My Menu Plan Monday: Savoy Cabbage

Summer is really in full swing, and between camp, swim meets and poolside BBQs, we are not home that much to cook. I am on the constant lookout for fun recipes to take to the pool, salads and sides that are easy to share in our weekly supper club. Please, send your favorites!

My new FoodSaver arrived this weekend and I am having fun packaging and repackaging items for my freezer. The FoodSaver is a kitchen tool recommended to me way back by Kalyn of Kalyn’s Kitchen, and since, many folks over have told me how great they are (thanks Rainier Wolfcastle!). The device sucks all the air out of special plastic bags, and then seals it all up. The resulting flat package is perfect for freezer storage.

Excuse me for a moment.

Now I am back. I remembered I had some plum butter in the freezer that I wanted to FoodSaver (can you use it as a verb?). Ranier suggested I freezer items that were very moist, then FoodSaver them, which would be better for the machine and not cause all my product to be sucked into the machine. So I did that, and just needed to finish the job.

The plum butter I made in my crock pot, using a clue or two from Marisa at Food in Jars (Slow Cooker Blueberry Butter) and Terri from Knit & Nosh. My first batch failed, but the second worked fine and I think the trick is to leave the lid slightly askew. Sounded weird to me, too, but it worked. I ended up throwing in about 6 pounds of plums (skins and pits and all) and 3 cups of sugar, and letting the whole thing cook for about 12 hours. Then I allowed it to cool and using my hands, found and removed all the pits. Then I used my immersion blender to make it smooth. I decided to freeze it, since I was not sure if it would be safe to can, since I let it cool.

Onto this week’s menu plan. Our box from Two Small Farms contained Hamburg Parsley (I shamelessly fed mine to the chickens), Strawberries, Romaine Lettuce, Red Beets, Bianco de Maggio Onions, Cherry Tomatoes, Round Zucchini, and Savoy Cabbage. I am excited about the cabbage and plan to try stuffed cabbage rolls. I also need to clean out the freezer, since next week, I pick up my split half of beef from Morris Grassfed. That’s 80+ pounds of grass-fed goodness. Yum.

Here is my menu plan for the week of July 5:

Monday: Leftovers from July 4th BBQ + a little zucchini, onion, corn sauté I threw together

Tuesday: Cabbage rolls with ground beef, salad, bread

Wednesday: BBQ at pool – Potato salad (or maybe this Potato Salad), Roasted Beets with Balsamic, watermelon, hotdogs and hamburgers

Thursday: Swim meet

Friday: TGIF and mini-block party

What is on your menu plan this week? Any special Independence Day dishes to share? I made a peach pie that was great (with Trader Joe’s pie crusts! Cheating, I know.) from How to Cook Everything. My baked beans were just so-so. The potato salad Christy brought was excellent. And of course, how can you go wrong with brownies!