I spent a beautiful sunny day yesterday in San Francisco with my daughters. We had lunch at Greens at Fort Mason down in the marina. Not only was our waterfront view spectacular the food was healthy and delicious. I had the Black Bean and Sweet Potato Burger with avocado, pickled red onion, and chipotle served on a acme pain de mie roll. It was served with a salad of arugula, frisee, endive, radishes, jicama and a light vinaigrette. I would like to try to duplicate the burger at home. Replicating the flavor will be the hard part. I look forward to my next visit to Greens!
Speaking of food, I thought I would share with you my menu planning strategies. I like to plan my meals a week at a time. I have found that if I have the meals planned and the necessary ingredients in the house, dinner becomes so much easier to get on to the table after a day at work. Life in our home, like most family homes can get so busy with work, school, after school activities, homework, and pets. My weekly menus tend to be rather simple and while I repeat meals, I do try to mix it up with variations on the same theme. When the weather gets cooler, I will add in more soups and stews; in the warmer months, there is more grilling. I tend to do most of my shopping on Thursdays. That just works best into our weekly schedule. I do not include amounts on the shopping list because in our home the number of people changes from week to week. So for me, I print out the week that I am using, run through what ingredients are currently in the house, think of the week ahead, make any adjustments needed, and jot down the quantities needed of each item. I also have menus with only five and six dinners for the weeks that we may have dinner out, or I know we have leftovers that need to get eaten up. Items on the menu that are written in red have accompanying recipes on the recipe page.
