Your Family's Favorite Recipie?

I work out of the house full time and don't have time for dinner. My super quick and easy recipe, but not healthy! is chili mac and the whole family loves it. Make 2 boxes of mac and cheese as directed, dump in 2 cans of chili and heat up. I serve with buscuits and green beans. We have this every couple of weeks when I'm pinched for time. Good luck.

Hi H., I feel like I make the same meals all the time as well. I recently tried something different. I make a list of meals for 2 weeks. I tell my husband the list is on the fridge and if he doesn't like something tell me and I can change it. It seems to be working for me so far. If you need new recipe ideas go to www.allrecipes.com. That is where I get some of my lunch and dinner ideas. Hope this helps!

Have you considered doing a theme night each week (or maybe Mon-Fri?) such as Mondays - Chicken, Tuesday - Ground Beef, Wed - Pork, Thurs - Fish, Fri - Chicken, Sat - Leftovers, Sun - Eat out.

That way you can plan a week ahead of time and have your husband and kids give you ideas for what they want.

For the chicken days, you could cook a whole chicken in the crockpot then serve it with mashed potatoes and a veggie. Or you could shred it and make dumplings and add carrots and chicken stock. Or add taco seasoning to the shredded chicken and serve with lettuce, tomatos and tortillas. You could make chicken spaghetti (same as regular but with beef), grilled chicken (marinated in Italian dressing and Soy Sauce) with grilled veggies, Chicken sandwiches (boneless/skinless or frozen breaded patties), Cream Cheese Chicken (chicken, cream of chix soup, cream cheese - put in crockpot on low).

For beef recipes, you could do spaghetti, sheppards pie, meatloaf, tacos, sloppy joes, salisbury steaks.

Fish - fried, popcorn, fresh, etc. This could include lobster and shrimp is your husbad likes these.

Another idea would be "Other" night where you make something that you have in your fridge or pantry. This could be leftover brats you had from a BBQ, hotdogs and mac and cheese, etc. Kielbasa sausage with bell peppers. Pork chops, applesauce and noodles.

Maybe ask your husband to choose a meal once per week and decide what he wants to eat. Then ask your kids what they want once a week. Even if it's mac and cheese or cereal, who cares? They are getting a say so!

I would designate at least 1 dinner per week to leftovers (if you have any) in order to avoid throwing food out. If hubby doesn't like leftovers, tell him to make something on his own!

Save one night a week for eating out - whether it be just you and hubby, the entire family, a drive through or maybe just tacos from Taco Bell on the way home and you can make beans/rice to go with it.

I guess I didn't really answer your question...but figured I'd give you that suggestion! I don't follow it becuase I have a hard time planning out specificlaly what i'm going to be 'hungry for' in advance. But then again my husband is not home at night so it's just the kids and I and I usually eat something easy - a sandwich, leftovers, etc. to save time!

We always buy what's on sale for $1 a lb or less (chicken, turkey, sometimes ham, pork loin) and when there's BOGO (often sausage). When we cook a chicken, we do two at a time, then eat on it until it's gone. We eat a lot of tacos and nachos. Last week I cooked an 8 lb pork loin in the crock pot with veggies. After we ate one or two meals like that, we ran out of carrot, so the rest of the meat we're re-heating in a pan with salsa and making tacos.

But you asked for our favorite recipe. This one is EASY and my 23 month old likes it. My husband said it's his FAVORITE:
SAUSAGE/RICE/&BEANS:
In a pot, make three cups of rice (1 1/2 cups rice with 3 cups water and a little salt and butter). While that cooks (it'll take 20 minutes),
Dice into bite size, and then sautee 1 pound any kind of sausage you like with 1/2 an onion and jalepenos. Sausage is already cooked, so just cook it all until the onion is done. We generally add a little bit of water (1/4 cup or so?) and put the lid on to cook the onion. Often, I cook my son's separate, as my husband likes a lot of jalepeno. When it looks almost done, add two cans of whole black beans. Viola! You're done with dinner. We put some rice in our bowls and then put spoonfuls of the sausage/bean mix on top. Add Tabasco for extra spice and flavor. My son (23 months) eats every bite of sausage and a few of the beans/rice

Note: the cans of beans have water in them too. We will sometimes use this water to cook the rice in. Sometimes, instead of adding 1/4 cup of water to the sausage/onion, we add some of the water from the bean cans. But it's nice to have a little bit of the bean juice when you eat it so that the rice gets some extra flavor.

good luck!

