Woman in Real Life

One great thing about having a party is party leftovers. We had friends over for our "A Turtle's Tale 2" preview party on Saturday. Although we had clean-up duties on Sunday, we also got a break from cooking. We ate leftovers like lentils and rice and chickpea salad, above.

I am trying my best to keep up my weekly meal planning. This is week four. Read on for this week's menu plan.

Last week started with Monday's Vegetable Soup with Lentils. This is a old favourite that my husband and I began making many years ago. The recipe follows. What I really like about this soup is that it's simple - you throw in the ingredients and let it cook for an hour. That gives you time to make a salad, slice up your bread, pour a glass of wine and relax.

With two weeks of meal planning under my belt, I find I am enjoying the process. Outlining what I want to cook for the week and having all the ingredients available kind of forces me to stick to the plan.

Otherwise, I might be inclined to slack off some nights and make less healthy dinners. In my opinion, half of the struggle with cooking is the daily decision-making.

Last week started off with Monday's Curried Chickpea and Tomato Linguine. I used a recipe from Best Health magazine. It was simple to make and I quite liked the curry flavour combined with the pasta.

I don't have a whole lot to report this What I Ate Wednesday. Our weekend schedule was completely based on my son's basketball tournament. Five games. Out of town. Equals few food pics.

I did have this one fabulous lunch this week. I love vegetables. Not that I want to go to a restaurant and only eat salad, just so you know. No vegetarian does, by the way. I like to have other stuff on my plate. On this particular day, I had leftovers from two dinners to use up...cauliflower and rapini from one meal and roasted veggies, beets and breaded tofu from another. I ate all this for lunch and I was stuffed!

This What I Ate Wednesday, I am looking at all of the food I consumed on Tuesday.

Let's start with breakfast. I just went grocery shopping on Monday, which means there was still fresh fruit in the house. I enjoyed some Nature's Path pumpkin flax granola with peach slices, raspberries and soy milk. I also had water with Emergen-C in it. I have had a crackle in my throat for a few days, so I am trying to ward off any illness. I added a clementine for good measure.

The past week has been a bit of a whirlwind, with a lot of short trips here and there. So, meals have been quick and baking has been minimal.

Here is my What I Ate Wednesday look at a few highlights. We had one of our summer staples again, tacos with refried beans. This time, we topped them with sautéed orange and yellow peppers, onions and mushrooms.

And that’s it! What foods have you enjoyed recently?

I have to say this has been a week of particularly delectable food. We have our good weeks and our bad weeks around here when it comes to food, as I’m sure most families do.

This week has been a good one, and I have discovered a few new favourites, including the amazing pancakes pictured above, a noodle recipe from a magazine and a fabulous new cake recipe.