WHAT I EAT IN A WEEK | Simple & Easy Weeknight Meals! Healthy & Nourishing Dinner Recipes

Let's get cooking. Give me some skin. She said, well, if you just throw away the packaging, nobody will ever know. Little did she know, I'm like, well, I'm gonna be sharing this recipe with quite a few people. ♪ Shaking ♪ Hello, welcome back to another What I Eat in a Week. It is Sunday afternoon, and we are starting out this week on a Sunday. So we're easing into the week. Today we're gonna be making a chicken Thai soup. So I think I'm gonna say it wrong, but I think it's tom kha gai soup. I don't know if I said that right, but I love this soup. I absolutely love this soup going out to eat and getting it in a restaurant. I've never made it at home, and I wanna switch it up and try new recipes this week. And I will say this too. So this specific recipe, again, I wanted to try something new and do something different. I know that some of these ingredients, I had to go to an international grocery store to find some of them. And the thing is, is you don't need all of them necessarily. Obviously you're gonna get a different flavor with them, but instead of, I believe it's pronounced galangal, galanga? I think it's galangal, but this says galanga. I don't know how to say it. But anyway, it's kind of like ginger, but if you don't have it, then you can absolutely use ginger and you don't have to use the lime leaves. So, you know, get creative. Again, these are your recipes. These are your meals. This is your, you know, dinner time. And so I just hope that you find inspiration and honestly are inspired to maybe try something new, try something that you've never done before and have fun cooking, have fun in the kitchen and find joy in it. So we're gonna make this soup. By the way, I've never again cooked with lemongrass. I guess you're supposed to pound it with a knife. We'll see how this goes. So this soup turned out so unbelievably flavorful. It's amazing. I highly recommend. And it was really easy because it was all done in the Crock-Pot. So I added in all of my ingredients. And as always, all the recipes are going to be in the description box for you so that you can get all the nitty gritty details of everything. And so basically you just wanna simmer all of your ingredients together and then you pull it out so that your broth is really flavorful. And that is the one thing that I did differently. I did use bone broth. And that way it's just gonna be a little bit more protein rich. We're gonna get that really good glycine in there, amino acid. And then we're gonna add in the coconut milk and the chicken and finish up the cooking. And I totally forgot to add the mushrooms in. So don't do that like I did. But then I just finished it up and it was really, really, really amazing, especially on the second day. ♪ I'm ashamed baby, I'm to blame. It's too late. ♪ Amen. So good. It's a really good soup. I have never made this before. How fun and different is this? That's what I love about dinners is that you're doing something totally different. I like those little tiny mushrooms they use. Mm-hmm. The ones with little caps on them. I don't know what kind of mushrooms those are. What a fun Sunday dinner, huh? The thing that I did though differently is I used bone broth to make it a little bit more protein rich. And I feel like next time, I just didn't think about it because I was working on some other stuff, but I would have thrown on some rice on the stove. I would have made some bone broth rice as well, so. Oh yeah, that's what we're missing. Yeah, we're definitely, we need a carbohydrate. So I'm gonna eat like a little bit of fruit after this just to, you know, protein, carbs, pair it up. Sunday night dinner is in the books. Super good. Good job, babe. Thank you. So this night actually was so fun because I'm making minestrone soup and I've never made minestrone soup before. Again, I've really just been trying to branch out and try different, just try different things. I mean, I've had it, but I've just never made it at home. So, and you know, putting the crock pot to use always makes life so much easier. And this recipe was really good. The one thing that I did do was I did make the sun-dried tomato pesto. So that's supposed to just add a lot more flavor. I know that you can buy that pre-made, but I just whipped it up quickly with my food processor and then put the rest of the soup together into the crock pot. So again, love the crock pot meals. It just makes life so much easier. So quick and easy, easy cleanup, and your dinner's ready to go when you're hungry. So it's really simple. And I love my chopper as usual. I just think this is one of the most helpful, time-saving, you know, little pieces of equipment that you can have in your kitchen. And the other thing is that it makes everything the same size. Whatever you're cooking, it's gonna cook evenly. And that's what I love about it so much. I really appreciate that about that. ♪ It was five for nine, on and on and on, we gotta keep it up ♪ ♪ Because baby, take your time, you got your whole life ♪ ♪ Put faith in the sky, on and on and on, we