Week 5 – Lockdown Menu + Recipes

Another week, another menu. As this period of time goes on, the meal plans that Sophie and I develop each week seem to become increasingly essential to our mental wellbeing. First of all we like to eat, so there’s that. But thankfully we also love to cook, so it actually gives us something to do. And now we’ve added a new dimension to our own ‘personal-meal-plan-as therapy/lifestyle’:  videos.

Sophie and I have always put what we’re cooking up on our Instagram Stories, and I’ve got a YouTube channel with loads of videos. But last week we decided to film what we’re cooking in a more planned out kind of way, and post the full cooking tutorials on IGTV. Just in case those random letters don’t mean much to you, IGTV is the part of Instagram that features longer format videos. Instagram TV.

So I film Sophie, and Sophie films me, and we are having TOO MUCH FUN.

Seriously, you have no idea how often we have to stop because we are laughing too much.

One of the big things we’ve discovered? We both say ‘SO ’ way too often.

Anyway, all this to say that our meal-plan-lifestyle is fast becoming kind of like a job, but in a very good way. Yesterday, when Sophie and I had our Sunday morning meeting to plan this coming week’s menu (yes, we actually sit down and have a meeting) we made sure to include not just recipes that we felt like eating, but also kept in mind what we felt like filming. And perhaps what you felt like watching? (and then cooking and eating…)

Here is where you can see the videos:

Elizabeth’s IGTV Channel

Sophie’s IGTV Channel

If there is a tutorial you’d like to see, leave a comment below. We are SO open to suggestions!

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming: here are the links and recipes for last week’s meal plan:

Lockdown Menu 5

April 13-19

MONDAY
Lunch: Pasta con Piselli, Green Salad
Sophie loves the tradition of recipes combining pasta and vegetables in the south of Italy. So since she nabbed a huge bag of fresh peas at the market last week she decided to make this. You can also do it with frozen peas of course.  Sophie wasn’t super happy about how the pasta turned out since she had pictured the peas remaining bright green and in tact, kind of like in this recipe. Instead they cooked into a puree, but was totally delicious and – I think – beautiful.
And if you see a lot of green salads that’s because our vegetable garden is now in full swing. Maybe I should do a salad tutorial? Seriously, I get a lot of questions.

Dinner: Roasted Asparagus, Salmon, Blini, Cream Cheese
Sophie had been craving smoked salmon and cream cheese and while I considered making bagels, we finally  decided to serve it on blinis and call it dinner. Blini’s are simply tiny savory pancakes that are often served topped with sour cream and caviar. They are super easy to make and here is the recipe I used, but instead of buckwheat flour I used rye.
Asparagus: My go to way of dealing with asparagus is to snap off the tough ends, then wash them. While still damp I place them in one layer on an oven tray and drizzle with olive oil, using my hands to coat. Next a sprinkle of flaky salt and into a preheated 350F/180C oven for about 15 minutes, till just cooked. Serve them with a squeeze of lemon, or else topped with an egg.

TUESDAY
Lunch: Mushroom Soup with Rice, Celery Salad
Usually once a week I make soup with what’s in the fridge and some leftovers. This time around I had frozen the sauce from beef bourguignon that I had made last week, as well as some broth I’d made from leftover lamb bones. This formed an incredible base for the mushroom soup, which was mostly onions, fresh mushrooms, celery and dried porcini mushrooms. Also leftover rice gave it heft.
The Celery Salad is one of my favorites. The recipe is here, and I might do a video tutorial this week
Dinner: Scaloppine al Limone, Cicoria Ripassata
Sophie had bought prosciutto to make saltimboca, but then we ended up eating the prosciutto. That’s how we ended up with Scalopine al Limone (a.k.a. Veal Piccata)
The chicory was simply boiled, drained, and then put back in a pan with tons of olive oil and garlic.

WEDNESDAY
Lunch:Farmer’s Lunch: Bread and Cheese and Salad
This is the one time per week when we let ourselves eat cheese and call it lunch. It’s usually because Sophie has been to the store, and so we have fresh mozzarella and ricotta. But don’t worry, we also have veggies. This time we roasted some  sorry looking zucchini from the week before. Roasting does wonders for not-so-wonderous veggies. Also, topping them with loads of freshly made salsa verde makes them sing.
We also made a simple salad of chopped cherry tomatoes and celery which was crunchy, juicy and delicious.

