October 12, 2024

WEEKLY MENU 10.13.24

Tipping our hat to National Chocolate Cupcake Day during the Weekly Menu 10.13.24~

The Weekly Menu 10.13.24 gets a delicious little bump from National Chocolate Cupcake Day, which is actually on Friday, October 18th. We don’t ever need an excuse to have some chocolate, but this just seemed like a sign, you know?

Full disclosure: I am not a big sweet eater, but Bert? He has a GINORMOUS sweet tooth. He’s the reason we have dessert every Sunday night. Don’t get me wrong – I always have a taste, but the lion’s share goes to the boys. (Unless it’s Sweetarts, and then the sharing goes out the window.)

Individual Treats Rock.

I love serving cookies, candies, and other treats that are self-serve. (Especially for a crowd or for a party.) If we have some spectacular cake or pie (or hot fudge sundae), I have to prep everyone’s dessert plate. One individual treat I don’t serve too often? Cupcakes. Why? Bert thinks they’re a waste of space. And they don’t have nearly enough frosting on them.

Cupcakes have been around for almost 225 years.

The earliest extant description of what is now often called a cupcake was in 1796, when a recipe for “a light cake to bake in small cups” was written in American Cookery by Amelia Simmons.^[1][2] The earliest extant documentation of the term cupcake itself was in “Seventy-five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats” in 1828 in Eliza Leslie‘s Receipts cookbook.^[3][4]

Wikipedia

It looks like they’re here to stay, so Bert will have to get used to them! I’m doing my part to help with this week’s dessert: a delicious Death by Oreo Cupcake. That’s a sweet I think we can all get behind!

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Weekly Menu 10.13.24

In addition to National Chocolate Cupcake Day, Our Weekly Menu 10.13.24 is heavily influenced by the steakhouse. With the cost of groceries, specifically meat, continuing to rise, we jumped on a “Freezer-Filler” sale from a local butcher. There is plenty of ground beef, stew meat, chicken breasts, and pork chops, but they also included four strip steaks. Yippee!

We’re starting with a crostini made from sliced baguette that we’ll toast. This week, I’ll bake bacon (yep – from our butcher haul) on a sheet pan at 425 degrees and then toast the baguette slices in the bacon fat. We’ll pop the crumbled bacon and a little shredded cheese on top of the toasties and let that melt all over the top. How good does that sound?

No steakhouse dinner would be complete without a (Mini) Wedge Salad. Fully loaded baked potatoes and creamed spinach will round out the meal.

What a way to start the week!

If you ignore the cooking time, we’ve got a ridiculously fast meal on Monday. Creamy Crockpot Chicken & Peppers is a delicious dump meal that goes great on some quick-cooking thin spaghetti. It takes almost as long to get the water boiling as it does to get the spaghetti cooked. Chicken only takes about two and a half hours on high in our crockpot, giving you time to attend a quick soccer game or enjoy a leisurely glass of wine after getting dinner in the slow cooker.

Bert had a fried chicken bowl out last week. It hit the spot and looked great, so we’ve got that coming at home this week. I may well use instant mashed potatoes and a jar of premade gravy on top of Pops Crispy Chicken. Do NOT tell the food police.

It’s coming fast – don’t forget to plan your party!