Phish Food

Like most weeks, I am beginning this one with a plan that may or may not be followed. A lot depends on my mood, or how things go during the week. I have to get the upstairs ready for Son3 and DIL3 who are coming to visit on the 18th, and it is a wreck.  When we sold the lake place a lot of the furniture that was there came to live upstairs at our house, which means a lot of rearranging and redoing. As much as I prefer to do things myself without asking for help, some of the furniture is too bulky or heavy for me to move myself, so maybe the person (TheHub) I asked back in February will finally help me. 

Meanwhile I will be doing all I can do by myself using silicon sliders. I anticipate a stream of expletives coming out of my mouth tomorrow, which begs a philosophical question. If there is no one here to hear did I really say them at all?

The song today is in homage to my sons' love of the band Phish. I first started listening to them when the older two were in their late teens, and I found I really liked their music. This is one of my favorites, but it is a very odd song.

But that is enough about Phish, now on to the meal [plan that didn't happen, what really did and what still might!

What I thought might happen last week 

1. Salad, chopped or garden salad

2 Veggie meal (depends on what is available) green beans

3. Veggie meal, okra and whatever is available, green beans

4. Burger patty, green beans, caulitato salad

5. Grilled chicken, green beans, tomato cuke and onion salad

6. Grilled fish, coleslaw, air fryer keto hushpuppies, green beans

7 Takeout

Monday: I woke and cooked the squash for the casserole at the same time I was brewing tea for the day. If I get things cooked early, the kitchen is not quite as hot since it gets no morning sun. Then when it get to be dinner time a short trip in the microwave heats what need to be hot.

Veggie meal, squash casserole, green beans, air fryer okra*, tomato cuke banana pepper and onion salad.

Tuesday: This was just another one of those throw together meals. I think it took about 15 minutes for start to finish, but I will confess I had already strung and trimmed the green beans Tuesday morning.

grilled chicken, sautéed green beans with garlic, tomato slices, cucumber slices

Wednesday: I had intentionally left a little okra uncooked so TheHub could have it again Wednesday. All I had to do was pop the okra in the air fryer and cook the peas. The rest was bits and pieces of assorted leftovers that were nuked on the plate. When we ate it looked like we had been through a cafeteria and chosen completely different foods

Zipper peas, air fryer okra and assorted leftover veggies

Thursday: TheHub had a dinner meeting and I was not about to cook for just me, plus I had some veggies that needed to be eaten.

Sliced banana peppers with cream cheese and Everything But The Bagel seasoning

Friday: Pre-Covid, Friday night was our date night when we went out to eat. We have continued our covid variation which is to run do a curbside pickup, bring it home and eat it.

Take out from Taziki's TheHub had the Friday special and I had the grilled lamb with a greek salad. Usually I think whatever I order is better, but his looked delicious!

Saturday: We did our usual Saturday running around(the produce market and Publix, ‘cause we are wild and crazy folks). While we were in Publix we hit the deli and dinner planned itself

Rotisserie chicken, tomato slices, cucumber slices and sliced banana peppers

Sunday: Last week was Son2’s birthday.  We wanted to do something for him but he and DIL2 were Phishing all weekend, so we had them over Sunday evening for dinner

Hamburgers with all the fixings, corn on the cob, caulitato salad, and Keto popsicles.

Maybe This week:

1. Veggie meal: Leftover zippier peas, corn on the cob, coleslaw, air fryer "fried" green tomatoes, sliced tomatoes, cucumber slices

2. Chicken salad with lettuce, tomatoes and banana peppers

3. White bbq chicken, caulitato salad, sliced tomatoes, green beans

4. Veggie meal: Squash casserole, green beans, tomato cuke and onion salad

5. Italian sausage, tomato, onion,  bell pepper, banana pepper, zucchini one dish meal

6. Take out

7. Grilled cheese sandwiches (Because I have a loaf of keto bread and have been sandwich hungry) coleslaw, chips or my keto version of cheese puffs**

Have a great week staying on plan, going off plan or with no plan at all!

*I found a different way to cook my okra because the normal way I cook it has a cornmeal coating which is not compatible with keto. Sunday, TheHub had cooked sausage patties in the air fryer. For some reason, known only to God, I assumed anyone who had cooked something in the air fryer would actually wash it after they used it. Yeah, I was wrong. He only washed the cooking rack.

I tossed my plain okra onto the rack and spritzed it with olive oil (thanks Misto)** About halfway through the cooking process I smelled sausage and realized what had happened. I never would have begun cooking it if I knew the air fryer still had sausage grease in the bottom, but it did add a fantastic flavor to the okra. The next time I am cooking some just for me, I might cook a sausage patty intentionally right before I cook my okra.

** I am in no way, shape or form affiliated with anything or anyone. Any product I mention here is something I use and recommend, but it is also something I bought with my very own money and get nothing for endorsing it. I use this mister every single day!

*** TheHub buys the small individual serving bags of regular crunchy snacks at Costco. They live in a huge basket in the butler's pantry and scream at me every time I walk through it to get to the laundry room. The School Yard snacks do not scream at me, but they at least muffle the noise the real (delicious) chips make.

They are a crazy expensive alternative to potato chips and are not as delicious, but are much better than having nothing crunchy. I have bought them twice. The first time I bought sour cream and onion, because they had only two options and that was my preferred choice. Since then, they have added additional flavors so I bought the fiery hot and cheddar cheese flavors. I eat a bag very rarely so I have a lot of bags in my keto stash. I am just glad they have a decently long shelf life. I am not sure if I like the fiery hot or the cheddar best, but both of them are better than the sour cream and onion. I would like to try the other two flavors but until I eat most of what I already have here that is not going to happen.