gotta keep it up ♪ Happy Monday. So today we are making a minestrone soup. I'm so excited about this soup because I've never made minestrone soup before. I've had it, but I've never made it at home before. And it already smells so amazing. So I just have really high hopes. And I think the flavors are gonna be exceptional. So delicious, so warming, perfect for fall. There's nothing like a delicious, hearty, filling bowl of soup to just relax, honestly, and unwind at the end of the day. I feel like soup just invites you to unwind, you know? Especially this time of year, there's something to you about slow cooking and just enjoying warming broths, super nourishing, and just absolutely delicious. So for this soup, obviously, as you can see, I am making it bean free. Here's what I'm gonna do. Here's my little twist on it. So we're of course gonna use the delicious Jovial brown rice pasta. I absolutely love this. And guess what? I found it at Food For Less. So check your local Food For Less if you have one, because it's definitely the best price on Jovial. But this one, I was gonna try to get the elbow ones, but they only had the little bow tie pasta. So cute. And who doesn't love bow tie pasta? I mean, just the look of it is adorable. So we're gonna do that. And then I found this at Trader Joe's, which I wanted to think about, because obviously we do have those amino acids in there from the bone broth, but I wanted to just make it a little bit more hearty, a little bit more protein, and just really give us that nice wide range of amino acids. I found these Trader Joe's chicken meatballs, and they're gluten-free. I love the ingredients, super simple. It's just chicken, oregano, basil, vinegar, garlic, onion, rosemary, parsley, black pepper. Like super good. I love it. And it's funny because actually, I've never tried these before, and I've never even seen them before at Trader Joe's. And the sweet lady that was checking me out, she goes, I love these meatballs. And I was like, really? I was like, I've never tried them. And she goes, these are so delicious. She said, the flavor is amazing. And she said, honestly, she was like raving about them. And just sharing with me how much she enjoyed them. So I told her I've never had them before. I'm so excited to try them. And she just made me even more, you know, looking forward and anticipating to try them out tonight. So I told her I was making a minestrone soup. So she told me, she said, well, if you just throw away the packaging, nobody will ever know. But now you know. Little did she know, I'm like, well, I'm gonna be sharing this recipe with quite a few people. You know, you get more protein and your carbohydrate. And then, of course, just such a delicious nourishing broth with all of that yummy, well, it's all the yumminess in there. There's so much in there. And I feel like that is what's really gonna make this a very, very flavorful soup. Okay, we're gonna let this cook. And then we'll finish up our soup later. ♪ When we go through our nights with the light on ♪ ♪ The supernova's blowin' ♪ ♪ Gonna get a hose up even if I hose up ♪ ♪ Don't let me steal your thunder ♪ ♪ Wake up at the right time, looking at my light, ah ♪ ♪ Those are you, those fireflies ♪ ♪ On and on and on, we gotta keep it up ♪ ♪ The killing love, baby, take it slow ♪ A little update on the minestrone. I ended up cooking the pasta on, oh, just, you know, cooking it separately, basically. You don't have to do that. This just makes so much soup, which is amazing. It's gonna be wonderful for leftovers, but it just makes so much soup that I didn't want every time we reheated it, and I just didn't want the pasta to be sitting in there and it gets all super, super mushy. And that way, it just tastes really, really good. It's just spot on every time you eat it, no matter if it's leftovers or not. And then I also did add in some more fresh basil, and I forgot to add in the crushed red pepper from earlier. I don't really like spicy, but that just brings it to life. It doesn't make it spicy at all, but it really just, it definitely needed that. And this is already such a flavorful soup, but when I had a sip, I just could not even imagine how it's gonna taste tomorrow, especially considering the Thai soup that we made last night. I was blown away at already how flavorful it was, you know, last night, but then today for lunch, it's almost like it's a different soup because the flavors are just that much more elevated and they're just the best. It's really good. This never crossed my mind to make something like this. The only reason why I thought about it was because of the can, like the progressive soups or something like that. Progresso? Progresso. Progressive. Car insurance. No, no, no, not the car insurance. But yeah, the can. Oh yeah, progresso. The only time I ever had this was in a can. Really? Can soup. Really? You've never had an Italian restaurant? Yeah, I don't think I've ever had this at a restaurant. Really? Monday night dinner's in the books. Give me some skin. Happy Tuesday. So today has been quite a full on day and I definitely wish I would have just