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[Bar-B-Lew]

Several other threads recently peaked my interest for this thread.  I am a household of two.  I cook on my pellet grills about 10x a year right now for our meals (even though I have too many pellet grills).  Most of the time it is lots of meat that mostly I eat as leftovers.  My wife has probably less than 10 dishes that she knows or likes to make in the kitchen.  It seems like we have a limited selection of meals that we eat on a regular basis.  I kinda think that I would like that list of meals to be larger, but I am not 100% sure of that.

So, my question is, do you have a regular routine of meals that your family eats?  If so, about how many different meals do you cook regularly throughout the year?  And, if you don't mind sharing, what are they?

[Bentley]

Fairly narrow here. 

As I try and think back to the meals I have had over the last 7-10 days.  Beef burritos tonight, last night scallops in butter and garlic with spaghetti...bacon, egg, potato and cheese burritos for dinner...meatloaf with fixins...last few weeks tri-tip with fixins...frozen pizza...Deviled Ham with Ritz...Throw in a couple on dinners before meetings, and that is about it.  Simply horrible eating habits as far as balanced nutrition!

Repeat with whatever is in fridge or freezer!

[pmillen]

No, we have an irregular dinner menu system.  We're retired so we can go to the grocery store at noon and buy what we cook for dinner.  There are four grocery stores within a mile of our house.

As a result, we'll decide on something I've seen here and we'll go buy the ingredients.  Then we'll not cook that item again for months 'cause there are so many options.

We have a somewhat standard menu system for family holiday meals, tho'.

[Kristin Meredith]

When I was younger I use to think it would be terrible to have to have the small frig's that European's had -- you would have to shop everyday!!

Now, I think "How great to walk out your door (if you live in the heart of a big city or even a tiny village) and walk into a shop and buy just enough fresh veggies, bread, cheese, meat for a meal and go home and cook."  When I lived in Vegas, I was able to do that more because the grocery store was almost right across the street and on the way home.  Here -- not so much.  A 15 mile round trip discourages that.

So I tend to be back to the big shopping trips and no planning.  Bent does his own thing for meals, so I seem to buy a hodge podge of stuff and hope I got things he will eat.

[Canadian John]

  We just keep coming back to the same meals except for a few days a month.. We are content enjoying the foods we like...Somehow this ties into dry rubs. We used to have a myriad number of rubs ranging

from excellent  down to barely acceptable. Now it's 3 - all home made..That is how it goes with food here..It may be age related, but when something works and we are happy with it, why change. We do have

a fairly diverse menu however.

[hughver]

I have a couple of "old faithful's" that I come back to every month or so, but in general, other than leftovers, I try to cook a different variation every night. Especially when we have guest, which is quite often.

[Bobitis]

When my ex was living with her sister, you knew what day of the week its was by what was on the dinner table. 

[cookingjnj]

Although we do not have any type of set rotation, over the course of a month we will usually have each of these main dishes, sometimes multiple times a month for some. 

-Grilled steak (usually rib eye seasoned with a steak seasoning on one side and Spicy Montreal on the other)
-Grilled chicken breast (I have so many different spices, I usually make a combination of spices as a dry rub for the chicken), grilled sausage (both hot and mild - we also like to throw Johnsonville Cheddars in the rotation too)
-Grilled boneless/skinless chicken thighs (season with a Thai spice mixture on one side and a Singapore mixture on the other -- Penzies product -- glazed with a sweet and spicy Thai sauce till caramelized -- also very good grilled with just a Coconut and lime marinade)
-Grilled bone in or boneless pork chops (brined -- I started including a can of Ginger Beer in the brine for added flavor--  and rubbed with BBQ pork rub -- Including Weber Chili and Lime rub)
-Grilled Hamburgers/Cheeseburgers (When kids were active with sports, this was a two or three times a week staple)
-Bone in turkey breast (rubbed with a local sourced bbq rub) always smoked on the pit
-Chicken wings -- always on the pit now, although my wife has taken a liking to the wings cooked in our air fryer
-Meatloaf -- wife has a great recipe, cooked in the oven.  Still need to try cooking on the pit.
-Chicken Parm -- home made pan fried and finished in the oven.  Have not tried finishing in the pit yet.
-Grilled pork tenderloin -- usually make a marinade, or use a Wegmans cilantro and lime store bought which is very good
-Grilled skirt steak (used to do this one more, but prices keep going up making it hard to swallow -- no pun intended) usually marinated in a chimichurri sauce and finished with same
-Panko and coconut crusted Tilapia pan fried
-Grilled Salmon (I know there are many kinds, but just keeping the description simple) on a paper thin cedar plank seasoned with a little maple syrup, brown sugar, course pepper and kosher salt.

