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What We Ate: 5 Family Dinner Ideas

What We Ate: 5 Family Meal Ideas

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I sit down to make a meal plan, and my mind goes blank. You’d think that after almost nine years of doing this, I would have zero trouble coming up with dinner ideas for my family.

That’s where inspiration comes in!

I love seeing what other people cook for their families. It’s great for inspiration. And…it’s also just fun to see what other people eat. ?

Today I’m sharing 5 homemade meals that I cooked for my family. Full disclosure: we definitely had takeout between some of these meals. But that’s not the point of this post. You don’t need ideas for what takeout to order. Although that might be an interesting post. ??

Okay, let’s get to the meals!

5 Family Dinner Ideas:

A bowl of chicken coconut curry soup.

1 Chicken and Coconut Curry Soup

For the first of our five family dinner ideas, we have coconut and chicken curry soup! Reuben isn’t a big curry fan, but he does like this soup!

I like to serve it over rice, but you could eat it plain if you want to keep it paleo or lower carb. I just find that the rice makes it more filling.

A pasta bowl filled with sausage, feta, and sundried tomato pasta. Just one of 5 family dinner ideas!

2 Sausage, Feta, and Tomato Einkorn Pasta

This is one of our all-time favorite meals. And it’s really easy to make. The one downside is it can be on the expensive side since it relies on some pre-made ingredients.

I use the Jovial Einkorn Traditional Fusilli for the pasta. I boil that up, and meanwhile I sear some Italian sausages. Next, I chop up some cherry tomatoes (sun dried tomatoes are even better) and crumble some feta cheese.

Normally I would add some spinach or arugula, but I somehow spaced buying any. So I just sprinkled in some dried basil. Making it work!

A plate filled with Instant Pot chicken, boiled yukon gold potatoes, green beans, and a sourdough roll.

3 Instant Pot Chicken Thighs, Potatoes, Green Beans, and Sourdough Rolls

For our next family dinner idea, we have Instant Pot chicken thighs! I put them in the pot, added a bit of water and salt, and cooked on manual, high pressure, for about 45 minutes. If I remember correctly, I slow-released for about 10 minutes, then quick released.

I served the chicken with boiled Yukon gold potatoes, boiled green beans, sourdough pull apart rolls, and lots of butter (of course!).

A bowl of sushi rice topped with avocado, seaweed snacks, carrots, cream cheese, and salmon.

4 Sushi Rice Bowls

This one is always a hit with the kids. First, I cook up some rice and season it with rice vinegar, salt, and sugar. You can get the exact measurements in the post I did for Pioneer Woman.

Then I top the sushi rice with avocado, seaweed snacks, carrots, cream cheese, and salmon. Ideally I would also serve it with sriracha mayo, wasabi, and pickled ginger. But mama was tired that night, so no extras. ?

Einkorn biscuits and gravy with peas and butter. Just one of 5 family dinner ideas!

5 Biscuits and Gravy

For our last family dinner idea, we have biscuits and gravy! Some of you might think it’s weird to serve biscuits and gravy for supper. But that’s how we always ate it growing up! In fact, I would request it for my birthday supper as a kid.

I made einkorn biscuits (using the biscuit recipe from my Beef Pot Pie post), and made a sausage gravy (using the recipe from my Biscuits and Gravy post) to go on top.

I like to serve it with green peas and butter. We usually have a “sweet” biscuit as well: buttered and spread with honey or jam.

 

So there you have it: five family dinner ideas!

I hope these gave you some inspiration for what to cook this week!

Here’s a video of the meals we ate:

xoxo
Erica

Jennifer W

Monday 25th of May 2020

These all look really good! I would love to do the sushi bowls. I love to do breakfast for dinner, that was always fun to do when I was growing up.

I just recently tried a biscuit recipe from America's Test Kitchen Cookbook and it turned out so good! The bottoms of the biscuit were so crispy and crunchy!

Erica Kastner

Tuesday 26th of May 2020

Thank you, Jennifer! I think you would enjoy the sushi bowls. :) Ooooh...a good biscuit recipe is gold! ✨

Nikki

Thursday 21st of May 2020

Hi Erica,

Yes, please include take out ideas too.

Also, you can smile more in your videos :)

Kristen Werner

Wednesday 20th of May 2020

Erica, Great meal ideas! New meals are always welcome. Me and my older sister are trying to meal plan for our family. It is really fun but sometimes inspiration is lacking. Thanks you for the inspiration.

Ps. Your kind comment on our blog warmed our hearts. Thank you, and God bless ❤️ Kristen

Erica Kastner

Thursday 21st of May 2020

Thank you, Kristen! So glad to give you some inspiration. Yes, inspiration for meal planning can be challenging, especially as the seasons change, I've found. Summer meals are particularly difficult, I've found!

I was honored that you chose to make some of my recipes - so happy that you enjoyed them! ❤