Welcome to the first day in Alisa’s kitchen. We are very excited to see and share her week. Alisa has been working on getting her kitchen “on track,” and she’s been having a lot of fun in the process. We hope you enjoy spending this week with Alisa.

Thanks for joining me in my kitchen! Don’t forget, it’s your turn to do dishes tonight. This week, I am on my “new” meal rotation. This is simply where I’ve decided I’m sick and tired of The Kids being picky eaters. They are 10 and 7 and The Dad and I are a little burnt out on noodles with butter. All of you parents out there know exactly what I’m talking about.

I will never forget when on one of the first camping trips we took as a family, The Girl was maybe 5, and The Boy around 2, there were two dads with their teenage-ish boys camping in the spot next to us. We were enjoying the smells of their steaks on the grill and we both looked at each other and said, “I can not wait until our kids are old enough to eat food like that”. The Dad made a comment to the other dads to that affect and they quickly said, “Oh no, the steaks are for us, the boys are having noodles with butter.” At that moment we vowed that our kids would not be eating noodles with butter as a staple dish when they were that age. We had to wait until they both were old enough that if they didn’t eat the meal, they wouldn’t be starving themselves. The Girl has a rebellious streak a mile long and if it’s not her idea…it is not gonna happen. I, personally, have no idea where she gets that from.

Anyway, to make a long story even longer, we have begun to play around with our menus some. One week out of the month is all brand new dinners. The bases of the meal, pork chops, chicken, pasta, etc., are all foods we know The Kids like or tolerate, but the spices, cooking methods, etc. may be different. I have previously tried making one new meal every week, but The Kids respond so much better when I hit them with new tastes all at once and then return to their familiar favorites for the rest of the month.

So, I heartily welcome you all into my kitchen…excuse me, could you just move over there a little? Thanks, my kitchen’s not so very big…during our trial of several new dinner recipes. Oh, and of course, the 4th of July, because it wouldn’t be me if I had not taken on this challenge over a holiday.

I have found that for us, planning breakfasts and lunches just doesn’t work. If we allow The Kids a reasonable amount of freedom to choose their own foods for those meals, then they are much more open to new tastes at dinner, and frankly, I’m fine with that. For breakfasts, we try to keep extra batches of waffles, pancakes, muffins, french toast, and cinnamon rolls sans frosting in the freezer. Currently, lunches for The Girl consist of Goldfish crackers and fruit and whatever protein type substance we can shove down her. For The Boy, it is mostly Jennie O Turkey hot dogs, plain, on a bun please.

I will tell you that today I woke up bright and early to make up a batch of waffles only to find this:

So we all kind of did our own thing instead because then I realized that we were out of eggs. That ends a lot of breakfast options.

Tonight for dinner, we are test grilling Grilled Pork Chops with Fresh Nectarine Salsa.

The verdict is: The Dad and I love it. It has just the right amount of spicy for me (The Dad made his a tad hotter) mingled with the sweetness of the nectarine…mmm…
The Girl, who can not stand pork chops at all, said that it was “OK” which is indeed high praise for a pork chop dish from her. She really liked the salsa.
The Boy, hated it. It was spicy and had “flavor.” He refused to try the salsa, which I expected because he really dislikes tomatoes. I think he’s still sitting at the table trying to get out of eating it…actually, he just came to me and said he didn’t think those spices on the pork chops “fit” with his mouth. I asked him what his solution was and he very clearly stated, “To just not eat it.”

Join me tomorrow when we make strawberry jam and attempt Pasta Roll Ups with Turkey and Spinach.

Make sure you stop in throughout the week to see what other adventures Alisa is up to in her kitchen. And don’t forget to stop by her personal blog, We Do Things. Thank you for your willingness to open your kitchen to us all, Alisa. It is going to be an interesting, humorous, and enlightening week!

If you are interested in participating as a guest blogger for this 3 Moms feature, please leave us a comment or send us an email at 3moms@happytobeathome.net. We are looking for a variety of women willing to open their kitchens for one week to all of our readers. You do not even have to have your own blog in order to participate.

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