inferior in any way. In fact, I find frozen prawns to be crunchy and fresh. If you have a concern if frozen food has equivalent nutrients you might want to read up here on the benefits of frozen meat and here on a test between fresh & frozen food.

Stay tuned for my updates on the meals I've prepared for this week!

5 Days Dinner At Only $50

Last week, I shared about my grocery haul and the week's dinner I will prepare. Here's a recap of what I've prepared for dinner last week. It was simple but delicious nonetheless!

I was so glad I didn't need to go back to the supermarket or wet market to get anymore groceries, it has free up a lot of my time to pursue other important matters for the family instead! So once again, a meal plan and a grocery list in place helped me to be more time efficient.

*Note: Some of the recipe links of the dishes below are attached for your reference.

On Monday evening, we had Prawn Paste Chicken (supposedly, I'll talk about that in a bit), and Stir-Fry Chinese Spinach with Oyster Mushrooms.

When it comes to recipes, one should really read it thoroughly before jumping right into cooking the dish. I have learned a lesson on Monday evening while preparing this Prawn Paste Chicken dish. I've completely missed the step of dusting the wings with flour, baking soda & baking powder. As you can see, my Prawn Paste Chicken has turned out to be grilled instead of crispy! Oh well, we all learn! Thank goodness it didn't taste weird at all.

Tuesday, I made a mixture of 8 different ingredients into a dish. This Vegetable Medley consisted of bean sprouts, carrots, chinese mushrooms, bamboo shoots, firm bean curd, black fungus, celery, red chilli. A refreshing change from my usual green leafy stir-fry vegetables.

The other dish that I made for Tuesday evening, was this Prawns in glass noodles. Also a new dish that I made for the first time. The kids and the hubby loved it as much as I did. The sauce was savoury and sweet and the aromatics made it extra flavourful! 

Wednesday, Steamed Fish in Lemon Sauce and Stir-fry Broccoli with beef slices were for our dinner. We just cannot have enough of this super appetising fish dish, the Sauce is the key of it!  

The taste and presentation of Taiwanese bentos remained vividly in my mind after I visited the place about 4 years ago. So Thursday, we had Taiwanese bento-style dinner. It was the easiest meal to prepare of the week (anything prepared in the oven is easy)! Simply grilled boneless chicken thigh meat and add on some stir-fry vegetables and voila!

Vegetarian Yee Fu Noodles, was our dinner on Friday. Another quick and simple meal done!

With all that time saved, I had some spare time to sew a Sock Monkey softie, oh how I love to sew!

Grocery Haul This Week

Grocery shopping is a weekly routine for me. Due to a lack of inspiration, I haven't been preparing any fancy dinners for the past week or so. All we had was just one pot meals on most days of the week, with a few nights of take-away dinners (oops! definitely guilty as charged!).

Now that we are back to a regular school week, I have a wee bit more time to make plans and work on a proper meal plan and grocery shopping list. Life is more organised when I get to sit down to do some planning.

Inspiration has been mainly drawn from these cook books for our dinner this week. Simple is the key, easy to prepare is of utmost importance, best if it requires the barest minimum cleaning and washing!

I enjoy the process of cooking and baking but seriously, I detest all that washing and cleaning it takes a toll on me. I have to spend a good 20-30 minutes washing pots, pans, plates/bowls, cleaning up the stove area and counter tops... oh I am exhausted with just the thought of that.

Anyways, let's talk about something that excites me more than the washing up!

I relish days where proper meal plans are done up and grocery list are in place because that means there can be loads of savings made! Since the groceries are done for the week, it's a load off my chest.

This week's groceries only cost me not more than $50!

And I am so proud of myself for not adding into my basket things I didn't account for! *yaay*

How can grocery shopping be complete without a nice fancy grocery bag? I love my handmade grocery bags. They are simply useful and best of all, I love how these grocery bags are reversible!

Oh! Just in case you are curious, here's the meal plan for this week's dinner (not fancy, I know) -

• Monday - Prawn Paste Chicken Wings and Chinese Spinach with Oyster Mushrooms stir-fry
• Tuesday - Vegetable & Tofu Medley (a variety of 10 different ingredients) and Prawns with Glass Noodles
• Wednesday - Steam Fish in Lemon Sauce and Stir-fry Broccoli & Beef
• Thursday - Taiwanese Style Bento: Grilled Chicken Chop, Stir-fry Mushrooms and Bok Choy
• Friday - Vegetarian Ee Fu Noodles

Will share the recipes as the week goes along or maybe I'll have them typed out by the end of this week.