Weekend Dinner Ideas

Okay, let's get going on dinner ideas for the weekend, starting with tonight. I'm thinking about the fresh tilapia that's $4.97 a pound this week at Sprouts, and that brings to mind a complete dinner menu from Bon Appetit, tilapia with balsamic butter sauce, thyme mashed potatoes, and sugar snap peas. Obviously, you can take or leave the side components, as you choose. If doing the mashed potatoes, remember that five pound bags of organic russets are $2.50 at Sprouts, where the tilapia is.

Both Sprouts and Sunflower are emphasizing ground meats with their sales this week, so for Saturday, I'm thinking about a casual dinner of a recipe that has turned into a hit around here, chipotle sloppy Joes from Cooking Light. You can do them on buns, as called for, but we like them better on baked potatoes, again thinking about those organic russets on sale at Sprouts. With ground chicken and turkey also on sale at both Sprouts and Sunflower, I wonder how either of those might do as subs for the ground beef in the recipe. Sauteeing some of the organic chard on sale at Sunflower for $1.50 a bunch would make a good side, boosted with a touch of garlic and hot red pepper.

By Sunday, we'll still need to make something big, to also serve as a midweek reheat, and it's going to be sweet potato and sausage soup from Bon Appetit, inspired by the chicken sausage (to be thoroughly cooked, unlike the precooked sausage in the recipe) and organic yams on sale at Sunflower. For the side salad, don't forget Sunflower has organic leaf lettuce as 99 cents a head and one pound bags of organic baby carrots also for 99 cents, both incredible prices.

And that will get us through the weekend!