Steak, Egg, and Cheese Burritos

I shared on Twitter tonight about my quick and easy freezer snacks and meals, and many of you asked for the recipes.  So, I thought I would share it with you.  :)

Let me first tell you, that I am not the best cook in the world...and I am sure there are thousands of other people (probably millions) who can cook better than I, but I do what works for us.

I wanted to make healthy, cheap and easy snacks/meals for my husband, who is always on the go....especially in the morning.  His normal breakfast includes Cinnamon Toast Crunch and a diet soda, so almost anything would be an improvement.   :)

First, the Steak, Egg, and Cheese Burrito.  Super easy.  We had steaks on Monday night for dinner, and I made a couple extra.  I cut them into small pieces (about the same size as I feed my 2 little ones), and popped them into the fridge.  Then, this afternoon/evening I made up some scrambled eggs, added some cheese and "hot sauce", and popped them into tortillas.  Couldn't be easier.

Here is the list of everything that you will need:

• Eggs (4 per steak, but eye ball it.  If you like more eggs/less eggs do whatever you like.)
• Milk (just enough to make the scrambled eggs)
• 2 Steaks (cut into small pieces)
• Motz. Cheese (a handful)
• Cheddar/American Cheese (I used 2 slices of American because that is what we had on hand)
• 1-2 bell peppers (I used green and red)
• Any other veggies you have on hand.
• Salt and Pepper (to taste)
• Hot Sauce (we used Asian Zing from BBW, about a tablespoon)
• Tortillas
• 1 Egg (the "glue")

Prepare steak, make the scrambled eggs with salt, pepper, cheese, and hot sauce.  Add steak, and you are ready to make the burritos.  Which I suspect is pretty self-explanatory.  :)  When you are at the end of your "roll" wipe the tortilla with a little egg wash to allow it is stick.  Man, I should write a cookbook with these type of explanations.  ;o)

Anyway,  put your burritos (it makes about 6 per steak) in the freezer to harden and then wrap individually wrap with plastic wrap.  Place in a ziploc bag with the date on it, and you are good to go.  When you are ready to eat, place frozen burrito in the fridge the night before and pop in the microwave long enough to heat through.  You can microwave frozen, but the tortilla tends to get tough if you do this.

Next is the personal pizza's.  Actually, this isn't really a recipe.  But, we love it.  I flatten out buttermilk biscuits and bake until golden brown.  Once cooled, top with your favorite pizza toppings (we do bbq chicken pizzas most often), then slip the pizzas into individual ziploc sandwich bags and pop into the freezer.  Done.  SO EASY!  When you are ready to eat, just place it in the microwave for 2ish minutes, until the cheese is bubbly.

I hope this makes it easier for you and your family to enjoy fast, easy meals at home.

Cheesy Dip

I shared with y'all on Twitter this afternoon that I was eating my world famous cheese dip.

And I had a request for the recipe.  So, here it is.....because it is going to be world famous.  Bahaha.

1/2 lb of ground hamburger - browned

one packet of taco seasoning (I prefer Taco Bell Taco Seasoning)

one jar of medium cheese dip (you can use Velveeta as well)

Add your taco seasoning to the meat according to the packet.  You will have extra liquid (because you are only using 1/2 a pound), and that is totally fine.

Combine the taco seasoned meat with the jar of cheese, and warm up in a sauce pan.

And there you have it.

If you want to add a little extra spice, add a can of Rotel (drained)

I prefer it served with corn chips rather than tortilla chips, just gives it a little something extra.  :)

Hope you like it, and let me know what you think.  :)

Meatloaf Recipe

So, it has come to my attention that someone (we won't mention any names) doesn't know how to make meatloaf.

That is just terrible.  :)

So, I thought I would share my meatloaf recipe, and our special sauce.  :)

Grab two pounds of hamburger (thawed) - 2lbs will feed 6-8 people, so just gauge it on the size of your family.

Season with a little bit of salt, pepper, basil (basically anything that you use to season your hamburgers)

Throw in one sleeve of saltine crackers (or oats, whatever you have in the house)

3 to 4 eggs

Mix this all together in a big bowl.  You will get messy.  But don't worry.  :)

Once you have combined all the ingredients split into two equal sections, and place into two greased bread pans.

Pop into the oven at 375 degrees, for roughly one hour.

While that is cooking up, we can mix up the sauce.

You will need brown sugar, ketchup and mustard.

Combine all the ingredients together until you get the taste you are looking for.  I would say my normal ratio would be 2 cups ketchup, 1/2 cup of mustard, 1 cup of brown sugar.

Yeah, it is not healthy.  But.  A little goes a long way.

And I have to say, I have never measured the sauce (or the meatloaf for that matter)....so it might be off.  I just like the sauce to taste most like the brown sugar than the mustard and ketchup.

