Beans & Basil and My Dinner Routine

The other day, Erin, who inspired me to jump on the NaBloPoMo bandwagon again this year, posted about the recipes she actually really makes, not just for blogging, but for regular eating. It got me thinking. Do I even make anything from this blog more than once? Most of the time, I blog about things after making them once or sometimes twice. I'm usually too hungry to style my photos (heck, it's rare that I bother to properly light the shot, ha). I almost never throw away "failed" dinners, because I can almost always find a way to rescue my missteps. But I am not very good at just eating the same thing over and over again (though I do have my methods for repurposing), which might be why I've been such a lackluster food blogger. Sure, I make cold brewed coffee all summer long and these buttermilk biscuits show up on our breakfast table every few months, and we just had this chickpea soup a week ago, but for the most part I'm an improviser. And improvising doesn't always lead to reliable, recreatable recipes.

Luckily I've got a willing dining companion who doesn't demand meat 'n two veg for every meal, and I don't mind eating mix-and-match dinners. Tonight we ate beans, which I soaked this morning and simmered when I got home with a bay leaf and some onion until they were tender. We had some basil in the fridge so I tossed a chiffonade on top of the beans with a drizzle of olive oil. I also roasted some vegetables: we got two tiny cauliflowers and one little head of broccoli in our winter CSA share this week, and we had a few turnips and a butternut squash around, too. Beans, roasted veg, some baguette with butter. That's dinner. When we have a lot of vegetables in the house (that is, most of the time), this is how I usually pull dinner together. What about you? Do you have favorite recipes you make over and over or do you pull together dinner from what you have around?