Dinner for Two: Fabulous Lasagna

The great thing about lasagna is that once you’ve gone through the trouble of putting it together, there are tons of leftovers for the next few meals.

The bad part of lasagna is that once you’re sick of eating lasagna every night, the rest sits in the fridge uneaten. It takes two people a long time to eat a full pan of it! But that problem is eliminated with this method!

Now, I’ve got an amazing lasagna recipe that I swear by, but this was just an easier, simpler, less time-consuming version.

Cook up some ground beef…

And boil some lasagna noodles.

When the beef is browned, drain out the grease and add jarred sauce. I used Wegman’s Italian Classics, one jar of Roasted Garlic and one jar of Grandpa’s Sauce.

Next, prepare your cheese. Some ricotta,

an egg,

and some basil, thyme, garlic powder, and oregano.

All mixed up!

Drain your noodles, let them cool, and then begin assembling.

Start with a little sauce in the bottom of some disposable foil loaf pans.

Then add a noodle to each (I had to cut about 2 inches off the end of each with a pair of kitchen shears).

Ooops, just remembered to add mozzarella to the cheese!

Stir that in, then spread a bit on each noodle.

More sauce…

Lather, rinse, repeat. I think I had 4 noodles in each pan at the end.

Top with some more shredded mozzarella, and you’re good to go!

I covered each with foil. Two were set aside to freeze, and the other two went into the oven.

After about 25 minutes in the oven, this is what one looked like!

Very yummy. A little more time intensive than I’d like for a weeknight, but I guess it’s worth it since it’ll save me the work on another night.

Beef Enchiladas with Corn and Black Beans

The strange thing about this recipe is that it’s entirely my own! I didn’t borrow or steal this recipe from anyone, I just threw everything together and made a meal all on my own.

Very strange.

But fun, I think.

I’ve made beef enchiladas a million times, but when I’ve done it, it’s been a primarily ground beef and enchilada sauce mixed up, put inside flour tortillas, and topped with more sauce and a whole bunch of cheese.

It’s very tasty done this way, but the problem is that it’s very boring. I just wasn’t feeling it, but I wanted something similar, so I decided to spice it up a bit with some additions.

Here is what I used: black beans, enchilada sauce, chopped green chilis, cilantro, onion, canned corn, ground beef, Greek yogurt, Mexican-blend cheese, flour tortillas, and a bit of refried beans to serve on the side.

First step, chop up the onion.

Second step: I sautéed a half cup of chopped onion for a few minutes, then added a half cup of rinsed and drained black beans. I figured they needed to cook down a bit so that they’d be tender before I put them in the enchiladas.

Then I added a half cup of corn.

Mixed all around.

Finally, I added the whole little can of chopped green chilis and let everything cook down until tender.

Then I took the mixture out of the skillet and set it aside.

(Nazzers – recognize the bowl? Points for those who do!)

Moving on. Next, I sautéed the beef in the same skillet.

After it was browned, I drained off the grease and then added a can of enchilada sauce.

Once it was heated up, I added most of the bean/ onion/ corn/ chilis mixture back in, though not all of it because it seemed like a lot.

In retrospect, I’m not sure it was necessary to separate everything out only to recombine, but ah well. It worked out.

Last step: a spoonful of Greek yogurt. This was really the change I was most looking forward to. I have recently discovered Greek yogurt and was looking for ways to sneak it into food, making it creamy, without tipping hubby off.

All melted and mixed into the mixture, this is what it looked like.

I laid out a bunch of tortillas in a dish and carefully scooped a bit into each one of them.

When the mixture was doled out, I rolled up the tortillas.

I poured the other can of enchilada sauce on top

And finally, I topped it off with Mexican-blend cheese.

Okay, by this point, my camera’s battery light was blinking at I wasn’t able to use the screen, so I actually had to use a viewfinder. That’s not something I’ve done in years! Ha.

Anyway, I served the enchiladas with some Mexican rice and refried beans on the side, and also topped with a spoonful of Greek yogurt in place of sour cream.

Very tasty. Different. I think I should have included less chilis, since they were a little overwhelming, but otherwise I liked it a lot.

Who am I kidding? I’m just smug that I made my own recipe and that hubby liked it enough to eat the leftovers. Maybe I’m learning a thing or two about cooking.

Jack O’Lantern Cheeseburger Pie

I’m not sure why I’m blogging about cheeseburger pie when I really should be doing the massive amount of work I have to do for school, but it’s probably got something to do with the fact that I just don’t want to do school work.

My apartment complex gives us a cute little newsletter every month with fun facts about the holidays in that month, community info and news, and a random recipe. This month’s was jack o’lantern cheeseburger pie. Of course I had to make that one.

It was helpful that hubby and I were invited over to my brother and SIL’s place on Halloween. It would have felt weird to make this for just us. They have a kid. Granted, she’s only a toddler and had no idea what was going on, but it seemed to make more sense to do something so whimsical if there’s a kid involved.

I started off with some chopped onion, minced garlic, sat, and pepper.

And ground beef.

Just kept stirring it to let it all cook.

When it was almost done, I measured out some ketchup.

And after draining the beef, I added the ketchup to it.

All mixed it, it looked almost exactly like it had before. I really didn’t think this was enough ketchup, but after a little taste, I decided to leave it alone.

Set the beef aside to let it cool.

Next step: prepare the pie shell! I cheated and used store-bough pie crust, though I was better about letting it warm up at room temperature before trying to unroll it.

Then I took some mustard…

And smeared it around the bottom of the pie crust. I told you this was weird!

Take a massive, ridiculous, crazy amount of Monterey jack cheese and put it in the pan with the beef.

As I mixed it in, I had second thoughts about the quantity of cheese and picked some back out. That’s not necessary

Once it’s all combined, press the mixture into the pie shell.

Then unroll the other pie crust so you can play with it!

Basically, I put it on a cutting board and cut out a silly jack o’lantern face with a knife.

The smile was lopsided, but ah well. It still looked cute, right?

I picked the whole thing up (carefully!) and placed it on top of the pie. Then I rolled the edges and used the cutout dough to make a little stem.

Just before cooking, I brushed the pie with a mixture of egg, water, and red and yellow food coloring. I also painted the stem green! Then I giggled at how silly it looked and announced that I would be very sorry if this turned out to be a complete flop.

After baking it for about 20 minutes, I took it back out to baste again. At this point, I filled in the holes with a bit of leftover Monterey jack cheese. I thought about making a foil shield to protect my crust from getting burned, but then I decided that I didn’t care.

The recipe said to bake another 10 minutes, but I think I gave it closer to 5. And then it was done!

I liked that there was a bowl of apples on their table. It make it look more festive.

Luckily, it was really easy to serve. I had greased the pie plate, which helped, and the food stuck together better than I expected. Thanks, cheese! I served it with some potato salad and that was that.

Verdict: Yes, it was reminiscent of a cheeseburger. The ketchup and mustard were both there, but subdued. I’m not a mustard fan, so I appreciated this. I noticed the cheese less from the flavor and more from the texture, which was actually pretty creamy. It was a heavy meal, so one piece was pretty much okay for one person, but it was pleasing enough that some went back for more. The leftovers were just as good, I thought.

Definitely a fun, easy meal. Easily modified for different holidays (or no holiday at all, I suppose, but where’s the fun in that?). Maybe a new family favorite!