put the crock pot meal on earlier, but I didn't. And so I, Tuesdays are just such full on days for me and I still haven't written my email. So they're just such crazy full on days. And I was working on the wellness method all day. Finally, just such a crazy year with the book and then my continuing education. So I finished the book, then I had to do my continuing education. And now I finally finished my continuing education. I can finally finish the wellness method. It's just been such a crazy year. But anyway, so I am making some chicken. We're gonna do like a chicken veggie stir fry curry tonight. So this is such a delicious and easy recipe. I haven't made it in quite a long time, but I, yeah, you can put it in the crock pot for sure. But I just was, I literally was just working on it all day. I should have just taken a break and just done it really quick, but it's okay. I feel like cooking too is almost a way, well, my throat, such a good way to decompress at the end of the day. And yeah, it's so nice to just focus on chopping and cooking and just being present for the meal that you're making. And you're about to eat a delicious meal and nourish your body. And it's just very therapeutic for me to cook. So I love it. So I am going to make this delicious veggie stir fry. Now, you literally can just chop up all these veggies, add in your coconut milk and add in your chicken and put it on high for three hours, or you can do it on low for six hours, just until your chicken is all the way cooked through. You can absolutely do that, but I am literally just gonna do the same thing, but I'm just gonna whip it up over the stove. So it will be very straightforward. So I'm gonna just chop all the veggies and we'll get our spices in there. And then we'll have a delicious dinner. And usually I would soak the rice. Totally forgot. It's just been a really full on day. You know, you just do the best you can sometimes. So, well, we do the best we can all the time. Sometimes it's a little bit more effort and sometimes it's a little less effort. And either way, it doesn't matter because it's your best. And as long as you approach it with a chill, healthy mindset of no stress, it's better to not stress. You know what I'm saying? So that is what's healthy. That's what's healthy. So anyway, that's my speech. And now we're gonna chop and cook. Okay, so this recipe is so good. You are going to love this. I don't know why I haven't made this chicken curry dish in quite a while, but it's just so easy and absolutely flavorful. It is packed full of flavor. And the secret ingredient actually to this dish, which is not a secret ingredient, because it's not secret, but it's the star really, is the dates. Because the dates with the curry really just give it such a balance between more of the spicy and then the sweet. I just have to say, the easiest way to sear chicken is this. Sear it for two minutes on each side. Then you're going to put it on low for eight minutes with the lid on and then turn off the heat. Let it finish cooking for about 10 minutes. And then I am, now I'm whipping up the coconut rice, which is so good. I will leave the ingredients and directions for that in the description box. But that was really a fun compliment to this dish as well. You can just make normal rice, but I thought that coconut would be really flavorful and just extra yummy for this dish. So I'm just finishing up seasoning it all. And I had vanilla, coconut sugar, which I usually just have plain, so I was kind of scared. Usually I would just use coconut sugar, not maple syrup, but the maple syrup turned out really well and it was really good. ♪ Two of my two chasing climbing, I'm one in sight ♪ ♪ Some fluorescent and infrared ♪ Wow. So excited. Ooh, it does look really good. It's really good. Mm. I like the rice too. Bone broth, coconut rice. So tasty. Such an easy dinner too, to make. Like such a simple recipe. Good job, babe. This is awesome. Thanks. This should be part of our weekly meal. Like, this is so good. Fun fact, I used to hate dates. I thought I hated dates until Cambria. Yeah. You wanna tell them why? I used to think they were big old cockroaches, but then she got me eating them and then they really taste good and I like them now. So thank you. That's a fun fact. You're welcome. So thank you. Dates are really good. They are really good. They're like God's candy. Happy Wednesday. I'm so excited for tonight's dinner. I just can't even wait because it's gonna be so quick and easy and so flavorful. So we are doing like a Cajun inspired shrimp and then some fried plantains. I am really looking forward to having these. It has been so long since I've had plantains. They are so yummy and so delicious. Really easy to cook and just such a fun food, honestly. I love the flavor of them. So we're gonna do that and then we're simply going to just chop up and roast some veggies in the oven. We've got some bell pepper and a zucchini. Feel like I just flung the water off of that. And then we're doing some shrimp. And by the way, the shrimp that I'm using is the wild shrimp from Costco. And I could not believe that