Eating at Home

I was out of town for about three weeks. My elderly father had a coronary bypass (three arteries) and a pacemaker. I'm back home for awhile now. My folks don't like cooking and I was there with just my Mom for two weeks, and my wife also for another week. It was a lot of eating out and getting takeouts.

Now that I am home, I'm determined to cook at least four nights in a row. Monday, I thawed out (hey, I had cooked it) some of Lydia Bastianich's recipe for meatballs in sauce, but served them over jasmine rice, with steamed zucchini and yellow summer squash on the side.

Tonight, I'm making Mark Bittman's recipe for "boiled water" from his "How To Cook Everything" iPad app. I used the variation that uses roasted garlic and I added tomatoes. I didn't have canned chopped tomatoes in the cupboard, so I used canned crushed tomatoes. There was leftover sliced squash from last night, so I tossed it in. We'll round out the meal with a half a sliced cold cut sandwich each.

Wednesday night will be simple, too. I love eating home. It'll be just pan-grilled hot dogs with baked beans.

Thursday, I'll either roast a chicken or bring in a rotisserie chicken. The dark meat leftovers and carcass will go in the slow cooker on Friday with carrots and onions to make a stock that I'll freeze.