If you have tried my prep-ahead strategy for ground beef, you will find this spaghetti recipe so fast it will take only as long as it takes to boil water and cook your spaghetti.  If you haven’t prepared ahead, this recipe is still quick, easy and delicious!  What’s for dinner tonight?  Yummm, spaghetti.

Spaghetti Sauce Recipe

Ingredients:

1 pound pack of pre-seasoned and cooked ground beef

or 1 pound ground beef, one onion (chopped) and 4 cloves of garlic (minced)

2 – 24 oz. cans crushed tomatoes

1 tablespoon dried basil

1/2 tablespoon dried oregano

1 tablespoon sugar

First things first.  Put on enough water to cook one pound of pasta.  Cover the pot to bring the water to a boil faster.  Make sure to stir the pasta well when you first drop it into the boiling water.  This will help keep it from sticking together.

If you don’t have the prepared ground beef from your freezer, in a large skillet or sauce pan, brown the ground beef with the onion and garlic.  Drain of any excess fat and season with a little salt and pepper.  Add the tomatoes, basil, oregano and sugar.  Simmer while the water for the pasta boils.

If you have the ground beef already prepared, in a large skillet or sauce pan add all the ingredients and bring up to a simmer.  Allow the sauce to simmer while you cook the pasta.

When the pasta is al dente, drain well.  Add a little sauce to coat the pasta so it doesn’t stick together.  Serve your pasta and sauce with a green salad and fresh bread. So simple.  So yummy!

Ingredients:

1 pound beef (ground beef or shredded roast)

1 large onion

2 cloves garlic

1/2 pound mushrooms (sliced)

salt to taste

1 tablespoon black pepper

1 pound wide egg noodles

2 10-1/2 oz. cans cream of mushroom soup

1 cup milk

16 oz. container of sour cream

Put on water to boil for the egg noodles. Brown the ground beef and season with the black pepper and salt. Chop the onions and garlic. Add mushrooms, onions and garlic to ground beef and cook until tender. Combine the two cans of soup with the milk and whisk until smooth. Add to the beef mixture. When egg noodles are cooked, drain well and add to the beef and soup mixture. Stir in the sour cream just before serving.

For a Quick Fix meal, use either frozen prepared ground beef or as I did pre-cooked and seasoned London broil or other roast.

With all the cold weather we’ve been having, I am ready for some comfort food. One of my favorite cold weather comfort foods is definitely Minestrone Soup! Here is my recipe for a very quick version.

MINESTRONE SOUP

Ingredients:

In a large heavy bottomed pan, brown the ground beef. Add the onion and sauté until tender. Add the garlic and sauté until softened and fragrant. To this mixture add the remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil and then turn down to a simmer for 30 minutes or until the carrots are tender. Cook the pasta separately until al dente. You can mix the cooked pasta into the pot of soup or add just as much pasta as you want to each bowl. Serve topped with parmesan cheese.

For a really quick cooking version – use your seasoned ground beef from the freezer and 1 jar of pasta sauce instead of the can of tomatoes and other seasonings. See Organization – the key to quick cooking! for details. Or, if you want dinner ready when you get home, use your crock pot!

Serve this soup with some warm, crusty bread and enjoy!

Having been on a fairly tight budget for the first few years of your marriage, I got used to planning what meals we would be eating for the week. I would make a shopping list, grab my calculator and off to the grocery store I would go. So the problem wasn’t what to cook, but where to find the time and energy to do it? I came up with a few BIG time-saving strategies that really work for me. The first, being to prepare some of the meal components ahead of time.

When I go shopping on Saturday morning I come home and get several things going at once. I get the oven preheating to 350°F. I grab my huge cast iron skillet. It is 16 inches wide. Very big, very heavy. I throw three pounds of ground beef into the skillet and break it up with a spatula. I take a large baking sheet and coat it with cooking spray and spread out a family pack of boneless, skinless chicken breasts. Salt, pepper, garlic powder – flip – salt, pepper, garlic powder and into the oven they go! As the ground beef starts to brown I continue to stir and breakup the large pieces. I chop up three large onions. One for each pound of beef I am using. I drain off the fat and water in the pan and add the onions. Now a bulb of garlic. Yes, the whole bulb. I peel and chop it finely and into the pan it goes. Now – salt, pepper and a big handful of dried oregano.

The chicken is flipped after about 30 minutes. I let it go for another 30 minutes and then allow it to cool off on the top of the stove. When the ground beef is well browned and the onions are soft, I let it cool and then portion it into six zipper bags. I use small sandwich bags and then stuff all six of them into a large freezer bag. I do the same thing with the cooled chicken. One breast per bag and into a larger freezer bag. This strategy allows me to pick the amount of meat needed for any particular meal.

I have also been known to throw a london broil or pork loin into the crock pot with a bunch of onions, garlic, carrots and celery and let it cook for hours until it just falls apart with a fork. Divide into smaller portions, bag and freeze. Another trick is when I make meatloaf or meatballs, I make a huge batch (3 pound of ground beef) and make half meatballs and half meatloaf. I freeze whichever one is not for dinner that night.

I have an arsenal of recipes that I use the prepared foods in. I call them my Quick Fix Meals. They are usually my regular recipes, but some of the preparation steps are already done. I can get a stir-fry chicken dinner on the table in the length of time it takes to make rice. Spaghetti in the time it takes to cook the pasta. This works so well, that my husband is now on board and helps with the Saturday preparation and often the makes dinner.