Oh and our 2nd favorite recipe is FRIED FISH. If you every fry fish, try battering it in POTATO FLAKES instead of flour. CRUNCHY delicious fish!

Turkey Meatloaf.
1lb Lean Ground Turkey
1/2 cup or a little more of bread crumbs
1 egg
1 tspn Dried Parsley Flakes
1/2 tspn Garlic Powder
1/2 tspn Paprika
1/2 tspn Onion Powder
any other seasoning you may like
Bake in meatloaf dish for 45-1 hour at about 400 ovens vary.
20 minutes before done spread top with bbq sauce for a glaze.

ours is Tater Tot Casserrole:
1 1/2 lb. ground turkey or hamburger
1 bag of frozen vegetables ( I get corn,greenbeans, and carrots)
1 family size cream of mushroom
1 large bag of tatertots

Cook the meat and put in a casserrole dish
add enough frozen vegetables to mix evenly
add cream of mushroom soup in
Mix all of these well
Nicely place tatertots in rows until the top is covered.
Cover with tin foil and bake at 350 for 1 hour.
Take off tinfoil and bake for 15 more minutes.

Healthy Enchiladas and very tasty:

1 large can mild green chile enchilada sauce

1 can mild green chiles

1 can fat free refried beans

12 burrito size tortillas (or 18-20 handmade tortillas)

1/2 medium size white onion-diced

2 cloves garlic-diced

1 lb cooked meat-ground beef, ground turkey, slow cooked roast, or other tender pre-cooked meat (The night you guys ate here I used ground turkey)

1 lb diced cheddar or cheddar mozarella mix-grated

6 oz. fat free cream cheese

Optional-
shredded lettuce,diced tomato, salsa,& sour cream as topping

Cook meat, add onion, garlic, & green chiles. Cook for 3 - 4 minutes on medium heat.
Add refried beans, half of the enchilada sauce (save the other half) & cream cheese. Stir until well mixed. The mixture will be thick. Remove from heat & let sit for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally to cool slightly.

Microwave tortillas one at a time for about 15 seconds each.
Put 1/4 cup mixture in the middle of tortilla in a vertical rectangle.
Fold right & left side towards center.
Roll bottom up.

Place enchiladas in a greased baking pan, being sure they touch slightly.
Mix leftover filling with other half of enchilada sauce. Pour over pan of enchiladas.
Sprinkle with cheese.
Bake at 350* for 25-30 minutes. Until pan is bubbly & cheese is barely starting to brown.

Top with shredded lettuce, tomatoes, salsa, or sour cream.

That would be a toss up between pizza casserole and potato hamburger casserole.

Pizza casserole: make half the amount of spaghetti as you normally do. Cook normally,them mix it together, put in the bottom of a casserole dish. Spread mozzarella cheese and whatever else you like on pizza. Do at least two layers. Bake in 350 degree oven until cheese is melted.
Potato hamburger casserole: cook and rinse hamburger in hot water to remove excess fat. Mix in one can of tomato soup,green beans and I do onions also.Put that in the bottom of a casserole dish,top with mashed potatoes, and whatever kind of cheese your family likes. I use mozzarella since we get migraines from cheddar. Bake in 350 degree oven until heated through or cheese is melted.

Good luck.

C.

Dear H.,
I have always felt that coming up with ideas is far harder than the actual cooking.
Thankfully, no one in my family has a picky bone in their bodies or they would have starved to death. I make what I make and they eat it.
I won't share any recipes right now because it might not do any good depending on the extent of your husband's pickiness.
He won't eat garlic, onions, spinach, eggplant, spices? I'm not sure what picky means.
I get recipes from Pillsbury.com that are pretty cool. There's about a million things you can make out of bisuits!
allrecipes.com is another good source.
Just surf around and find things you think your family will like. Slip in a new thing once a week. How will you know they don't like it if you don't try it?

Have fun!

