Eating with Liz 2011 - e-mealz

I haven't been keeping up with my new recipes on the blog this last week. I've just been lazy. Really, that's my only excuse.  To make up for it I'm going to post two recipes we've tried that we have liked. I'm not going to say that we "really" liked these because that's not a word I'd use for these recipes, but they were edible, and we didn't object to the leftovers. These recipes are for 2, but we found that there is usually extra.

 Last Week:

 

Creamy Crock Pot Chicken

4 oz cream cheese

½ can cream of mushroom soup

½ pkt dry Italian seasoning

(½ c dry white wine or cooking wine)

2 lbs chicken thighs, skins off

 

Soften cream cheese in microwave. Mix cream cheese, cream of mushroom soup, Italian seasoning and wine until smooth. Place chicken breasts in crock pot and cover with mixture. Cook on low 4-6 hrs. Serve chicken and creamy gravy over steamed rice.

 

Serve with:

Steamed White Rice

Sautéed Zucchini - Sauté sliced zucchini in melted butter until crisp-tender.

Garlic Bread

 

 

This Week:

 

Chicken Noodle Casserole

2 chicken breasts, cooked and cubed

2 c egg noodles, cooked

10 oz can cream of mushroom soup

1 c frozen mixed vegetables

(½ c milk, ¼ c parmesan cheese, ¼ t pepper)

1 c cheddar cheese, shredded

 

Combine all ingredients, reserving ½ c of cheese, and place in small casserole dish. Bake @ 400 for 25 minutes. Top w/ remaining cheese and return to oven just until cheese is melted.

 

Serve with:

Garden Salad with Vinaigrette dressing

Serve with salad tossed w/ celery, tomatoes, and dressing.

 

So why the statement about these recipes being edible? Well, there is quite a story behind that… I recently, in my quest to save some money on groceries, discovered the website www.E-Mealz.com. For a small fee of $5 a month ($15 dollars for three months pay up front) this website gives you a menu and shopping list weekly that supposedly adds up to weekly grocery bills coming to approximately $75 per week for a family and two person plans average $35 total per week. (7 days of recipes for families 5 days of recipes for two) Sounds like a great idea doesn't it?

I thought it did. I have been looking for something like this that would tell me what to eat and what side dishes to serve, and it's so handy that it includes a shopping list so I don't have to worry about it. I hate menu planning. I hate shopping list creation. I don't much like shopping either. So this sounded perfect. I've been following this for 2 weeks now.

The first week there were a few recipes that just didn't win us over… Like a stroganoff that used ½ cup Catsup – who uses that much Catsup for anything. Yuck. But I made it, and we tried it, and it was gross. Last weeks final score for these recipes: 2 out of 5. Yep, we liked two out of the five recipes we tried and one of those two was a taco salad that we usually make anyway. Not a great start. It has actually made us a little gun shy when trying any of the recipes provided.

So far this week, I have only tried the one recipe. (because John's been gone and it seems that when I'm home alone I usually end up not eating dinner at all because cooking for myself is lame.) I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of last nights recipe. The rest of the weeks recipes don't seem too bad, but we have yet to see.

The recipes are based mostly on canned, frozen and dried foods with some fresh stuff thrown in here and there. I'll admit, I have saved between $60 - $80 on each grocery trip with this list so YES, it is saving me money, but John inquired about the nutritional value of the food with all the canned stuff… I have to admit that I wonder that too. I've tried to buy low sodium and no salt added stuff when I can, but with canned food you can't really avoid those things.

I guess we'll try this out for the next 3 months (because that's what I paid for) and see how things turn out. I'm hoping that maybe last weeks recipes were just a bad selection. I'll follow up on this again after we've tried it out for a while.

 

If you're interested in looking at www.e-mealz.com for yourself, please use me as a reference. I could get free stuff out of it. Click on the picture below.