Summer Cherry Chutney

When it is as hot out as it has been here the last few weeks, no one wants to cook at the end of the day, and especially anything fancy. My favourite way to work around this is to make a lot of something and then eat the same thing for a week. It sounds boring, but there’s ways to switch it up.

For lunch, I’ve been packing hard-boiled eggs, a container of cut veggies, some almonds or nut butter, and a piece of fruit or two. The things that keep it interesting are having different combinations of veggies and different fruits, as well as different nuts or pairing the nut butter with the fruit.  Kale salad has also been featured here instead of the veggie sticks, and a left-over burger snuck it’s way in instead of the eggs. I’m fairly sure I’ve eaten some variation on this for the last two weeks (atleast), and I’m not bored yet.

Dinners can be a little bit harder. A couple weeks ago I was rooting through the freezer while figuring out what to cook for the week and found three GIANT pieces of pork. Like enough to last two people for most of a week. The obvious solution was to defrost one over the course of two or three days in the fridge, and then grill it on low heat until it was cooked through. We paired this with really simple kale salads straight from the garden, and we didn’t have to really cook dinner for days!

Eating the same dish over and over can get repetitive eventually. An easy way to mix things up and keep your healthy eating interesting is to change what sauce you have with your meal. Sauces are easy to make and many can be made with a few ingredients you already have on hand. This one uses the sour cherries I froze last summer after making this recipe.

Does anyone else eat the same thing all week often? Let me know in the comments and tell me what keeps it from getting boring!

Have a great 4-day week!

Ingredients:

• 2 tbsp coconut oil
• 2 cups fresh or frozen and thawed pitted sour cherries
• 1 cup vegetable broth (like from this recipe)
• 2 tbsp dried thyme
• Pinch each salt and pepper

1. Heat the oil in a small sauce pan over medium-high heat. Add the cherries and cook 5-7 minutes, stirring occasionally, to caramelize the sugars.
2. Add broth, thyme, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil and reduce heat to simmer 20 minutes or until almost all liquid has evaporated.
3. Serve over your favourite grilled meat.