Dinner: Moroccan-ish Chickpea Stew with Couscous
I was craving a chickpea filled stew and so made this recipe, more or less, served on top of couscous.

THURSDAY
Lunch: Pasta alla Puttanesca
This is one of our favorite pantry pastas. You can watch Sophie make it here, or the recipe is here.

Dinner: Chicken Cacciatore, Stuffed Peppers
For my first videos I decided to stick to recipes from my book The Italian Table. First up Chicken Cacciatore and Stuffed Peppers, both from the Umbria chapter. The Chicken video is here, and the pepper video is coming soon. But both recipes are in my book.

FRIDAY
Lunch: Leftovers (chicken and peppers)
Dinner: Sardines & Marinated Onions; Beans with Seasoned Breadcrumbs; Roasted Radicchio
I’d been craving sardines for a while, ever since I bought 6 cans of them at the beginning of this ordeal. Of course we never ‘needed’ them, which meant we hadn’t eaten them yet. Hence the craving. Here’s how I served them: Thinly slice 3 red onions into half rings. Place in a small bowl and add 1 tsp salt and toss. Next add about 1/4 cup of white wine vinegar. Toss and let sit for at least 20 minutes. When ready to serve drain the onions and pile on a small plate. Gently lay the sardines on top (2 cans work for 3 people). Top with fresh herbs. I used marjoram and it was fantastic. Drizzle with olive oil.
I also made beans. I had cooked a batch of unfortunately named Corona beans (big white beans). I drained them, and placed them in an oven proof dish and topped them with leftover seasoned breadcrumbs (from the stuffed peppers) and olive oil, before placing them in the oven.

SATURDAY
Lunch: Pasta con Fagiolini, Another one of Sophie’s favorite pastas that use a lot of vegetables. You can see the video of her making on her instagram channel later this week.

Dinner: Hamburgers, Coleslaw
You can read all about this dinner, with the recipes (including home made buns and truly excellent cole slaw) here.

SUNDAY
Lunch: Onion Parmigiana; Salad of Leftover Beans and Grilled Radicchio; Salad of Fave Beans and Pecorino
Onion Parmigiana is a thing of wonder. It’s the invention (as far as I know) of our friends and Agriturismo Cerretto. You can find a video of Doriana making it in the highlights of my Stories on Instagram. They actually delivered this dish to us, along with our farm share, so I didn’t even have to cook it!

Dinner: Shrimp Fried Rice
Sunday dinners are for something NOT Italian. And so I made fried rice using this recipe. I didn’t have any sesame seed oil, and so used peanut butter instead. I felt very proud of coming up with this substitution.

Desserts:

Sophie’s Apple Cake: This cake was as delicious as it was pretty. See Sophie’s video here

I also made Melissa Clarks’ Olive Oil brownies again, but added a half cup of dried coconut which I recommend.

Drinks:

Sorry, but I’ve been really boring in the drinks department lately. I alternate between gin and vodka martins, dirty. The other thing I insist upon is a steady supply of potato chips and/or salted peanuts or cashews. While Domenico and I have always  had cocktail hour, I have to admit to looking forward to it even more these days. And I feel absolutely no guilt whatsoever about the amount of chips consumed. I am, however, considering adding dip to the lineup. (where is my mother’s old recipe box when I need it?)

Table Setting:

With the nice weather we’ve been able to have lunch outside quite a bit (Yay!). I also tackled the linen closet and have discovered that almost all of my tablecloths and napkins are either green or yellow. But I did find some hidden gems  (the blue and white checked one below) I had forgotten about buried beneath the stacks of white napkins. I also found a set of cute Bodum glass tea cups that Sophie is going to use to make Tiramisu in next week on her IGTV.

For more inspiration on planning your meals and setting your table buy my book The Italian Table.

And for past Lockdown Menus and Recipes see the following posts:

Lockdown 1

Lockdown 2

Lockdown 3

Lockdown 4