a week of meals no. 67
meal plan for the second week of Feb. 2025
Welcome to mamaeats, a twice-weekly newsletter (Tues. & Sat.) inspired by a simple + seasonal home life. I’m a mother of three, avid reader, gardener, and home cook who focuses on nourishing, whole food meals with a focus on plants. This newsletter is my labor of love, and it means so much that you are here. If you are not already, and are able to do so, please consider becoming a subscriber to support my work here. This gives you access to all the archives and recipes (find the recipe index here), as well as cook-along videos which go along with most recipes.
Hello friends, how has this week treated you? I hope you have been able to find pockets of peace this week. The news has been chaos and tumult, hasn’t it? I feel like it’s all we are all talking about, thinking about, right now. Continuing on with our self care and community care and relationships are more important than ever to keep things afloat in the tempest. The literal weather this week here has also been mainly stormy, bleak and doused with rain- rain we certainly could have used one month ago as the wildfires raged down south. Sigh. There’s a break in it. today, though, which is lovely. I plan to take full advantage and garden, air the comforters outside in the fresh air, and play tennis with the kids.
The pleasures of the week have been- James returning to nursery school after having to skip last week due to recovering from a cough which started the previous week (ugh), lighting our bright pink candle at dinnner and breakfast each morning, morning runs in the rain (so fresh), having friends over for dinner, and the beautiful daffodils, narcissus, almond blossoms, and tulip magnolias blooming right now.
This week, I’m reading Gwendoline Riley’s My Phantoms, alongside continuing through Natalia Ginzburg’s essays in A Place to Live. I am quite enjoying My Phantoms, although itʼs a bit of an unhappy one (toxic mother-daughter relationship, dysfunctional family, but plenty of black humor). The Ginzburg essays, as I shared last week, are a true delight and Iʼm intentionally going slow to savor each one. I also picked up a few May Sarton books from the library, as I read a poetry collection of hers, Coming into Eighty, which I found incredibly beautiful and touching. I picked up a biography of her and one of her journals.
In food, this week thereʼs lots of legumes, several soups, a few salads, and a peanut butter mousse, plus pizza and some promising looking whole grain pancakes. Itʼs Valentineʼs Day this week and I love to make a marinara spaghetti, thereʼs something classic and romantic about it- plus itʼs gorgeously red. I love the pinks and reds of Valentineʼs Day- I always pick up red and pink flowers and stick a pink candle in our dinner candlestick to quietly celebrate. This year, Iʼve got delightfully fluffy and deeply ruffled hot pink and baby pink large carnations, which remind me of ballerina tutus. So enjoyable!
the meal plan
weekend prep work: clean out the fridge, go to the farmer’s market and grocery store to re-stock pantry essentials and vegetables, bake 2 loaves of sourdough bread, soak and cook chickpeas and cannellini beans.
Sunday: Ottolenghi’s orechiette puttanesca with chickpeas using the frozen cherry tomatoes from my summer garden, will do either sauteed broccoli or sauteed kale on the side with this.
Monday: dilly bean stew with cabbage and frizzled onions, plus sourdough toast and a simple green salad, with grapefruit and avocado.
Tuesday: farro and arugula salad with veg feta - will add cannellini to this.
Wednesday: maple sriracha tofu bowls- will add edamame and broccoli to this, use brown rice, and possibly bake off the tofu instead of pan frying for less hands-on cook time.
Thursday: simple red lentil soup with spinach, lemon, and pepper + toasted sourdough and fennel/orange salad
Friday: Valentines Day spaghetti and marinara dinner with a red and pink salad (red and pink radicchio, pink lady apple, blood orange, shallot vinaigrette). Ice cream sundaes for dessert with whipped cream, chocolate shavings and maraschino cherries.
Saturday: gyoza chile noodle soup, adding some cubed tofu
weekend bake: peanut butter mousse with chocolate ganache layer
weekend breakfast: going to try these gluten free whole grain pancakes to use some of the huge bag of brown rice flour in my pantry. Will make a quick frozen berry compote to go with + a dollop of thick yogurt mixed with vanilla and a bit of maple syrup.
Leaving you with this poem in which I rolled around in my mind this week like you roll a hard candy around in your mouth- savoring, thinking, tucking into this cheek and that while enjoying the flavor it leaves. Wishing you well this week and have a lovely Valentine’s Day, I hope you eat some very good chocolate xx A
The Good Life
Susan Allison
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