they had that shrimp there. I've only ever seen it at Trader Joe's. Well, I mean, I've seen it at other places, but I usually get it from Trader Joe's just because they have the best price. But then I saw it at Costco and I was like, wow, that's a really good price. So really nice because you can get it in bulk. So check your Costco. I think it's like wild Argentinian shrimp. I feel like I definitely said that wrong. This is gonna be such a quick dinner. Seriously, shrimp takes like two minutes. Well, five. Shrimp takes about like five minutes. And then the plantains, you're just gonna fry them up for a couple minutes. And while I'm doing that, the veggies are gonna be roasting in the oven. That only takes about 20 minutes. So we're gonna have dinner on, well, I was gonna say on the table. We do have a table, but we usually eat at the Kitchen Island. So we'll have dinner on the table in like hopefully less than 30 minutes. 30 minute meals with Cambria. Cambria's Kitchen, 30 minute meals. Rachel Ray, I was trying to, you know what, we're just, it just didn't happen. I was gonna try it because it's Cambria's Kitchen, but it's Rachel Ray's 30 minute meals. So now I'm over explaining this. You already understand. I failed at the bridging of the joke. We're gonna move on before it gets even worse. And I'm just so excited to make this food. Let's get cooking. And by the way, I always get questions about my apron. It's from World Market and it's on sale right now. It's actually been on sale for quite a while. So hopefully it's still on sale. Let's get cooking. ♪ So cool and fine ♪ So this dinner might be the star of the whole week because it was so flavorful, but so simple. I can't even believe, just watching this makes me wanna make this again for dinner tonight. But this recipe was absolutely incredible. All I did was just chop up my bell peppers and my zucchini, and then a little bit of some fresh garlic. And I roasted that in the oven, I believe for 25, for about 20 minutes, 20 to 25 minutes with a little bit of MCT oil and some salt. That's it. I didn't put anything else on there. I mean, so simple. Yeah, 20 minutes, 20 minutes. And then I seasoned my shrimp. I have this wild red shrimp from Costco with just a little seasoning blend that I whipped up, which was paprika, onion, a little bit of oregano, and then some cumin. And then I went ahead and chopped up my plantains. Now, these were so delicious. I cannot believe that I haven't had plantains in quite a while. If you've never made plantains before, they are so easy to make, and they're so flavorful. So I just grabbed a ton of coconut oil. You wanna make sure that you have enough in there to fry them up. And then you just fry them up for like three to, about three to four minutes on each side. I really like them nice and crispy and golden. And as you can see, they just turned out so beautifully, and they tasted unreal. They are so good. They're starchy, but they're sweet, and they're just the best. They're so good. Looks good. As always. Now give me some lips. Man, I want that plantain first. That's some good banana. Banana? How good is that? Excellent. I didn't even put anything on the zucchini, and it's phenomenal with just salt. Sometimes simple is just the way to do it. Shrimp's great. Shrimp's great? Oh my gosh, this is such a good dinner. These plantains are awesome. I didn't even put anything on them. Oh my gosh, I'm so happy. Yeah, you crushed it. That was so easy. Gosh, yeah, the plantains are great. So good. Like really, I can eat a whole plate of the plantains, and sat like almost done with it. It was like a little plane ride. A quick flight. It's a banana, right? They're a type of fruit that look like they're relative to banana. They're a relative of the banana. A relative. I don't know. I'm sad it's over. Might even be my favorite dinner of the week just because of those plantains and because of how simple that it was. That was the easiest dinner ever. All right, it is already Thursday, and we're keeping it chill with our dinner tonight. We're gonna do a spaghetti. Super easy. And actually, okay, technically, I know this is not spaghetti. This is capellini. I think is how you say it. You know I love jovial. But I don't know what it is about it. There's something about the thinner noodles. They're just so delicious. I think what it is is that I feel like the sauce really gets, like it grabs the sauce really well. So every bite is just so flavorful. You know how sometimes with spaghetti, you can kind of, you know, you twirl your fork around, and you're ready for this perfect bite with marinara, and it's just, it doesn't stick. The tomatoes, they kind of slide off, and there is sauce in there, but it's not on the noodles. You know what I mean? Anyway, that's my noodle chat. But I just feel like these ones in particular, because they're so much thinner, I feel like they really grab onto the sauce, and every bite just, it just twirls and wraps it up in there, and they're just so good. Anyway, so that's my speech on spaghetti or capellini. We're gonna do that, and then I just have some local grass-fed beef. So