Last week I posted our menu for the week. It was heavy on slow cooker meals because we are in the crunch time for the end of the school year and all the activities, clubs and classes both of my children are involved in are trying to fit in those last meetings and events. That means lots of driving for me, careful scheduling and some waiting in parking lots. I have my special bag with a magazine, a book, notebook, scissors and pens that I keep so that I can keep busy even when I have some down time. The other day I adjusted my menu for the coming week based on our calendar of events.

So the menu for this week looks like:

Tuesday: Spinach, Sausage and Bean Slow Cooker Soup (with homemade bread) (click for link to post)

Wednesday: Sloppy Joe Casserole with Tater Tots (click for link to recipe)

Thursday: Crockpot Beef Stew

Friday: My daughter’s birthday party and Tech Fest for my son

Saturday: Rainbow waffles and German Dinner

Sunday: Ham dinner with fresh pineapple salsa, Confetti rice

Monday: Ham croquettes with baked sweet potatoes and vegetable medley

I used the slow cooker last night and it was a life saver for getting dinner on the table. We love to sit together as a family. It has become our time to review schedules, talk about what is going on in our lives and the world around us. We talk quite a bit about politics lately, but doesn’t everyone?  It gives us time to talk about our values and what we are looking for from our politicians and leaders. My son has decided he wants to be president someday. Part of his Autism is he cannot lie. He may be able to try to explain away or justify what he is doing but he has never learned to lie.  He just may make a good politician one day.

Verdict:

If you like the smell of ginger, cinnamon and garlic this smelled wonderful all day long as it was cooking.  As we were finishing making the rice and beans we were all commenting about how hungry we were and how it was hard to not dig in to the pork right from the slow cooker!

If you like ginger this has a great ginger taste but not too overpowering. I don’t like things that are heavy on ginger and this seemed to be a nice balance. My family loved the glaze over their rice too. Even my rice hating daughter ate two servings of rice with the glaze over the top.  It has to be good for her to eat that much rice!

The best part was that for my mostly gluten-free son this dish was gluten-free.

Tip: Although it looks like quite a bit of ingredients most of them are spices you most likely have in your spice cupboard.