After the one hour of cook time, top the meatloaf with the sauce.  Bake for another 15-20 minutes, and it is ready to serve.

This is a GREAT recipe to hid veggies in.  I often slip peppers or onions into the mixture.  So feel free to go crazy.  :)

Well, that is what we are having for dinner tonight.  What about you?

Chicken Noodle Soup

So, like I have said before....I don't follow recipes, and I just make stuff up. But, per request, here is my chicken noodle soup recipe.

2 cartons of chicken stock
2 cooked chicken breasts, thinly chopped
1/2 package of egg noodles
1 onion (medium), diced
2 cups of carrots, chopped
1 cup of celery (if you want)
3 chicken bouillon cubes
basil
salt and pepper, to taste
chili powder

Basically throw everything together, except for the noodles, in a crock pot. Set on high for around 5 hours (depends on how firm/soft you like your veggies).

Toss all the spices to taste. Sorry it is not specific. I am just a tosser.

About 30-45 minutes before serving toss the noodles in.

Then, it is ready it go :).

It is a pretty standard chicken noodle soup recipe, I think. But, it tastes really good...and I hope you enjoy it.

Let me know if you give it a try :).

Lasagna Recipe

(Sorry for the bad picture, it was taken with my cell phone)

Lasagna. It is good stuff!

In fact, it is what we had for dinner the other night.

I thought I would share the recipe with y'all here. :) Hope you enjoy. It's delish!

9, cooked, lasagna noodles (you can use the "oven ready" kind, but I don't think they taste as good)
1 jar of spaghetti sauce (you can use two if you like to have sauce to soak up with garlic bread, yum!)
1-2 lbs of hamburger, cooked (season with basil, salt, and pepper) (I use 1lb and more cheese, my mom uses 2 lbs and less cheese....whatever works for you and your family)
1-2 bags of motz. cheese
a large spoonful of grape jelly (I am sure you can use other types of jelly, or even jam, but I have never tried it)
1/2 container of cottage cheese

Combine the hamburger, spaghetti sauce, grape jelly, and cottage cheese in a large bowl.

Drizzle a little bit of the sauce mixture onto the bottom of the pan (9x13).
Place 3 noodles on top of that.
Cover with sauce mixture. Make sure to cover all the noodles, otherwise they will be crunchy.
Cover with cheese.
Repeat. (do not add cheese to the top layer, just leave it as the sauce mixture)

Cover with tin foil. Bake at 350 for one hour. Remove tin foil, add cheese to the top, and bake for another 15 minutes.

Then you let it sit for 15 minutes, serve. :)

Let me know if you try it, and whether you love it or hate it! Enjoy ;o)

Bon Appetit...

...those two little words always makes me thing of the move "Julie and Julie".

It is a move I love to watch, and if you haven't seen it, you need too. Truly a great movie.

Well, you will think so if you are anything like me :).

Anyway, back to my point.

Yesterday, I posted on Twitter and Facebook about my new chicken salad recipe. And because y'all are so interested in my recipe, I thought I would share it here with you today.

Disclaimer: I made this recipe up, and I didn't measure. So, if it doesn't taste quite right to you just toss some more stuff in! That's how I cook. I hate to follow the rules (this is the reason I don't like to bake....you can read about his baking fiasco here). Oh, and sorry about all the canned goods, I was trying to come up with a recipe to use up some of the stuff in my pantry. Obviously, you can substitute any of the canned items for fresh veggies. :)

With that said, here is the recipe (at least rough estimates *grin*):

3 cups medium noodles, cooked
1 can of medium peas (toss the peas in with the noodles for the last minute or two while boiling)
2 cans diced tomatoes, drained
1-2 cups Miracle Whip (depends on how much "sauce" you prefer)
2 pieces of chicken breasts, chopped
1/2 cup of black olives
3 tablespoons of honey
dash of maple syrup
salt and pepper to taste

Basically, you just combine all the ingredients.....and viola!

Make sure the everything is chilled before you add the ingredients together :)

I hope you enjoy it as much as my family and I have (and still are, yeah for leftovers!).

PS - Don't forget to vote for Ady! Just click here, and select Madelyn Grace :).

Menu Plan

A question was posed in one of my recent posts, so I thought I would go into a little bit more detail than is really possible in comments.

Here is what my family would eat during a typical two weeks. I don't plan lunches because we will eat the leftover from the night before.

This is in no particular order:

Monday - chili
Tuesday - lasagna
Wednesday - kraft mac n' cheese w/hotdogs
Thursday - chicken and biscuits
Friday - chicken/baked potato/green beans
Saturday - chicken noodle soup
Sunday - bbq chicken pizza
Monday - chicken breasts/mashed potatoes/broccoli and carrots (steamed)
Tuesday - chicken salad
Wednesday - kraft mac n' cheese w/hotdogs
Thursday - chicken salad
Friday - chicken/baked potato/corn
Saturday - beef stew
Sunday - chicken breasts/mashed potatoes/broccoli and carrots (steamed)

Meltdown with Snow Pops

Seriously, I had a meltdown. I gave myself a time-out! I was getting so frustrated with these darn things, well before I get ahead of myself....