we have our carbs and our protein, and I know that I just feel like for so long when it comes to just nourishing your body and eating, you know, we're really, there's so much information out there, and honestly, it can get really overwhelming, really confusing, and I just want to assure you, if you are having that mindset of like, again, you're not coming, you're relaxed when it comes to your food, that is literally the healthiest thing that you can do. But if you have a protein and you have a carbohydrate, and you are getting it from basically a whole food source, like, you know, brown rice pasta or grass-fed beef, you know, there's just one ingredient, protein and carbohydrate, and you pair them together, support your blood sugar, carbs, remember, carbs spare protein. And what that means is that if you are not eating carbohydrate with your protein, that protein is not going to be spared. In other words, our cells run off of glucose, and if we don't have glucose, if we don't have those carbohydrate to use and turn into fuel, then our body is going to use protein as the fuel source, and we don't want that because protein is a structural macronutrient, which means that we want that macronutrient to, sorry, something was like on my leg, I was like, is that a spider? Okay, I lost my train of thought. We want that protein, we want that protein to be there to repair, to do what it's there to do, which is to build back, to build our hair, to build our muscle that we tore down in our workout. That's what we want that macronutrient for, and then we want our carbohydrate to be that fuel source. So if we are getting, if we're not getting really, we're not really getting it, our body's going to convert that protein into fuel because it needs fuel. Our brain needs glucose. Our cells run off of glucose. That's the gas that goes into the car. And so it would be like, if your car needs to be filled with gasoline, that is the only way that you're going to be able to move, but you got to go into the shop and get maintenance on it. You know what I'm saying? So, which you don't have to do that every single day, but I'm just trying to differentiate, carbs are the gas and the protein is that structure. You want to keep the structure and make sure that you have a car to put gas into. You know what I mean? So we need protein to rebuild and repair, and then we need the carbohydrate to give us the energy to go. So it really not can be, but really is so simple and it doesn't need to be overwhelming and you're doing a great job. You're doing a great job. So, you know, there's no such thing as perfect. There's no such, there's no need to stress or worry. And yes, a meal like spaghetti is absolutely nourishing to your body. And it can be really, really, really simple. So yeah, just want to encourage you that, you know, like nourishment and healthy eating, it starts with our mindset first and not having a restriction, fear-based mindset that God, you know, he gave you your body to nourish it and take care of it. And you can do that without obsessing over it. And I love to cook. Cooking makes me happy. It brings me joy. Jesus liked to eat too. So, you know, there is absolutely everything right with enjoying the gift of food. God gave us taste buds, sweet, salty, savory. And when taking care of your body and eating well is in the right place in your life where it's not the number one thing as far as it's all about getting, you know, this perfect looking body. And it shifts to truly being at peace and just using food as something that yes, you enjoy and you love it. It's not just fuel. You know, we were created to enjoy it as well, but it just, it gets to have a healthy place, you know, in our lives. So I'm gonna go ahead and cook this up. And by the way, I really like the Costco marinara. Then we're gonna have dinner in like 10 minutes, which is great because I'm gonna get back to working on the wellness method. And I really want to do that. Let's get cooking. You see what I mean? You see how it like grabs onto the noodles, the sauce? Yep. They're good. Really good. I like the way we eat. You do? Yeah, it's great. That's such a cute thing to say. Are you laughing at me? No. Do you want to have a Lady and the Tramp moment? What if you and I decided to eat at a bully's bowl, a dog bowl together? Spaghetti in there. Lady and the Tramp moment, dog bowl. Why does it have to be in a dog bowl? Because it was a dog scene. Do you want to know a fun fact? When I was little, we put on a Lady and the Tramp play, like me and my siblings. No, it was Lady and the Tramp 2, actually. Thursday night dinner is done. So good. So, so good. And it kind of- That was very tasty. Yeah, and it kind of saved the day, huh? It saved the day. We both didn't want to. You're busy making cakes right now for Lucy's birthday. I know. Nobody wanted to cook tonight. No. We got it today and it gave me a clutch. It really did. Never know with those things. I know, I know. It always comes at the perfect time. Friday night dinner's in the books. Thank you, Home Chef. You saved the day. Yep. Thank you. Today was a crazy, crazy, crazy day.