Meal Planning for the Easily Bored Family

Dinner was very yummy last night.  I decided to cook "Western" food because I was feeling lazy.  Made a Parmesan Chicken based on a recipe I googled, along with mashed potatoes and peas. The entire family LOVED it.  I did not think they could eat that much!  Now I know they can really eat - their pallate is for Western style food, not my kind of food.  I am a Malaysian born Chinese who married a "white" Canadian guy.  My Hubby really likes my kind of food - Malaysian food.  I LOVE Malaysian food.  Hubby's favourite is Mexican food.  My kids' favourites are Kraft Dinner and Red Hot brand Hot Dogs.  Malaysian food is unique - it is simlar to Thai food in that some dishes use lemon grass, lime and coriander - spices/fruit from that region.  They are also mostly spicy.  However, I think it is better than Thai food because it had the privilege of influence from other cultures such as Arabic, Indian (as in from India), Chinese, Dutch and Portuguese.  I won't get into the history of Malaysia here but, if you have tried food from Penang, Malaysia you know what I mean.

When I plan my meals, I usually do them when I go grocery shopping - whatever is on sale that week.  I know many women do the same - it makes perfect sense.  If it is a really good sale, like a whole chicken for $4 (this week's big sale), I would buy more to stock up for another week.  I keep thinking that my family gets bored easily.  So, I try to cook a different cuisine each day.  Chinese food one day, Italian another day, Malaysian the next, Mexican, Indian, Western food and then rotate.  Here's what a week's menu could look like:
Mon:  Pork Tenderloin (garlic, lime, garlic, ginger, soya sauce, honey), with Rice and Yu Choy (Chinese greens)
Tuesday:  Leftover Pork Tenderloin and Snow Peas used to stir Fry with Spaghetti Noodles - add Hoisin Sauce and Soya Sauce to flavour the noodles.
Wednesday:  Roast Beef, with potatoes, carrots and gravy
Thursday:  Linguine with Clam Sauce
Friday:  Butter Chicken (from scratch) with Rice
Saturday:  Penang Laksa (Rice noodles in a tamarind based fish soup, complete with mint leaves, pineapples, cucumber and oyster sauce) - my mouth is watering, just typing all this up!
Sunday:  Shrimp Pad Thai (from scratch)

Lunches each day are usually leftoevers from dinner the night prior.

They don't seem to eat that much - good for the grocery bill, but I need them to GROW!  When their friends come for sleepovers, you should see some of their reaction - often times I have to make KD for their friends.

Then I make the easy Parmesan Chicken with peas and mashed potatoes, because I was lazy, and it was such a hit!  The problem I found was, I used more than half a stick of butter for the entire meal.  There was 1/2 cup of butter in the chicken, more butter in the peas, more butter and cream cheese in the mashed potatoes.  I don't think it would be very healthy to eat this kind of food every day - although I think it would help fatten them all up so that I don't look like such a terrible mother/wife with such skinny kids and a skinny hubby!  Oh the decision - to fatten or not to fatten them up!  Nah - I think the condition of the heart is more important than "looking prosperous" - as the Chinese would say to someone who has gained weight.

So, why are they not eating more and gaining more weight?  Is the problem due to a lack of fat (BUTTER) in my cooking?  Or, is it that their pallate is over stimulated and I should just stick to easy boring foods - like Macaroni and Cheese (from scratch) and Mashed potatoes?  Hmm, I am planning on making Liver pate from scratch today - wonder how they would like that!  Bwaaaaaaah!