Meal Plan Monday

Alrighty friends, I am back!

The break was much longer than anticipated, but the end of last year saw me focusing on other priorities - family members in need.  Much of the year, and especially the latter half saw heartbreak, deceit, pain, suffering, and a death.  My Grandfather passed away just before Christmas after a lengthy illness.  He is at peace now and has been reunited with my Grandmother.  And the other family member who was in need is now finally at a point where they can start rebuild their life and hopefully start to heal.

Even with all of that, I was still cooking away - my hubby, kids and I still had to eat, and I do still love trying new recipes.  Some things never change!  I am still a big planner when it comes to our meals.  So, figured I would start back into the blog with Meal Plan Monday!

Here is this week's meal plan:

Sunday - Rosemary Pepper Crusted Roast, Mashed Potatoes, Gravy and Salad

Monday - Leftovers

Tuesday - Savoury Fish and Salad

Wednesday - Pork Chops, Perogies & Peas (3 "P" Night)

Thursday - Spaghetti & Salad (are you noticing a salad theme?  I m very lucky 
to have two kids who love their veggies, especially fresh in a salad!)

Friday - Chicken Courdon Swiss & Salad

Saturday - Out for dinner, it's our 9th wedding anniversary!

I hope you have a wonderful week!

Meal Plan Monday

Hello everyone!  How are things in your world?  Tis the season of busy days - it's a busy time at my day job, add in all the added fun around the season...having a blast, but a little slow with my posts lately.

I'm back with my family's meal plan for this week.  Here we go!


Sunday - Spaghetti and Meat Sauce

Monday - Sweet and Sour Pork Chops, Perogies and Corn

Tuesday - Homemade Hamburger Helper

Wednesday - Leftovers

Thursday - Savoury Fish

Friday - Leftovers for the kids, Mom and Dad are off to a Christmas party!

Saturday - Still to be determined...hey I can't always be THAT organized! ;-) 

Enjoy your week!

Dawn's Tomato Sauce

Ahh tomato season.  The time of year when the little Addicted to Recipes garden is producing tomatoes like crazy.  Today was a cooler day with some storms blowing through, which meant a perfect day for a big pot of spaghetti.  And since we have that abundance of tomatoes, I figured I should make some tomato sauce for our spaghetti.  Here is what I did:

Dawn's Tomato Sauce

4 cups cherry tomatoes (4 varieties) - peeled (see instructions below about peeling tomatoes)
Salt & pepper (to taste)
15 basil leaves, chopped
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
Dash red pepper flakes
1/2 green pepper, diced
1/3 orange pepper, diced
1/3 yellow pepper, diced
1/2 onion, diced
1 green onion, diced
Handful fresh mushrooms, diced

1 lb ground beef, browned

Start by bringing a large pot of salted water to a boil.  Put the tomatoes in the boiling water for 1 minute, then drain and place the tomatoes in ice cold water.  This will allow you to easily peel the skin from the tomatoes (and yes I did that with 4 cups of cherry tomatoes, it really didn't take much time to pull the skins off).  Once the tomatoes are peeled, place them in a large saucepan, salt and pepper the tomatoes, and turn the pan on medium.

Meanwhile, brown your ground beef.  I left mine unseasoned as I added it to the tomato sauce a little later on.

While the tomatoes are cooking, add the basil, garlic, and Italian seasoning to the pan.  Mix well.  Add in the vegetables.  Taste and add any salt and pepper as needed.  Reduce heat and simmer for 40 - 50 minutes.  When the beef has browned, add it to the tomato sauce.

Prepare your favourite pasta (we went for traditional spaghetti), and serve.

VERDICT:
My hubby's first words were that the sauce tasted just so fresh.  He could tell there were no glass jars or cans involved.  It was so good, and nice to know exactly each ingredient that went into the sauce.  Our kids devoured their meals too.  Yay!

