There’s a lot of baking going on in my house, trying to make sure I have portable, enjoyable snacks on hand to take to work and keep things enjoyable and entertaining even with the dairy-free and soy-free restrictions at the moment. I’ve been leaning a lot on the carrot cake cookies and German chocolate cake from Cookie and Kate’s Love Real Food book, the whole meal muffins from Power Plates, and this chocolate war cake from Food & Nutrition.
Here’s what I’m eating and reading this week:
WEEKLY MENU PLAN
All the options below are dairy-free and soy-free recipes now that we’re managing a dairy- and soy-protein intolerance in our little one.
Sunday: Dinner out (Gaslight – the duck confit means cooked in its own fat, so no butter)
Monday: Leftovers
Tuesday: Pasta with caramelized Brussels sprouts & cabbage (using half a package of bacon instead of pancetta this time)
Wednesday: Fish-sauce caramel chicken (next time I’d do chicken thighs – the whole legs were a bit unwieldy) and fragrant rice with pepitas and dates (half recipe)
Thursday: Leftovers
Friday: Quick egg scramble with chopped bell peppers and toast
Saturday: Pan-seared salmon with lemon and leftover rice
I took last week off, so here’s the menu for that one, too:
Sunday: Roasted chicken with sweet potato and roasted vegetables
Monday: Leftovers
Tuesday: White bean soup (from Power Plates)
Wednesday: Pan-seared pork chops with pear chutney
Thursday: Chicken with broccoli, farro and beet salad (a pretty meh recipe, the leftovers sat around for quite awhile)
Friday: Spaghetti with simple tomato sauce and ground beef
Saturday: Ribs slow-roasted in coconut milk
WHAT I’M READING AND ENJOYING THIS WEEK:
I love, love this wall art. And this one.
Taking fat shaming out of fitness culture.
It’s not just the male gaze; it’s the male glance, too.
Books by living women to replace those written by dead white men: several of these found their way to my TBR list.
BOOK REVIEW
Title: The Checklist Manifesto
Author: Atul Gawande
Date: 2011
Format: audiobook
I get why lobbying for using checklists to reduce errors in the face of growing complexity in our professional lives makes sense, but I don’t get why this simple premise got turned into a whole book. It would have been so much better as a TED talk, and if I had another audiobook lined up, I might have actually stopped listening after 20 minutes. This book also focused a lot on nerve-wracking situations to explore how and when really intelligent people we trust with our lives make errors (a lot of surgery and flying vignettes). While parts were certainly interesting, a felt so much was simply redundant. I’m not quite sure I get what all the buzz was (and still is) all about.