Those are the usual treats, we do throw in other experiments and try different things too.  We also have a full range of veggies we do quite a lot -- roasted cauliflower and broccoli, roasted brussel sprouts, grilled zucchini, grilled yellow squash, steamed green beans tossed with shallots and EVOO, grilled or steamed asparagus, sautéed baby spinach, sautéed field greens mixed salad.

Sorry got a little carried away since it is morning and I guess I am hungry....hahahaha.

[Bentley]

Boy did I take this for granted in Pasadena and Las Vegas!

There are four grocery stores within a mile of our house.

[DE]

We keep things pretty simple but mix it up

Baked pototoes with Smoked Cheese
Baked potatoes with smoked Cheese and Brisket (3oz vac pkg)
Smoked Cheese Nachos
Smoked Cheese brisket Nachos
Home made Chilly (vac pkg)
Smoked Chicken Breast (vac pkg)
Reverse Seared Prime Rib (not often enough)
Brisket Sandwich (3oz vac pkg)
Grill Smoke Cheese Sandwich
Grilled smoke Cheese and Ham Sandwich
Instant Pot Pinto beans


Store bought on occasion
Frozen Pizza with Smoked cheese added
Ham Sandwich
Basic Lettuce Tomato Onion Salad
Instant Pot Pinto beans

[Hank D Thoreau]

No Wednesday is meatloaf night at my house.

We are all over the map. Often, we do a mass cook on the weekend and run out of food by Thursday.

That could be a crock pot dish like a low carb stew or stir fry.

Often it is whatever meat looks good at the market, barbecued. More often than not that is tri tip. We add vegetables to that.

I have been doing a lot of salmon lately, plus grilled zucchini and asparagus.

This past week or so I smoked a pork loin, pork butt, leg of lamb, New York strip steaks, and cooked talapia, swale and salmon on my gas grill.

I have another pork butt to smoke on Tuesday. We have some frozen scallops that we got a good deal on and will cook those this week also.

Oh ya, we also cook a lot of turkey meatloaf.

[Mudflap]

So, my question is, do you have a regular routine of meals that your family eats?  If so, about how many different meals do you cook regularly throughout the year?  And, if you don't mind sharing, what are they?

Not sure if your question was for pellet grill only or any cooking method.

There is only 2 of us left at the house also. We both work outside of the home. Wife works 4 10 hr days at the school and I work 4 on 4 off 12 hr rotating from days too nights. So we don't have a dinner time. We have learned to "fend for ourselves". My wife always cooked every night when kids were home but now we both agreed she dose not have too because of our work schedules it dose not work very good. She will cook some on weekends and I will cook when I am off during the week. We cook with the intentions of having left overs for the days we both work.

We always have salad fixings. Lettuce, tomato's, cucumbers and olives. This allows us to have a side or we can make some chili and make "Walking Tacos" with Frito corn chips. Also may make large batch of Elk taco meat. Turn this into Burritos or Taco salads through the work week. Some times after a hard 12 hr shift and heading to bed I like to just have a salad with cottage cheese and Greek yogurt on top then add Jalapenos too it. We also have been searching online for some crock pot soup recipes. I like taco soup and wife likes chicken tortilla soup recipes.

As for pellet grill. We cook steaks, Elk hamburgers, pulled pork and tri tip most of the time. It has to be one of my days off before the grill gets out of the garage and I always cook too have left overs.


Mudflap

[KeithG]

Not even close to a standard menu in our house. I’m retired, my wife still works.

There are a few things that show up with some frequency like chicken parm and teriyaki turkey burgers but most of the time it is what’s in the fridge and freezer and what can we make from it. Once a week there will usually be a “clean out the fridge” stir fry involving whatever bits of leftover protein, veggies and starches are there. Never the same twice.

In winter we usuallly make a big batch of soup on Sunday and that’s what I eat for lunch for the week. That might range from posole to Russian borscht to chicken noodle.

Keith

[Free Mr. Tony]

I make a tentative menu every week. I typically put about 5 things on it. Sometimes we get to 3 of them. Sometimes the whole thing. It just depends on alot of factors.

I usually try to make 2 or 3 things we know we like, and that I've made before. Then 2 or 3 other things that I haven't tried before. I have literally thousands of recipes sorted by the books they came from in my phone. If something pops into my head that sounds good, I just use the search button in the Google drive app. I type in lamb, teriyaki, or say BBQ and a list will populate from a bunch of different books that I've had over the years.

That's how I've done it for the past 7 years or so at least. Some standards that get put in the mix alot are:

Crunchy baked chicken
Enchilada- red or green
Subs- turkey, Italian, veggie, and others
Many many different kinds of soup
Wraps- chicken Caesar, Tex mex, and a few others
Grilled chicken breasts
All kinds of rice
Tacos of all sorts
Pollos poblano
Several different kinds of salad

I'm sure many others, but that's what came to mind right away.

[Bar-B-Lew]

not the FMT McRib?