Homemade Hamburger Helper

Last month I wrote a guest post over at Everyday Mom's Meals.  Krista was so kind to host me as part of her Weekend Company series.  If you happened to miss my post, I wanted to share it with you here today!  Here it is:

----------

Today I had my LAST duty day of the school year at preschool.  I cannot believe that the school year is nearly OVER.  Where did that year go?  Our oldest will be starting KINDERGARTEN in September!  Didn't I just have him?  Seems like yesterday, not 5 years ago!

Today also happened to be a dreadfully dreary day.  We're caught in some wicked weather system that is dumping rain, rain, rain on us.  It was a homemade chicken noodle soup kind of day, but with my necessity to be at school, I didn't have the time to put it together.  So it became spaghetti night, or so I thought.

Once school was over, I had NO DESIRE to make spaghetti.  But what could I do with the ground beef that I had laid out?  Meatloaf? My boys would LOVE that...me, not so much.  What to do, what to do.  I thought about my Dad's "Hash" recipe (which essentially is a whole bunch of stuff hashed together...with a ground beef base and add in all the leftovers from the fridge) - but we are all out of leftovers.  So then I thought about Hamburger Helper.  I've seen it on TV many times, never tried making it on my own.  A quick little google search, read through some recipes, and found one to base dinner on.  The recipe I used was found at Food.com, and modified to include more vegetables.  Here is the recipe:

Homemade Hamburger Helper

1/2 lb ground beef
1 lb macaroni
1/2 cup onion, diced
1/4 cup green pepper, diced
1 cup frozen peas
1 1/2 cups cheddar cheese, shredded
1/2 cup cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup flour
2 cups milk
2 cups tomato sauce
1/2 teaspoon dried basil
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon parsley flakes
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Cook the pasta according to the box directions.  Drain and set aside.

While the pasta is cooking, cook the ground beef over medium in a large skillet.  Cook until the meat is browned.  Add in all the dry seasonings (including the flour) and stir until combined.

Add in the milk, tomato sauce and peas.  Bring to a boil, stirring frequently.

Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 2 minutes.

Add in the cream cheese, cheddar cheese, stir until melted.  Add in the macaroni, stir to combine.  Serve immediately.

VERDICT:
This was an absolute HIT.  Our five year old had THREE helpings.  And my husband loved it too.  he didn't want to share the leftovers for tomorrow's lunch, he wanted them all to himself. This could easily be a new go-to recpe for us in place of spaghetti!  Yay!!

Would love for you to follow me on Facebook too!

Scrumptious Sunday #4 - Features!

What an incredible party it was last week!  Thanks so much to everyone who came and shared recipes.  I really enjoyed reading each and every submission.  Everyone it so talented!  An amazing 85 entries last week!  WOW!

It was SO HARD to choose just three submissions to feature...I know I've said that before, but it is true!  And I couldn't choose just three this time, so I picked four features for the week.  Congratulations to everyone on your fantastic posts....if you are one of my features, please grab my "I Was Featured" button and post it on your site, please and thanks!

<a href="http://iamaddictedtorecipes.blogspot.com"><img src="http://i1079.photobucket.com/albums/w519/AddictedtoRecipes/addictedbutton.jpg" width="200" height="177" border="0" alt="I was featured, I was Featured by Addicted to Recipes"></a>

Here are my four features from Scrumptious Sunday Link Party #4:

#13 - Strawberry Shortcake Appetizer from Lady Behind the Curtain

#48 - Spaghetti Squash Carbonara from The Travelling Spoon

# 56 - Royal Icing Recipe, Step-by-Step from Lizy B

#74 - Skinny Mashed Cauliflower from Serena Bakes Simply from Scratch

Scrumptious Sunday #5 Link Party opens late tonight - be sure to link up your favourite recipes from the last week!

If you have a moment, I would LOVE for you to support my blog by voting for it at the voiceBoks "Top 10 Foodie Blogs of 2012" awards - simply click this link and vote for ADDICTED TO RECIPES.  Just takes 2 little clicks...thanks so much!  Voting ends on April 13 (which happens to be my son's birthday!).