Have you heard of the recipe MckMama posted on her blog? Well....in my attempt to be "Susie Homemaker" I tried to make these delicious looking treats. But, as you will see below....I failed, miserably.

It started off really well, actually it was probably my best cake ever. No burnt edges, etc. It was perfect! (I have been known to cut the edges off of a cake and serve it anyway, lol.)


After my success on the cake I started on the cream cheese frosting, which is absolutely delicious by the way. I could've eaten the whole bowl....but ya know I am trying to lose weight :(.


Oh and here is my little helper....running away with "his" cell phone of course.

Okay, back to the Snow Pops. After the cake cooled (I stuck it in the fridge to speed things along), I crumbled up the cake. MckMama said to use a food processor, but I don't have one. It was pretty easy to crumble up the chunks of cake myself....so no harm done.


This is about the time things started going downhill, and my mind completely forget to take pictures.

I combined the frosting with the cake crumbles (I didn't have to add oats, hehe), and formed the "dough" into balls. Once the balls were formed I placed them on the wooden skewers.

Then I melted the chocolate (I couldn't find Hershey's Bliss white cholocate melts ANYWHERE...maybe this is were I went wrong), once it was melted I attempted to add food coloring. Once I added the food coloring to the melted chocolate it stiffed back up. I couldn't even "re-melt" it. I have no idea what was in the food coloring, but it definitely didn't like being combined with chocolate.

So, I tossed that chocolate and started again. Once melted I dipped the skewer with the cake ball into the chocolate, and the darn ball kept falling off the skewer!!! I was VERY frustrated at this point (it probably didn't help that I was on a deadline because we had a New Year's Eve party to get to).

My next thought, freeze the cake balls. So, there they sat in my freezer for an hour "hardening" to the skewer.

Then I melted more chocolate, but this time I kept burning the darn stuff. I was literally tossing, eh throwing, things in my kitchen at this point. UGH! Lol. I was so excited to try these because they looked so cute.....but, never again. Haha.

So, after my second time out of the day. I gave up. I took the cake balls off the skewers and placed them in a bowl, rolled them in some powdered sugar and called them good (I added caramel when I served the dessert). Here is what I ended up with.


Not as attractive as MckMama's are they?

Have you tried making these? Did you succeed? Let me know what I did wrong ;o).

2x4 Soup

Per request here is my 2x4 recipe. It is VERY simple, and it is great for those nights that you do not feel like cooking.

2 cans Progresso Minestrone Soup
2 cans Rotel
2 lbs hamburger, browned (you can add a little onion if you like)
2 cups medium shell noodles, cooked

That's it! Combine all ingredients and heat to liking. This does tend to be a little spicy, so if you have small children switch out a can of Rotel for more Progresso Minestrone Soup.

Good luck, and let me know if you like it!

Meal Plan

Sorry for the late post, I took a little break over the weekend. I hope that y'all hate a great holiday weekend! My family and I visited my sister at college, and had a lot of family time. It was great.

Here is my meal plan for the week (yeah, I know the first two days have already gone by...but, at least you know our plans):

Monday
grilled cheese sandwiches and soup (lunch)
no dinner necessary

Tuesday
pancakes, eggs, and bacon (lunch)
bbq chicken pizza (dinner)

Wednesday
chicken alfredo/noodles (lunch)
chicken and biscuits (dinner)

Thursday
leftovers (lunch)
steak and mashed potatoes (dinner)

Friday
tuna sandwiches w/fruit (lunch)
mac n' cheese w/hot dogs (dinner)

Saturday
ham sandwiches w/yogurt (lunch)
no dinner necessary

Sunday
chips and dip
no dinner necessary

Hope you guys have a great week! And don't forget how much time meal planning saves you....give it a try.

Have a meal plan already? Please leave the link in the comment section. I would love to read your weekly meal plan.

Simple Goulash

1 lb ground beef, browned
2 1/2 cup egg noodles, cooked
1/2 onion, chopped
1/2 green pepper, chopped
1 can tomato soup
handful of shredded cheese
3/4 cup of water
1 1/2 cup bread crumbs
3 tablespoons butter, melted.

Brown meat w/onion and green peppers.

In a bowl, stir together meat, noodles, cheese and soup until well coated.

Place in a greased 9x13 pan.

Combine bread crumbs and butter, then add on top of noodle mixture.

Bake at 350 degrees for 35-40 minutes.

