Weekly Recipe Wrap-Up

Happy Easter, friends! It's a joyous day, and it's joyously beautiful here in chicago, with lots of trees budding and birds singing to celebrate the risen Lord!
And in the spirit of spring renewal, we're finally getting some more food pictures up on the blog!

Brad and I are in a place right now where we're starting to pay a lot more attention to our budget. And, unfortunately, the food I like to make is not always the food our bank account likes for me to make. But we also don't want to swing towards mac and cheese every night and consequently gain 20 pounds each this year. So this installment of recipes, and many more in the future, are my first attempt at budget-friendly, healthy meals for us.

So, marching on!

The first recipe of the bunch was Linguine with Tuna Puttanesca. I had most of the ingredients for this in my pantry already, and it looked quite yummy. I used thin spaghetti instead of linguini, and I chopped up some leftover piquillo peppers to add in as well. They were a great addition to this acidic, tangy sauce.

All in all, very light, fresh-tasting, and enjoyable!

The next night, I made bean and cheese burritos, one of our cheap favorites. But I had one extra tortilla leftover, so I decided to use some of the leftover kalamatas and some veggies in the fridge to make a little cheese crisp appetizer. Delicioso!

Another recipe idea came from having a bunch of eggs in my fridge that I never use. It's feeling a lot more like springtime, so I decided to make a spinach, egg, and bacon salad. Nothing too special there, but it tasted amazing. I found a dressing for it on this blog, and now I have a new balsamic vinaigrette recipe. Perfect.

The best part about this dinner was that our friend Sarah, who comes over on Thursdays to watch Project Runway with us, had the wonderful idea of making a sangria, since it was perfect weather for it. So she brought all the ingredients for a really fruity, sparkling sangria that was a perfect addition to the night. I think we're going to make "salad and sangria Thursdays" a running theme. 

The last meal for this installment was our dinner last night with some friends. Seth, who goes to school with Brad, his wife Shauna and his nephew Max, who was in town for spring break, all came over for a game day extravaganza. We played Settlers all day long. And dinner was one of my favorites. Vodka sausage pasta. It's based off this recipe, though with the sausages fried up in the pan following the shallots and garlic, before simmering in the tomatoes.

It was yummy. And the bread and salad they brought topped it off perfectly. Plus great root beer and cream soda. The pizookie we made for dessert wasn't so bad either.

That's all for now. Hopefully we'll find some more cost-cutting-yet-still-good-for-you meals to make this next week. Though we'll have leftover pasta for just about every meal for four days.

Until next time, have a blessed Easter night!