eggs

A few things happened this weekend. Friday was the Friday for a fortnightly funky food farm box of fruit and veg. I add a dozen eggs to this order because we love eggs. By the time we came home from the park at lunchtime, it was waiting for us at our front door. S very enthusiastically carried the eggs to the kitchen while I watched helplessly until she had speedily and carefully put them on the bench.

Then through some glitch in the system, the other dozen eggs I had ordered to be delivered from Woollies – first extra large, then I had to change it to large, then that wasn’t in stock so it would be jumbo – well, it made me feel like a magician. Or more accurately, a magician’s assistant, most likely a volunteered audience member, as I found not one, not two, but three dozen jumbo eggs in our delivery.

Having 48 eggs did affect my weekend food plans, I must admit. That, and the other thing that happened which was the hot water system beeping every 10 seconds on Saturday. Every. Ten. Seconds. No. Matter. What. It turned out to be needing a battery change. Yes, this was the day I found out they have batteries and yes, I had asked the internet and ChatGPT for help, and no, nobody told me this until our real estate phoned me and told me. Thank goodness we had some of the right size battery in stock. But this did mean that irritability was high, and that Saturday washing was put on hold. Baking took over.

So. Friday dinner was salmon bake from my childhood (5 eggs). Saturday morning breakfast was scrambled eggs (7 eggs). I made “sheet pan eggs”, as this person calls it, which is usually in our household baked by Glenn in a round pan and called eggy pizza. Same deal, though – lots of eggs (10), lots of vegetables, a bit of cheese, baked until set. Great for breakfast or lunch or a snack. Great to have on hand for when you ask a 4yo what they want for breakfast after the time you actually normally like everyone to be eating breakfast and the 4yo says enthusiastically, “eggy pizza”, and the first reaction is, “but it’s too late for that”, but the second reaction is, “but that’s okay because I made some on Saturday!” This one had broccoli, cherry tomatoes and capsicum in it. Also to be mentioned in the delivery oddity was an extra bag of frozen strawberries, which I hadn’t really wanted in the first place, either (I was aiming for raspberries). S helped me make strawberry and chia jam with some of our bonus strawberries. I made chocolate chip zucchini strawberry muffins (2 eggs) – these are a new favourite, I think – and zucchini and blueberry baked oatmeal (2 eggs).

Sunday was prepping some sandwiches for school lunches. Today, with E home with me and both of us not well, I boiled some eggs (4 eggs) and made some chocolates. I think of them as “loaded chocolates”, as they are dark chocolate mixed with a hefty dollop of nut butter, and combined with, in this week’s batch, dried blueberries. There are, um, not as many now as were made this afternoon…

With other fried eggs for breakfasts, our 48 eggs are down to 12, which seems like quite a normal number, and I feel well-stocked for lunches and snacks and breakfasts. For now.

I am inspired. One of my Facebook friends shares, it seems, everything that she makes for lunches and treats and dinners, and every single photo is terrible and unappetising. A page I follow, on the other hand, shares what she eats and what she makes for healthy everything, and everything looks fantastic and healthy and an Anna Thing To Eat. In my “I can do that, too” mentality, and with the amount of food prep that actually happens Friday-Sunday (usually), I now plan to do a roundup of that on Mondays for you. You’re welcome. Actually it’s also part of me reminding myself of achievements. If I feel like I’ve just been opening yoghurt pouches and doing the washing and chopping up oranges and doing the washing and separating squabbling children and doing the washing and sorting the washing and doing more washing, noting the other things really helps. Yes, I did all those other things too, but now I also have a record of the snacks and other things prepared. Lots of them include chocolate chips.

Friday normally gets me baking something but we had stuff to do so, no. Saturday morning, though, I baked sweet potato and apple oatmeal, sweet potato and banana chocolate chip bread, and “4 ingredient peanut butter banana bars”. That’s in quotes because, as is so often the case with recipes with a small number of ingredients, whoever did the recipe didn’t actually count. Out of bananas, peanut butter, vanilla, oats, salt, baking powder and chocolate chips, some of those are clearly more special than others. I am not, however, game to omit any. And also, I couldn’t find the silicone loaf pan I wanted so as the recipe makes 6-8 bars, I used a 6-hole silicone muffin pan and I will be making these again. New favourite, despite the lack of accountability (ha pun).

You may have noticed a theme with both bananas and sweet potato. We suddenly had a glut of 12 very ripe (black) bananas. Although I love Our Go-To Banana Bread, I had made it recently as bread and muffins and mini muffins and there was only so much I could take. With recent baking and Saturday’s baking, I cleared the build-up just in time for a fresh bunch to start going spotty. Good times. The sweet potato was from our farm box. Not the most recent one. The one a fortnight before that. I didn’t weigh it, but it was about the size of a toddler’s torso. Glenn used some in a couple of meals. I reserved some for baked oatmeal and then had enough to try this bread as well. The bread is fantastic and will be made again.

Less exciting meal prep but very necessary meal prep happens on Sunday evening. If we have eggs, I hard boil four of them. C and I both enjoy them during the day. Everyone else does, too, but E and S are not so adept at peeling or biting without the egg bouncing away. I also do a batch of overnight oats which will do me for three breakfasts. I did not do either of those things for a few weekends in a row and I was really feeling it. Mornings were a bit more rushed. Snacks were a little less varied and less protein-rich. I’m back on track now, though, and much relieved.

Top left: Sweet potato and apple baked oatmeal https://thenaturalnurturer.com/baked-apple-sweet-potato-oatmeal/

Top right: Sweet potato and banana bread https://thenaturalnurturer.com/sweet-potato-banana-bread/

Bottom left: “4 ingredient peanut butter banana bars” https://sammibrondo.com/peanut-butter-banana-bars/

Bottom right: hard boiled eggs. I draw on them so we know they’re boiled and not not-boiled. I am not good at drawing flowers.

The Stuff of Our Life

Meal Prep Monday (14/07/2025)

Meal Prep Monday (02/06/2025)