Leslie Blogs

writing about my life on a tiny island

Cook Once, Eat All Week Cookbook Review

For a couple months, I kept seeing posts on my feed about meals from a cookbook, Cook Once, Eat All Week (affiliate links used).

Although I have tried my hand at meal prepping in the past, I didn’t love it because I got tired of eating the same meals over and over again throughout the week. Even when I tried things like cooking several meals worth of chicken and seasoning it differently for each meal, it was still just….chicken with different seasoning. The intriguing thing to me about this cookbook was that although you had just one day of prep and you use the same 3 main ingredients, the recipes have a totally different take on how to use the ingredients so you get 3 really different meals!

I finally ordered the book a couple months ago and haven’t looked back since! The book is divided into 26 weeks of menus, with weeks focusing on either chicken, turkey, beef, or pork as the protein of each week. Each week provides a list of ingredients needed that will make up 3 dinners along with 2 optional bonus dinners (that may include seafood options) for each week.

Each week is set up around three main ingredients and starts with a shopping list for week as well as substitution options for each week. So for example, one of my favorite weeks is Week 10: Brisket, Bell Peppers, and Russet Potatoes. There are substitution options to make the week paleo, grain-free, or dairy-free.

So, here’s an overview of how each week works for me:

  • I pick the week I’m going with and add the ingredients I need to my Walmart Grocery order for the week (most of our meat comes from Butcherbox, so I choose meals based on what we have on hand from that).
  • After picking up the grocery order, I get started on the Prep Day tasks in the kitchen! For Week 10, this started with cooking the brisket. One of my FAVORITE things about a lot of the weeks is that at least one component can be cooked in the Instant Pot. This means hands-off time to complete other tasks, which I love!) Instructions are included for cooking the brisket in the oven, Instant Pot, or slow cooker and it is great to have choices! This week’s prep day also included baking potato wedges, cooking rice, making stir-fry sauce and dressing, chopping a few vegetables, and sauteing peppers and onions. Instructions are included for each of these tasks and tips for how to store and label each component are provided. Prepping all three recipes took under two hours!
  • At the end of prep day, you have three meals in the fridge pretty much ready to go!
Brisket Stir Fry over rice!

The recipes for Week 10 are Philly Cheesesteak Loaded Fries, Pepper Steak Stir-Fry, and a Gyro Salad with Garlic Potato Wedges. Each recipe for this week yielded 4-5 servings, which meant that in my house, there were always leftovers for lunches. For each night, there was only a few minutes of prep and cook time to assemble the meals, since most ingredients were already prepped and cooked. For example, on the stir-fry night, I just had to crisp up the brisket and then combine with the veggies and sauce. In about 10 minutes, dinner was ready!

Philly Cheesesteak Loaded Fries

All in all, I’ve tried about 4 of the different weeks and we have enjoyed everything! There are a couple of recipes that weren’t my favorite (like the Cottage Pie from Week 5) but that is mostly because it was something that I just am not a fan of in the first place. There are a couple of weeks that I’ve already repeated just because they’ve been so good! Using these recipes has not only helped me prep and eat more “real” food but has also helped me branch out and eat foods that I normally wouldn’t, such as acorn squash or picadillo tacos. I can definitely say that in just the short time I’ve had Cook Once, Eat All Week, this has become the most used cookbook I’ve ever had!

  • Using ALL the containers for a week of meals!
  • The Chicken Broccoli Fried Rice was a favorite!
  • The Picadillo Tacos from Week 04 were great!
  • The Honey Garlic Pork Skillet from Week 22 is my FAVORITE so far!

So, if you’re looking for a way to make meal prep easier or want to try new recipes, check it out! If you have tried the book, which week is your favorite?

