A diverse menu featuring crusted salmon and chicken, a trio of fresh dips, a savory paneer stir-fry, and a chocolate oat loaf to finish

The fettuccine is deliberately plain: olive oil, salt, parsley, nothing else. Every other dish here arrives with a sauce of its own, horseradish tomato for the meatballs, ranch for the potato wedges, avocado lime for the salmon, so the pasta is the one thing on the table that takes whichever is left over. This dish exists to be a base, not a feature.

All three dips travel in separate tubs, and that is not presentation. Horseradish tomato and ranch both split when they are heated, and the avocado lime browns within a day once it is spread over warm salmon. Sealed and cold they hold four days, which matters more in a Houston July than it does in January. The oat double chocolate banana loaf is the exception and is better on day two, once the oats have drawn in moisture.

Reheating splits neatly into two groups. The apricot mustard chicken breasts and the garlic potato wedges want 12 minutes at 400°F uncovered, so the panko and the crisp edges come back. Braised white beans with zucchini and the broccoli paneer stir fry want 6 minutes at 325°F covered, or the paneer goes squeaky. Fettuccine is better warmed in a pan with a spoonful of water than in the oven at all.

This menu leans on the white beans harder than it looks. Braised with zucchini they carry most of the fiber for the week, and between those and the everything bagel crusted salmon a single container holds enough protein that nothing else has to work for it. The salmon is also the only real source of omega-3s in a week otherwise built on chicken, which is most of why it is here. The oat double chocolate banana loaf is still dessert, but oats and banana mean it is not only sugar.