Happy morning! Breakfasts aren’t quite the same big event they once used to be. Back in the days before baby, I used to LOVE my breakfast ritual: brew the coffee, spend time making something special, enjoy it slowly it with an episode of House Hunters or a good magazine. Perhaps some blog reading. Even in the days when I worked and had to be somewhere early, I made breakfast something special.
These days it’s quite chaotic. Preschool days especially. I am up and down constantly, grabbing milk or a towel to wipe hands or picking up spilled oatmeal off the floor. Yes, I still make stove-top oatmeal and French toast and pancakes, but I do long for the days when breakfast could be savored. It’s really a miracle that I have managed to take a photo everyday!
This breakfast is a good example of a quick morning. I heated up some toast for carbs, added some nut butter for fat and had a Siggi’s for protein. Done and done.
Overnight oats are still a quick morning favorite! If I remember to make them… These were pumpkin, yogurt, oats, milk and banana in the last bit of my Good Spread Peanut Butter jar. Man was that stuff good!
Eggs/toast/fruit – this is the easiest breakfast for me to make these days because I can get Mazen started on one component before finishing the others. I put the toast in and get out the eggs, then give him his fruit to eat while the eggs cook. I also enjoy the variety myself!
Oatmeal does pop on the menu quite frequently, and M loves it. He can throw back some oats! This was pumpkin oats with banana and chia seeds and some chocolate Nutty’s butter! Another one I’m loving these days.
Lastly – it was pancake morning. Compared to preschool days, Fridays (when I don’t have to be at the gym until 10) feel luxurious! I’m not looking forward to the days when school starts before 8am… we will all have to go to bed early again. Pumpkin pancakes (can you tell we went through a can of pumpkin this week!) with clementines dancing around.
Can someone please remind me never to buy a canned soup again? I got a chicken chili from Whole Foods (365 brand) that was just soooo meh. I need to make a big pot and freeze individual portions! Or even better…maybe I could can them for quicker reheating…hmmm… I also had a pear to round out this lunch.
Leftover green curry shrimp + noodles! This, on the other hand, was delicious!
As was the Cook Smarts fish chowder! Gobbled up with a grapefruit on the side.
Next up was a salad with Bar Harbor sardine on top plus cheese and almonds and an olive oil dressing. Gotta get in those sardines!
And finally…lunch at a friend’s house! She made turkey chili that was amazing along with salads topped with artichokes and avocados.
Plus freshly baked S’mores cookies (Averie’s recipe!) I ate mine with a spoon – SO gooey good!
Awesome dinners this week thanks to Cook Smarts!!
Marinated chicken thighs with Brussels sprouts and brown rice. Pretty tasty!
THIS soup was amazing! Green curry with shrimp, mushrooms and udon noodles. I love green curry paste! Rocky Mountain Sriracha on top.
And a Brazilian fish chowder that was one of my favorite Cook Smarts meals ever. We used cod and red pepper and mixed brown rice in. I LOVED the flavor of this soup!
Finally…easy night was J&P BBQ from the freezer with salads and Popeye bread on the side.
That wraps up my week! Hope yours was delicious too. Happy 26th!
Maryea {happy healthy mama} says
I get up early before the kids just so I can enjoy my breakfast quietly. The days I don’t I feel off the rest of the day!
All of your food choices look fabulous!
Livi @ Eat, Pray, Work it Out says
I love your food pictures!! Those s’mores cookies look too good!!
Kaila @healthyhelperblog! says
All your Cook Smart meals always sound delicious! I would LOVE to try fish chowder!
Shel@PeachyPalate says
Always so beautifully presented regardless of your lack time! The fish chowder sounds good! Ne chance they’d let you share the recipe? Happy 26th!!!
KathEats says
If I do another post with them I’ll ask! And happy 26th!! 🙂
Shel@PeachyPalate says
Yep you too! Hope you’re having a nice chillaxed day!
Irina says
The brazilian fish “chowder” is probably moqueca, which is more like a fish stew, but not thickened by any thing and is eaten with rice or farina to pick up the broth. The key ingredient that is frequently omitted is dende oil (red palm oil) that gives moqueca its’ red color and a very specific taste. It is probably not a practical ingredient for a home cook that does not cook Brazilian food regularly, so it is normally either completely omitted or replaced with something like paprika. Probably still tastes great, just different.
some links to recipes:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Brazilian-Fish-Stew-238413
http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/moqueca___brazilian_fish_stew/
http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/brazilian-seafood-soup-moqueca
some recipes:
Emily @ Life on Food says
I always like breakfast. It is my quiet time. Yours look so yummy!
Lisa C. says
Do you eat breakfast as soon as you get up? I am just super thirsty when I wake up. I usually guzzle a large glass of iced green tea followed by hot coffee. Sounds strange, but is good!
