Taco Spaghetti

Taco spaghetti doesn't sound good at all, but SURPRISE! It's delicious!

5 oz. dried spaghetti, broken

1 lb. ground beef 

1 large onion, chopped

3/4 cup water

2 tbsp. taco seasoning mix

11 oz. can whole kernel corn with peppers, drained

1 cup sliced pitted black olives, drained

1 cup cheddar, shredded

1/2 cup salsa

lettuce (optional topping)

Cook pasta al dente. Drain. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large pan, cook beef and onion until meat is brown. Drain fat. Stir in water and taco seasoning. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer uncovered for 2 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in cooked pasta, corn, olives, half of the cheese, and salsa.

Pour into lightly greased casserole dish. Cover with aluminum foil and bake at 350 degrees for 15 to 20 minutes until heated through. Sprinkle with remaining cheese and bake until melted.

M&M Cookie Bars

The other day I had the urge to bake so I decided to whip up these m&m cookie bars. I am so glad I did, well maybe my mind is but my body isn't because I could not stop eating them. They even stayed soft and chewy for a few days unlike when I make regular cookies. 

12 TBSPs butter (1 1/2 sticks), melted and cooled slightly

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

1 large egg

1 large egg yolk

2 tsps vanilla extract

2 1/8 cups flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 12oz bag mini M&M's, divided

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Line a 9x13 inch pan with foil, make sure the foil goes up the sides of the pan too.   Mix the butter, sugar, and brown sugar together. Stir in the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla. Fold the flour, salt, and baking soda in until just combined. Stir in 1 cup of m&m's.

Pour batter into pan and smooth it out.  Place remaining m&m's on top and smoosh into batter a little. 

Bake at 325 degrees for 25-28 minutes. 

Penne Rosa

I have had this recipe on my Pinterest board for a long time. Now that I have made it I am kicking myself for not making it sooner. It was amazing! We've been to Noodles & Co restaurant before and have seen other people eating this and always say we're getting that next time because it looks so good, but we can't ever remember what it's called when we return so we haven't actually ever tried the restaurant version. I hope my version is just as good if not better!

1 (1 lb) box penne pasta

1 lb boneless chicken breast

1 (8 ounce) box frozen chopped spinach (thawed and drained)

1 (14 1/2 ounce) can Italian-style diced tomatoes (drained)

2 (16 ounce) jars alfredo sauce 

1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce

Cook chicken and cut into small pieces.  Boil noodles in large pot.  

In a large saucepan mix Alfredo sauce, tomatoes, tomato sauce, and spinach. Simmer on low for 15-20 minutes.

Drain pasta and add to sauce mix. Also, mix in the chicken. Stir and serve immediately. 

SO GOOD! 

Greek Chicken Pita Folds

This recipe looked so yummy I couldn't wait to cook it up.

1 medium onion, sliced

1 clove garlic, minced

1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs, trimmed of fat

1½ teaspoons lemon pepper

½ teaspoon dried oregano

4 pita pocket breads

½ cup plain yogurt

In slow-cooker, combine onion, garlic, chicken, lemon pepper, and oregano. Place chicken in and spoon mixture over chicken. Cover and cook on low for 4–6 hours.  Heat pita bread as directed on package.  Remove chicken from slow-cooker and shred.  Stir yogurt into onion mixture in slow-cooker. Place chicken in pita and put yogurt mix over top. 

Simple Taco Casserole

This dish does not look very delicious but it sure was. Mike put some on a taco shell and it was good that way too.

2 pounds chicken breast or tenderloin

(I used ground beef instead of chicken because we had a lot of chicken this week)

1 16oz can refried beans

1 16oz can red beans

1 16oz can corn (drained)

2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1 cup salsa

1/2 package taco seasoning.

Cook your meat and set aside. Mix refried beans, red beans, corn, salsa, 1 cup of shredded cheese and taco seasoning in a pan. Heat until cheese is melted. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

Place your meat on bottom of baking dish and cover with the bean mixture. Sprinkle remaining cheese over top.  Bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes.  

One dish Chicken, Vegetable, Rice Bake

This dish was very easy to put together and was really good.

10 3/4 oz cream of mushroom soup 

1 cup water
6 oz seasoned, wild rice mix)
16 oz mixed veggies of your choice
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
6 boneless skinless chicken breast halves
paprika

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Mix soup, water, rice, seasoning mix, vegetables and half the cheese in baking dish. Top with chicken. Sprinkle with paprika. Cover and bake at 375 degrees for 1 hour.  Top with remaining cheese.

Creamy Italian Chicken Crock Pot Freezer Meal

Back for another freezer meal.  If you're not going to freeze it all you have to do is dump all the ingredients into the crock pot. If you are going to freeze it, just dump all ingredients into a freezer bag and freeze. On cooking day just thaw it out and pour it into crock pot. Super easy!

4-6 chicken breasts

8 ounces cream cheese

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 packet italian dressing powder mix

Dump all ingredients into crock pot and cook on low for 4-6 hours.

Cheesy Chicken Rolls

Wow! Where has the time gone?!  It seems like a few weeks ago I had so much time and now I barely have enough.  I do have several recipes to share in the next week and hope to be back to regular blogging starting Monday.

This recipe was quick to put together and was really delicious too!

1 (8 ounce) can refrigerated crescent roll dough

4 slices processed American cheese, cut in half

4 cups cooked, boneless chicken breast halves, shredded

(I used chicken tenderloins and didn't shred them and they worked perfectly)

1 (10.5 ounce) can condensed cream of chicken soup

1 cup milk

1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Unroll a triangle of crescent roll and place a half of cheese and chicken on large end. Roll it up and place in a baking dish. Repeat for all crescents. 

In a small bowl combine soup, milk and cheddar cheese. Pour oven chicken crescents. 

Bake at 375 for 12-15 minutes.

* I had to bake this for nearly 30 minutes to make sure the crescents were cooked completely. I read some comments on the original recipe and almost all of them suggested cooking the crescents and heating the milk, soup, cheese mix in a pot on the stove and then pouring it over top after crescents are cooked. That seems like a much better method and would make your cooking time only 12-15 minutes instead of the 25-30 that I did*

InstaFriday 8

Back again with my InstaFriday post hosted by Life Rearranged.  I missed last week because I only had one picture to share so decided to just skip it.

Baked Chimichangas from dinner last week. 

Fat sleepy cat. 

And Mason doing some drawing. Marley said he drew a candy cane lol 

Cheesy Pork Chops

These sounded good and even looked good, but the sour cream was too much for me. Mike on the other had ate like 4 of them so I guess he liked them.

boneless pork chops

10 tsp sour cream

seasoning salt

2 cups shredded cheese

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line the pan with your chops and sprinkle with seasoning salt or any other seasonings.  Spread sour cream on top of each pork chop.  Cover each chop with cheese. Bake at 350 for 20-35 minutes depending on thickness of your pork chops. (I always get thin sliced ones and they were done in 20)

Baked Chimichangas

A friend of mine posted a picture of these chimichangas the other afternoon. I don't think I've ever ate them before so I had to give them a try. They were so good!! 

8oz pkg. cream cheese

8oz. Pepperjack cheese, shredded (I used taco blend)

1 1/2 Tbsp. taco seasoning

1 lb. cooked chicken, shredded

8 flour tortillas 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Mix first four ingredients together in a bowl. 

Separate filling on to taco shells. Fold up and place seam side down on a cookie sheet. 

Bake at 350 for 15 minutes.  Flip chimis over and bake for an additional 15 minutes.