Happy Moanday: The First

Mondays are hard.

On Mondays I go grocery shopping, which means on Monday mornings I troll around looking for good recipes. This usually takes a while. For the rest of the week, I can pretty much just eat whatever is in the fridge, but Mondays are like Sophie's choice(s). To document my weekly struggle to figure out what to eat, here begins a new column for Mondays called "Happy Moanday."

So today I didn't actually go grocery shopping, except for getting some Mac n Cheese and napkins at my local market. I live 1 block from a tiny market that always smells funny but not in a like "I shouldn't be eating here" way, and 3 blocks from a giant Stop n Shop. Also 1 subway stop away from what my friends and family call the best fruit and vegetable stands in the world (but, um, I've never visited). The plan was to make my list, check it twice, strap my little bookbag on, and jog to the Stop n Shop, but mostly I ended up napping and then eating Mac n Cheese. But, I did sort of make my list. I plan my meals out and get groceries based on that, so the waste factor is pretty low. This is what I'm planning on this week:

Butternut squash soup
Garlic spinach macaroni soup
Panko-crusted fried chicken, all from the New York Times

Not much. But since I work early mornings at a job that gives us free snacks, my breakfasts and lunches are taken care of, and being a single gal in the big city, I can stretch a meal out to 2 or 3 dinners. Soups that eat like a meal are usually mixed with some homemade bread rolls (more on that later), and contain a good mix of the "healthy" stuff, which I have avoided for most of my life but now realize is probably my best bet at not getting fat(ter).