Today I’m sharing some of our favorite family dinners and diving more into the details of what I feed my family most nights. These are simple, quick, and get the job done. I’m not claiming to be Ina Garten. Right now my life with toddlers looks like prepping as much food as possible on Sundays so meals throughout the week are ready in under 30 mins. This season also requires that most of my energy go into raising these toddlers….I know that this menu might look boring or sad to some of you out there haha. That’s okay. As less attention is called outside the kitchen, I can spend more time trying new recipes and making things fun again. I love food just as much as the rest of you. But for now, this will do.
Side note: You can read more about my meal prepping & my 7-Day meal plan here.
With all of that said, let’s dig in!
Weekly Dinner Menu
When I’m doing my weekly meal planning, I always have a general idea of what dinner will look like. That’s because I theme my days to take the extra thought out of it. I know that Tuesday is always Taco Night. Boring? Perhaps. Time-saving? Definitely.
This is what we eat in a typical week:
Sunday – deposit in the bank (which is just a more elaborate meal to set us up for the week with leftovers)
Monday – pasta night
Tuesday – taco night
Wednesday – leftovers or freezer meal
Thursday – date night out & kids get a meal with my parents
Friday – pizza night
Saturday – David on the grill
All of these meals are things that my kids will eat and enjoy. From here, I switch up the recipes weekly. So one week we may have spaghetti & meatballs on pasta night and the next we might try a baked ziti casserole from Pinterest. Does that make sense? Comment below if you have questions!
Some Favorite Family Dinners
So once I have the theme night sets, I pull from my favorite recipes each week. Most of these recipes are saved in my head but I also like to save & organize recipes onto my Pinterest board. You can find that here. My goal one day is to have a big binder with everything organized into sections but that hasn’t happened yet.
Below I shared a bunch of our favorite recipes:
Pasta Dishes
- Creamy Italian Sausage pasta
- Crispy Tortellini with peas & proscuitto
- Barefoot Contessa’s Meatballs
- Italian Sausage + Rao’s Marinara: Grill up some Italian sausage. Once it’s done, combine with Rao’s sauce + penne pasta. Enjoy!
Generally served with salad + garlic bread!
Taco Night
- Chicken fajitas: saute 2-3 chicken breasts (cut into cubes) with diced green peppers & onions. Serve with tortillas + rice & beans.
- Goop’s slow-cooker chicken posole soup
- Simple enchiladas verdes: I use rotisserie chicken or crockpot chicken to cut down on time
- Chicken & cheese quesadillas: on your griddle, use two tortillas & combine crockpot chicken + shredded cheese + some spinach added in
Generally served with rice & beans!
Pizza Night
- The Meanest, Greenest Pizza
- Make-your-own pizza night (+ Half-Baked Harvest pizza dough recipe)
- Or take-out pizza from Costco/Papa Johns
Generally served with a salad & wine haha!
On the Grill
- Ribs on the Big Green Egg: David uses this recipe
- Salmon
- Steak
- Ribs
- Beer Can Chicken
- Cookout: Hamburgers & Hotdogs
General Favorites / Sunday Night Meals
- John Legend’s Fried Chicken Wings
- Breakfast for dinner
- Crockpot chicken gyros
- White Chicken Chilli (will share soon!)
A Few Notes
- I love anything that I can make with a crockpot. Nothing makes life easier than setting & forgetting it.
- Double batch & freeze recipes whenever possible
- We do all of our grilling on the Big Green Egg. It’s amazing!
- I use Naptime Kitchen as an ultimate kitchen resource.
- Our freezer is always stocked with Trader Joe’s meals for a quick go-to!
- For side dishes: it is always 1 veggie + 1 thing I know my kids will eat (like a fruit or a starch)
Cookbooks I Use & Love
Sunday is my day to pull out the cookbooks and go crazy. It is also the day that I do my meal prep so a lot of time is spent in the kitchen. My happy place. Here are a few of my favorite cookbooks that I am working through…
- The Defined Dish by Alex Snodgrass
- Dining In by Alison Roman
- It’s All Good by Gwyneth Paltrow
- Half Baked Harvest Super Simple by Tieghan Gerard
- Pioneer Woman Cooks by Ree Drummond
- Franklin Barbeque by Aaron Franklin
- All of Barefoot Contessa cookbooks
Did I miss anything? My goal is to share more favorite recipes as we go. If you have any recipes we need to try, please share them below! XO
