I originally sent this out as a Substack newsletter, but I’ll be moving these posts here for now.
Oh, hey, look who it is! It’s me, writing for once!
Happy Sunday after the first full week of 2025. Let me tell you—it was a bit of a doozy for me. I don’t want to get too into it, but for the sake of transparency: in this first full week of January I started AND quit a new job.
Honestly, that’s pretty impressive. Again, don’t want to get too into it, but I was mislead into accepting the job—which I think was purposeful, as I was the 4th hire for this role in the span of a year.
After a lot of thought and discussion about the last year, Danny and I came to the conclusion that I will aim for part-time employment. In a post-COVID world that has had a serious backlash to the working conditions that came during lockdown, life has gotten way, way harder for mothers in the workforce. It’s near impossible to find a flexible role anymore: the amount I’ve had to argue about my children in the past 2 1/2 years has been astronomical. I just don’t think school pick up is the end of the world—after all, I work in marketing. I’m not a doctor. No matter how much someone feels like something is an emergency, it’s not an emergency. It’s never that serious.
There are a lot of things I’m willing to compromise on when it comes to working. But I’m not willing to compromise on my kids and I’m not willing to overschedule my life in order to work at a “butts-in-seats” kind of place.
This is all to say: 2025, what a year already!
So anyway, I’m settling into being a partial stay-at-home mom for the time being. I have some freelance work and a part-time gig already lined up, but I’ve decided the next year is about healing for me.
Ok, that’s the general life update. Let’s discuss why we’re here today: cooking.
It’s been one of my goals for 2025 to make more things homemade, to do more food prep to make our lives easier, and to get back to cooking and baking, one of my favorite hobbies. A lot of this is a money saving endeavor (groceries are… expensive?), but I also just enjoy cooking and baking on the weekend. I haven’t really done it for the past several…. years (?) because, let’s be honest, I’m tired. I’m really tired.
So here’s everything I made this weekend.
Rotisserie Chicken - a Classic
If you go to Costco and don’t get a rotisserie chicken, what are you doing? Full disclosure, I had to Instacart my Costco stuff this weekend—I’ve had a cough for about 2 months now and I really don’t want to get sick again—so my rotisserie chicken was at the mercy of Dylan. While Dylan struggled to identify eggs, he did pick a good rotisserie chicken.
I shredded the rotisserie chicken into roughly 2 cup portions (I got about 3 containers) to use in lunches and dinners throughout this week. Then, I did my usual: make chicken stock with the leftovers.
If you haven’t make chicken stock, it can seem really daunting. I just use my crockpot.
Here are the simple instructions:
In your crockpot, place your rotisserie chicken carcass. (As a note, you can also do this with any bone-in chicken leftovers—like if you make a half-chicken or a quarter piece).
I usually add 2-3 carrots, just cut into large pieces, and whatever amount of onion I had. This time, I had a leftover half onion that I didn’t want to go bad, so I chopped it roughly and tossed it in.
I add 1 tablespoon of kosher salt, 1 tablespoon of pepper, and 3-4 cloves of garlic as well. This time I did add some fresh ginger I needed to use up.
Then, you add water to cover the chicken, or as close as you can if it’s a big chicken.
I set my crockpot to low for about 10-12 hours. It will smell incredible all day.
I’m currently learning how to can chicken stock, but you can also just freeze it when it’s done.
Speaking of when it’s done, you’ll want to let it cook before you strain out all the physical pieces. I usually double strain through a mesh strainer and then portion it out.
Included here: I cooked up a pound of ground beef I’d defrosted in my fridge; I’ll either use it for a dinner this week or freeze it. I often like to batch cook several pounds of ground beef at once to have ready for weeknight dinners…but I didn’t quite plan that far ahead. Maybe next week.
Roasted Tomatillo Salsa
I got a bag of tomatillos this week, so I knew I needed to make some salsa as they were already looking rough. Plus, I had some jalopenos leftover from making a dupe of Chipotle’s corn salsa last week. (If anyone would like a round up of what I made to make Chipotle bowls, let me know!)
Tomatillo salsa is the easiest salsa to make. Here’s what I did. (You might notice all my measurements are general and approximate. It’s your salsa. Do whatever you want.)
Peel your tomatillos and rinse well.
On a baking sheet, place tomatillos along with a chopped white onion (can be rough chopped!) and 1-2 jalopenos. I personally cut the jalopeno I used in half and removed about 75% of the seeds.
Add oil to baking sheet and toss, then salt and pepper.
Roast at 350 degrees for about 25-30 minutes, until everything is soft. Take out of the oven and let cool.
Once cool, add to a blender with the juice of 1 lime and about 1/4-1/2 cup of water. Blend.
I separated into two small containers. I’ll use one container for enchiladas this week and the other to make some tomatillo ranch soon.
Cranberry Sauce
Cranberry sauce, in January? In my world, yes, because I kind of use it as jam.
I got a bag of cranberries this past week (for free, just like the tomatillos) so I decided to make some cranberry sauce. I follow a really general recipe for it, but cranberry sauce is painfully easy to make. You can really do whatever you want.
I used:
1 bag of cranberries (16oz)
1/2 cup of water plus 1/2 cup of orange juice
The zest of 1 orange
1/2 cup of sugar.
Combine everything in a sauce pan and bring to a boil. Boil for about 10-15 minutes, stirring and breaking up the cranberries. When it was thick and most of the cranberries had burst, I let it cool, then blended it a little with my immersion blender. This made about 2 cups of cranberry sauce, so I froze half and kept the other in my fridge. Perfect for sandwiches this week.
Banana Bread Muffins
I had some decrepit looking bananas that needed to GOOOOO so it was banana bread time. Typically, I like to bake a loaf of banana bread, but this time I baked muffins so I’d have individual portions. I follow a super basic recipe from Better Homes & Gardens cookbook; it’s this one here. I do usually omit the lemon zest (because I very rarely have it) and add mini chocolate chips and flax seed instead of nuts.
These are great for a quick breakfast on busy days or a snack for Violet. I also like to pack them in Forrest’s lunch throughout the week. He’s notoriously a picky eater, but he’ll always eat a banana muffin.
What’s Left from Last Week?
Last week, here’s everything I made that I still have for this week:
Chipotle’s corn salsa
Egg, bacon and cheese breakfast sandwiches on pretzel rolls and english muffins
Egg, potato, and sausage breakfast burritos
Cilantro lime rice
The corn salsa and lime rice will be easy to morph into burrito bowls with rotisserie chicken, and I’ll be able to use them with enchiladas this week. That’s a win-win to me.
And that’s it, folks! Everything I made this weekend to make the week a little bit easier. I might start writing these weekly as a type of round up and I’m hoping to share everything I make for dinner throughout the week. Is this interesting? I don’t know, but it’s what I feel like writing about and I promise I’d write more this year.
Thanks for reading, as always, and let me know what I should add to my weekly meal prep rotation.