One Pot Enchilada Pasta

This was my favorite dish from The Week of Trying One Pot Meals. I could have eaten the entire pot. By myself. Enjoy!

2 tbl. olive oil

2 cloves minced garlic

1/2 small onion, diced

1 1/4 lb ground beef

1 taco seasoning packet

2 c chicken broth

1 19 oz. can red enchilada sauce

2 1/2 c dry rotini pasta

2 c shredded cheese

green onions, diced

sliced black olives

In a deep skillet or a pasta pot, warm olive oil and saute the onion & garlic. Add in the beef and cook until brown. Drain, then stir in the taco seasoning. Add pasta, broth, and enchilada sauce into the pot. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer with the lid on for 15 minutes. Remove lid and let cook for about 5 more minutes. Take off the heat and stir in 1 c cheese. Add the rest of the cheese to the top and cover to melt. Garnish with green onions & olives. 

One Pot Cheesy Sausage Pasta

I'll be posting a few one pot recipes that we tried last week. Both were big hits. This was my husband's favorite, probably due to Husband's love of sausage. The leftovers are so much better, as the best recipes usually are. I should mention that I used turkey sausage and Husband did not even realize it. So sneaky bonus points for that.

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1 tbl olive oil
1 lb Smoked Turkey Sausage, sliced
1 c diced onion
1 tbl minced garlic (about two fresh cloves)
2 c chicken broth
1 (10 oz) can diced tomatoes
1/2 c milk or heavy cream (I used whole milk)
8 oz dry pasta (any small pasta will do)
1/2 tea salt and pepper, each
1 c shredded cheese
1/3 cup chopped green onions, for garnish

Heat up the olive oil in a pot, toss in sausage and onions, cook to light brown. Add the garlic for about 30 seconds until aromatic. Add the broth, tomatoes, milk, pasta & salt and pepper. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat to simmer for about 15 minutes, until pasta is tender. 

Turn off the heat and stir in half the cheese until combined. Sprinkle the rest of the cheese on top and cover to melt. Top with green onions & Serve. Come to think of it, this would be awesome with some sliced black olives. Black olives for everything! 

Cranberry Orange Bran Muffins

I don't think I can overstate just how many of these muffins I consumed upon plucking them out of the oven. They are delicious (and while wheat bran may have little nutritional value at all, who's to say) and healthy.

I nervously make a bunch of tweaks to this recipe. I wasn't PLANNING on making a bran muffin. I just ran out of flour and had to substitute. I also doubled the recipe. BECAUSE WHO WANTS ONLY 8 MUFFINS?! Crazy people who don't know to freeze their sweet delicious muffins. This was also my first introduction to Craisins. Holy wow, how did I miss this?! They're amazing. I'll probably scarf them all by the end of the day. ALL THE CRANBERRIES FOR ME.

To the recipe!

1 c. flour
1 c. wheat bran
3 tbl. flaxseed meal (or a couple extra tbl of either flour or bran
1/4 c. sugar
2 1/2 tea baking powder
1/2 tea baking soda
1/4 tea salt
zest of a couple oranges (mine were small, but more is always better, right?
2 eggs
1/2 c. milk
1/2 c. orange juice*
4 tbl. melted butter
2/3 c. dried (probably sweetened) cranberries

Mix the dry ingredients (not the cranberries, though) in a bowl. Add the orange zest. In a separate bowl, add the eggs, milk, orange juice, & butter. Stir in the flour mixture, and spin with a mixer a bit. Fold in the cranberries and fill into muffin tins.

Bake at 425 for about 20 mins.

 *I squeezed as much as I could out of the oranges I'd zested (?) and added regular bottled orange juice to make up the difference

Pumpkin Pie Smoothie

1 c. Almond milk

1 spoon/serving of protein powder

1 banana

1 c. Pumpkin purée

1 tea. Vanilla

2 tea. Honey

1 tea. Pumpkin pie spice

Blend and chill. Or toss some ice cubes in while blending. Makes 1-2 servings.

Pumpkin Oatmeal Spice Muffins

Stop what you are doing right now and bake yourself up these muffins. For a couple reasons 1) they make the house smell AMAZING while in the oven. and 2) with all the sugar, these are almost cupcakes. But there's OATS. So "healthy." Basically, I used this recipe, but did not do the full streusel type topping. Because really, I had to draw the line SOMEWHERE on the sugar.

Dry bowl:
2 1/2 c. flour
1/2 c. rolled oats
1/4 c. flaxseed meal
4 t. pumpkin pie spice*
2 t. baking soda
1 t. baking powder
1 t. salt

Wet bowl:
1 1/2 c. pumpkin puree (or one 15 oz. can)
1 c. brown sugar
1 c. white sugar
2/3 c. coconut oil 
1/2 c. applesauce
3 eggs
1 t. vanilla extract

*I had to make my own using 2 tbl  cinnamon, 1 tbl ginger, 1/2 tbl allspice, 1/2 tbl cloves, 1/2 tbl nutmeg. 

Preheat oven to 350. Mix the wet & dry ingredients separately, then combine. Pour into muffin tins (about 18 muffins) and I sprinkled some of the rolled oats on top (you know, for reasons) bake for 30-35 mins. (my oven runs cool, so the full 35 mins was about right) 

Pinky & The Brain Smoothie

Before you start rolling your eyes, this has nothing to do with pink everything breast cancer awareness. We are already quite aware of it.

This recipe (one of the only ones I made up on my very own!) was inspired by the opening of a Jamba Juice near our house. JJ was a big part of my teenage/college experience, we got smoothies ALL. THE. TIME. Jamba has changed quite a bit since those days. They have kids' meals! (and sandwiches!) The kids meal comes with cheesy whole grain pretzels; It's amazing. The kids picked a smoothie with a beet component, and I really wanted to duplicate it, but only with what I had on hand. 

My kids are WILD about steamed beets. But the stem/stalk (the red part, before the leaf) is edible too! Instead of tossing them in the trash I threw them into the blender and it turned out nicely. I am SO PROUD, y'all. Stuff I would have thrown out- useable once more! Not to mention the vitamins! The brain food that magical beets posses. (notice the excellent first grade math skills in the background?) 

1 c. Pomegranate juice

1 banana

1 large gala apple, sliced

1/4 c. grapefruit juice

1 handful beet stalks

1 c. frozen strawberry/mango/pineapple blend

French Apple Pie

I was looking for my apple pie recipe and made the grave realization that I had not put it on the blog yet. This makes baking with my phone on the counter impossible. So I went and dug out the paper copy. I also forgot to buy apples at the store! So no picture yet. Anyway, this is a recipe I found on the back of a pastry box. I tried it on a whim, and not only is it fool-proof (I am a kitchen fool, you realize) but it is delicious and elicits many compliments. The peeling, coring, & slicing of the apples is the hard part- maybe get someone else to do that part.

1 ready to bake pie crust (rolled up in the refrigerated section of the grocery store)
1/2 c sugar
1/4 c cornstarch
1/2 tea nutmeg
1/4 tea cinnamon
1/4 tea salt
6 c cored, peeled, thinly sliced tart baking apples (I like granny smith, about 4-5 medium sized)
1 c flour
1/2 c brown sugar
1/2 c butter

Prepare the crust according to instructions in a 9 in pie dish. Preheat the oven to 350.

Mix sugar, starch, nutmeg, cinnamon, & salt. Stir in sliced apples. Spoon apple slices into pie place. To make the crumb topping, mix together flour and brown sugar. Blend in butter until crumbly. Sprinkle atop the pie. Bake pie on a sheet pan for 1 hr 30 mins.