Dried Beef Casserole

1/4 lb dried beef cut into thin strips
1 can of cream of mushroom soup
About 1 1/2 C shredded cheese (either cheddar or colby jack)
1/4 C milk
Little bit of butter and flour
Egg noodles

After slicing the dried beef, mix in a tiny bit of flour. Saute it in butter until it crisps, just a little bit. (Maybe 2-3 minutes)
Boil your pasta and drain. Add all ingredients together and either warm it all up on the stove, or, put in a 9x13 casserole dish and bakeat 350 until hot. My kids like crumbled popato chips on top too.
EVERYONE loves this recipe! Very fast and easy!

we like chicken and rice....boil a whole chicken and de-bone. mix with the chiken a bag of shredded chedar cheese, a melted stick of butter, a med size tub of sour cream, and a large can of cream of chiken soup. Bake till bubbly then top with crushed ritz crackers and return to oven to brown. I make rice on the side and mix it together on the plate... some people add the rice to the casserole dish with all other ingredients but it doesn't come out quite the same to me.

my kids also enjoy when we make pizza...i get the crust already made from the store. I buy pizza sauce in a squeeze bottle and add motzarella cheese, ham, and pineapple (you add what your family likes) but this is a easy, fast, kid friendly meal, and the kids LOVE to help me add the toppings to the pizza!

Breakfast for dinner- it shakes things up a bit, and the kids LOVE it! We usually do scrambled eggs with some cheese, bacon and/or sausage, fruit and pancakes or waffles. We haven't worked the kids up to any veggies in the eggs yet, but we're working on it!

Good luck!

Its called goowie chcken. My kids love it. You need a whole cut up boned chicken or whatever pieces everyone likes. Like i use legs and tighs and breasts only. Put in plastic bag with bisquick has to be bisquick or doesn't come out right I have tried other things to coat and it didn't work. Put in electric frie pan for abo 20 mins to half hr on both sides cook half way. Cook withbout 2 sticks of margerine. ( Butter) than stick in a deep pan. cover with tin foil put in oven at 400 for about an hr. It should fall right off the bone. The kids love the stickiness and my son loves the goow!.

My family went on a food plan last year and we are really enjoying it. The plan and recipes use produce that is in season and it has saved us a lot in grocery bills. We got the plan from www.animalvegatblemiracle.com The site is based on a book where the author and her family became locovores for a year. While we will probably not be making our own cheese, killing our own chickens or giving up our imported bananas anytime soon, we are loving the healthy recipes, and they are easy and kid-friendly. I have modified them to suit our family, I hope you enjoy it as much as we are!

The rule needs to be the cook chooses and those who don't cook eat whatever he/she makes and appreciates the efforts of other. Too much choice without learning that too much complaining makes the household very unhappy. Under 5's need to eat what helps them to grow healthily.

Our faves from kraftfoods.com are easy to make and delish! Pizza pasta, farmhouse chicken dinner, ritz paemesean chicken, sothwestern cavatappi

I have some really yummy recipes that are always a hit but I'm not sure if they would be a fit for your family. What will your husband eat?

My best piece of advice is make pizza out of your leftovers! Our favorites are BBQ (whatever meat you have leftover, shredded with BBQ sauce, co-jack cheese and onions and green peppers if you want) and sloppy joe (Leftover sloppy joes and cheddar) If you put it on a crust and under cheese and call it pizza they'll eat it!

Here is my fast, easy, and tastey meal that my family loves. We call it Spagetti Pie

1 lb ground beef
8 oz pkg spaghetti noodles, cooked and drained
2 eggs, beaten
1 c. cottage cheese
1/2 c. chopped onion
1 jar (15 oz) spaghetti sauce
1/3 c. grated parmesan cheese
2 tbsp melted butter
1/2 c. mozzarella cheese

Brown beef and onion. Drain fat. Add jar of spaghetti sauce. Mix well and simmer.
Combine hot spaghetti noodles, parmesan cheese, eggs, and butter in large bowl. Mix well.
Place noodles mixture in bottom of 9 X 13 dish. Spread cottage cheese over noodles. Pour sauce over cottage cheese and sprinkle mozzarella cheese over top. Cover and bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.