Then after I get the 3 big kids and hubby out the door with their breakfasts in their bellies and lunches in their hands my daycare kids are dropped off. I let them just play and settle in (along with my 3 yr old) while I sit down and savor some breakfast. It might only be 5 min but it is a critical time for me. Interrupted, yes, but I still enjoy it.
Your breakfasts always give me ideas!
Jessica says
You may already know this, but if you home-can soup, you need to use a pressure canner. Freezing is so much easier, and although it takes a little more time to warm it up, it’s still less time and effort than pressure canning requires. Pressure canning isn’t difficult, really, but it is time-consuming and the risks that improperly-canned foods carry shouldn’t be taken lightly.
As an experiment, I froze the Cook Smarts green curry soup, which I made with some hardy (and hearty!) monkfish instead of shrimp, so I’ll be curious to see how it holds up. You’re right – it was really tasty!
KathEats says
Cool! Thanks. We do have a pressure cooker. .. 🙂
Jessica says
I tried to post a reply to your reply, but my comment may have been lost to the ether!
I wanted to say that a pressure cooker is different from a pressure canner. Pressure cookers are great for stocks and stews, for example, but their gauges aren’t accurate enough and their thinner metal sides heat up and cool down too quickly for safe pressure canning. Here’s a good article that explains it in greater detail:
http://www.foodsafety.wisc.edu/consumer/fact_sheets/pressurecannerandcooker.pdf
I like my steak rare and I make an aged eggnog with raw eggs that we don’t drink until it has mellowed for a year, but I’m not fooling around with botulism!
Here’s the eggnog recipe for any brave and curious souls; it’s delicious!
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16631663
KathEats says
Ahhh thanks!
Linda @ the Fitty says
I love the accurate and amazing portions sizes of your meals, like that chicken. I could never do that as I always devour so much more. That should be one of my resolutions, come to think of it.
Happy boxing day!
(PS-if you don’t want that chicken skin I’ll take it :D)
KathEats says
I do!
Kelly says
I hear ya! Is Mazen sooo hungry the minute he wakes up? My son is 16 mo old and he demands his oatmeal, I can barely cool it down for him. My daughter was not like that at all. Sheesh
KathEats says
Yeah!
Sagan says
Some tasty eats! I can’t eat canned soup, either. I’ve made a point of avoiding ordering it in restaurants too, because while I enjoy soup, I like it JUST so. I don’t tend to feel like I’m overly fussy when it comes to food, but soup is something that really needs to be just right if I’m going to eat it!
Kelly says
Hi,
I love looking at your meals! They always look so good and well balanced:). I also love that you seem to have fun with food and enjoy life. Do you try and stay within a certain calorie range or just eat by satiety cues? Also, I was just on the Cook Smart Website and didn’t see this info, but do they send you the nutritional info for each recipe? Thanks! Happy Holidays!!:)
KathEats says
I try to eat by hunger and fullness cues primarily. Cook Smarts does have all the nutritional info!
Sabrina says
I think you mean hearts of palm and not artichokes.
I can no longer make oatmeal in the mornings- neither kid can wait that long! Instead they have honey nut Cheerios most days and pancakes or oatmeal only when I can sneak down super early and have them ready when they wake up. I do your old school heating up the oatmeal method lots of mornings if we are in an oatmeal mood!
Merry Christmas to you and yours!
MaryBe says
I found getting up a little bit earlier helped. I could eat my breakfast, and start theirs!
(And I think those are hearts of palm, not artichokes – both delicious!)
Lisa @bitesforbabies says
True story…I was JUST thinking the same thing about how my breakfasts have become so quick and simple since having kids (as I sip my espresso and eat my toast!). Having said that, I did add some homemade chia jam to my toast 😉
http://www.bitesforbabies.com/recipes/raw-blueberry-chia-jam/
Becky says
I hear ya on canned soups. I’ve taken to pressure canning my broth, but leftover soup still goes in the freezer if we don’t eat it fast enough. The heat of the pressure canning process tends to pulverize solids (also why canned soups you buy tend to be so mushy & meh) which is not a hit here. But having jars of homemade broth on the shelves is pretty handy.
cynth says
Baby days are definitely time consuming! It puts other things on hold but not forever 🙂
Alex @ True Femme says
I totally agree with you about canned soups! Though the convenience factor is a plus, I always feel kind of meh after eating them. I’d much rather make my own and freeze them too!
Nikki says
I love Good Spread! My kids are addicted!!
Jeri says
Not sure if you have a Fresh market near, but the Little Big Meal for the month is stir-fry. Sauce, noodles or rice, choice of steak, shrimp or chicken and veggies. About to eat the leftovers for lunch now. See I am learning from you. Save the money and eat the leftovers