Cheesy Chicken and Potato Casserole

1 box scalloped potatoes
4 potatoes, thinly sliced
shredded cheese
2 chicken breasts (cut into chunks)
3 teaspoons vegetable oil
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can mushrooms.

Cook potatoes slightly before cutting (to insure fully cooked).

In a medium sauce pan over med-high heat, brown chicken.

Prepare scalloped potatoes as directed.

Stir in sliced potatoes, chicken, cream of chicken soup, and mushroom.

Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes, then add cheese to top and return to oven for another 10-15 minutes.

BBQ Chicken Pizza

pizza crust
cooked, shredded chicken (about 1/2 chicken breast)
BBQ sauce
shredded cheese

Prepare crust according to directions.

Spread BBQ sauce evenly.

Add shredded chicken.

Top with cheese.

Bake for 15-20 minutes, until crust is golden brown and cheese is melted.

Crockpot Bacon Wrapped BBQ Apple Chicken

1 boneless chicken breast per serving
2 slices of bacon per chicken breast
2 apples for every 2-3 chicken breast
1/4 cup BBQ sauce for each chicken breast

Peal and chop apples.

Stir in BBQ sauce and place mixture into crock pot.

Wrap chicken with bacon and allot to cook in BBQ/Apple mixture for 4 hours on high.

Caesar Pockets

4 cups torn romaine lettuce
6 oz. shaved turkey breast, cut into strips
1/4 cup drained roasted red pepper strips
3 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup Caesar dressing (or ranch)
4 pita breads, warmed, and cut in half

Toss lettuce with turkey, peppers, cheese, and dressing.

Spoon in to pitas.

Chili

2lbs hamburger
1/2 onion
2 green peppers
1/4 teaspoon garlic flakes
3 tomatoes
2 cans of red kidney beans, drained
1 can of tomato sauce
4 teaspoons chili powder (can edit to your taste, this is a pretty mild chili)
1 teaspoon basil
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground pepper
1 big can of V8 juice

Brown hamburger with your onion.

Combine all ingredients into big pot or crock pot and allow to cook (on high) for 3-4 hours minimum. Basically judge the timing by the tenderness of your vegetables. Each person is different, so whatever you prefer.

This is even better the next day!

P.S. I hope that my Dad doesn't discover this blog, he wouldn't be too happy with me for disclosing this "secret" recipe. Haha ;o).

Chicken Noodle Soup

2 quarts chicken broth
6 1/2 uncooked wide egg noodles
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) cream of chicken soup
3 cups cubed cooked chicken
1 cup sour cream
minced parsley, optional

Bring chicken broth to a boil; add noodles and cook uncovered until tender.

Add soup and chicken' heat through.

Remove from heat and stir in sour cream; sprinkle with parsley.

Savory Chicken Casserole

10 - 3/4 oz. can cream of mushroom soup
10 - 3/4 oz. can cream of celery soup
1 cup milk
1 cup instant rice, uncooked
2 to 3 lbs chicken
1 1/2 oz. pkg. onion soup mix
1 teaspoon garlic, minced
1 teaspoon onion salt

Mix soups, milk and rice together; spread in a greased 9x13 baking pan.

Arrange chicken over top; sprinkle with soup mix, garlic and onion salt.

Bake at 350 degrees for 40-45 minutes, until juices run clear when chicken is pierced.

Lasagna Toss

1lb ground beef, browned
2 green peppers, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, minced (I just use minced garlic from a jar)
1 jar of spaghetti sauce
1 2/3 cup water
1/4 cup Italian dressing
12 oven ready lasagna noodles, broken into quarters
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

Combine beef, garlic, peppers, spaghetti sauce, water, and dressing into saucepan.

Bring to a boil, add noodles; stir. Cover and cook on medium (low heat) 10-15 minutes or until noodles are tender.

Stir occasionally. Remove from heat.

Sprinkle with cheese; cover. Let stand for about 5 minutes.

Baked Oatmeal

I don't know about you, but I am always on the search for recipes to feed my family. And the other day I came across this fantastic blog....she cooks like I would cook. Without using "weird" ingredients that you wouldn't have on hand, etc. You can find her blog here.

So far I have only tried the Baked Oatmeal, and my husband LOVED it (I am not big on oatmeal)! I even some how got roped into making a couple of batches for his parents trip up to Canada. Anyway, it is incredibly easy....and you probably have all the ingredients right in your cabinets. There are several other recipes I have written down to try over the next two weeks. I will post my meal plan soon to let you know what they are....hopefully with the recipes included (or at least the link to the original recipe).

By the way, I served the Baked Oatmeal covered in strawberries....you can pretty much use any fruit or topping that you would add to oatmeal. It also is very easy to freeze and pull out the night before for a great breakfast!!! Such a good idea for simple meal planning.

Good luck...and let me know if you like the recipe!