Getting Started on This Week's Dinners

Amazing how quickly Fridays come around, and it's time to start planning dinners again. With temperatures approaching 60 today, it's time for something light that reminds me of the shore, so why not sea scallops? Wild caught flash frozen ones are on sale for $9.99 a pound at Sprouts this week. A favorite recipe that works really well on a grill pan is grilled sea scallops and tomatoes, originally published in Gourmet magazine. You could go upscale with the organic heirloom tomatoes on sale at Sunflower for $3.99 a pound, or experiment with using the organic grape or cherry tomatoes also on sale there. The little guys would fall between the ridges of the grill pan but would probably char nicely.

Then, as usual, we need something big made over the weekend that will double as an easy midweek reheat, and I'll do a comfort food casserole that hasn't appeared yet all winter, a baked penne casserole. This can be done by following a recipe like penne with sausage and tomatoes from Bon Appetit, or more simply by combining a pound of cooked penne with cooked sausage, a jar of nice pasta sauce, and grated mozzarella in a large baking dish, and bake until it looks great. Basil chicken sausage is $2.99 a pound now at Sunflower, but I'm intrigued by the Market Made smoky chipotle sausage currently on sale for $3.99 a pound at Whole Foods, since they come in chicken as well as pork, and I love chipotle in anything, possibly including an Italian pasta casserole.

To round out the weekend, the Harris Ranch ribeyes on sale at Sunflower are high on the list, since the bone-in ones are $4.97 a pound, $6.99 a pound for the boneless. We'll bake potatoes on the side, more likely sweet potatoes than russets, to lessen the steak guilt. Either is great topped with my fave Straus European style organic plain yogurt, currently on sale at Sprouts at $3 for the big 32 oz container. Steamed asparagus will be a necessary side, since it's 99 cents a pound at Sprouts (while most of my veggies are organic, asparagus usually falls into the conventional category). Another I'll add if feeling ambitious is an intriguing one from the Food Network, roasted cauliflower with dates and pine nuts, since I've been wanting to try that recipe for awhile, and organic cauliflower is on sale for $1.99 a pound at Whole Foods.

And that will at least get us through the weekend, with more planning to come.