Taco Stuffed Mini Bell Peppers

Last week, I made this recipe and shared with my parents. It was so good that my mom requested I make it again the next night! Not only is it pretty simple, but is also reheats really well, so it’s a recipe that I’m sure I’ll be making more once school starts back! It would be a pretty appetizer (just ignore my horrible photograph), but we loved it for dinner as an entree. As written, this makes about 4 servings. I can take or leave regular bell peppers, but LOVE the sweet ones! This recipe is based on this one from  The Girl Who Ate Everything.
What You’ll Need:
  • 1 lb bag of sweet mini bell peppers
  • 1 lb ground meat (I used ground sirloin, but any ground meat would work)
  • Homemade Seasoning (adjust to meet your taste preferences)
    • 1 Tablespoon chili powder
    • 1 teaspoon garlic powder
    • 1 teaspoon onion powder
    • 1 teaspoon cumin
    • 1.5 teaspoons salt
    • 1.5 teaspoons ground pepper
  • 1 cup shredded cheese
  • 3/4 cup water
  • A handful of fresh cilantro
  • 1/2 cup Greek Yogurt 
  • 2 Tablespoons lime juice
What to Do:
  1. Preheat oven to 350.
  2. Brown ground beef (or other meat). Once fully cooked, drain beef.
  3. While your beef is browning, cut peppers in half length-wise and deseed. Basically, you’re making little pepper boats. Line a baking sheet or dish with pepper boats.
  4. Sacrifice enough of your pepper halves to create about 3/4 cup of diced pepper.
  5. Once meat is browned and drained, add in diced pepper, seasoning mix, and water. Stir and simmer for about 5-10 minutes, or until water is soaked up and peppers are soft.
  6. Fill pepper boats with ground beef mixture and bake for about 15 minutes. During the last 5 or so minutes, sprinkle on cheese and allow it to melt. (I like a little crispiness, so I turned the oven to broil for the last few minutes.)
  7. In a food processor or blender, process your cilantro, greek yogurt, and lime juice to create a sauce to drizzle over finished peppers. You can adjust your sauce ingredients to your taste preferences. (Don’t skip this….it is SO delicious!)
  8. Serve peppers with cilantro yogurt sauce for drizzling or dipping!

Food: Bacon Meatballs with Barbecue Sauce

The Super Bowl was tonight, which of course meant craving Super Bowl food. I wanted to make something that would be delicious, but not quite as bad for me as all the other food we were planning on serving up. Plus, I needed something that could double as a couple lunches for the week ahead. I settled on meatballs, and ended up combing a couple of recipes to make bacon meatballs and a tangy barbecue sauce. The recipe I used is an adaption and combination of these two: PaleOMG’s Bacon Meatballs and The Pioneer Woman’s BBQ Comfort Meatballs. The Bacon Meatballs are paired with a Mango Honey Mustard Sauce that sounds awesome…but I’m allergic to mustard, so had to figure something else out. Here’s what I ended up with:

Bacon Meatballs (recipe adapted from PaleOMG, cooking method from Pioneer Woman…this version is not paleo)
1 pound of ground sirloin
4 slices of bacon, diced
1/2 sweet onion, diced
1 egg, whisked
1/4 cup flour (divided)
2 teaspoons chili powder
Oil or cooking fat
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
  2. Throw the diced bacon into a skillet and start to brown.
  3. Once the bacon starts rendering enough fat for the onion to not stick, add the onions to the skillet. Stir the bacon and onion around until the bacon is cooked and the onions are soft. Remove and drain on a paper towel.
  4. In a bowl, combine the ground sirloin, bacon, onions, egg, spices, and a couple Tablespoons of the flour. Mix it all up with your hands.
  5. Scoop out meatballs and roll into balls (I used a small cookie scoop to make sure they were all the same size). Roll each meatball in remaining flour to coat.
  6. Get the oil or cooking fat of your choice hot (or just use the bacon grease if there’s enough) and add the meatballs to the skillet. Cook enough to sear each one. 
  7. Once the meatballs have reached the brown-ness of your liking, remove to a parchment covered baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until done.

Barbecue Sauce (adapted from Pioneer Woman)

2 cups of ketchup
2 Tablespoons of sugar
5 Tablespoons of distilled white vinegar
4 Tablespoons of Worcestershire sauce
4 Tablespoons of minced onion
1.5 Tablespoons of grape jelly
  1. While meatballs are cooking, combine all sauce ingredients in a sauce pan. 
  2. Cook on medium low heat, stirring frequently, until mixture comes to a boil.
Once the meatballs are cooked, you can either pour the sauce over them or serve on the side as a dipping sauce, depending on your preference.
Since it was Super Bowl Sunday and I knew we’d be grazing, I dumped the meatballs and sauce in the crockpot after cooking to keep it warm.
This recipe received raves from everyone!

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