Easy & cheesy phillies

The last couple days of my staycation I have been SO lucky- Curt has been a cooking machine! Which naturally I"m ok with, but he was getting annoyed I kept asking "what do you want me to do?"  "how can I help".....hard for me to leave the kitchen alone & relax.

Neither of us are gourmet cooks, for sure...and we like easy. Like our easy cheesy Philly cheesesteak sandwiches Curt whipped up last night- 4 ingredients!! mmm.  I'm in no way claiming these are a copycat of the famous sandwich or anywhere near as juicy & perfect as those in Philly, but for a quick dinner at home- good stuff.

Easy Cheesy Philly

Ingredients-
-Steakums (those beef slices in the frozen food section)
-Bird's eye pepper stir fry (frozen veggie mix of red, yellow, & green peppers & onions)
-Borden singles sensation 3 cheese Italiano cheese slices
-Rotella's Italian hoagies

Directions-
-cook up the steakums- Curt did in a frying pan on the stove- about 1 minute each side
-cook up the pepper/onions- we did stove top, you could easily thaw & cook in the microwave
-toast the hoagie bun
-layer on the steakums, peppers & onions, and place cheese on top
-place back in toaster oven/oven/broiler until cheese melts

--ENJOY!!!

easy to make & work with...and tastes pretty darn good too! the picture doesn't do it justice!

also- the fries...yummmm.  Trader Joe's handsome cut potato fries- baked them & sprinkled with salt & pepper.

TGIF people!!!

Pre-Valentine's Day Valentine's Dinner

I LOVE YOU ALL! First and foremost, and thank you for loving ME enough to click on this link & read my attempts at cooking or just read me rambling on about nothing or look at my photography skills (or just scan over my sarcasm too, that works).

Since my man & I are having a mini staycation/5-day weekend home, I decided to surprise him with dinner last Thursday, since I was off & he wasn't.  I hit up the dollar store & bought cheesy decor. Drove down to the airport & shoved a balloon bouquet in his car and a little present- a card saying "I love you" and a fork wrapped up saying "you'll need this later" (hey, I'm a pharmacy student for a reason!).  At home, I decorated the apartment door, and then strung up a banner inside of the door.  I got pictures printed off at Walmart of him & Jethro & I and trimmed them into heart shapes.  I then taped them to streamers & taped the streamers onto my fan to hang down as decoration.  Covered the table, made a heart bouquet, and bought cheap plastic heart plates & bowls. 

AND there was food, of course! I tried to cook a nice & easy meal (as presented below), and then lit candles, dimmed the lights, set the table, dressed up, and greeted him with a kiss!  And he even ate my cooking! so that was the most successful part of the night, lol.

Here's my little made-up recipe for pasta I threw together-simple but yummy.

Ingredients:
-1 package of Buitoni ravioli (or whichever noodle variety you are feeling like consuming)
-1 jar of traditional Prego sauce
-1 jar of 4-cheese alfredo sauce (I use Classico brand)
-dash of olive oil
-1 bag of frozen peas
-1 green pepper
-1 yellow onion/Vidalia onion
-shredded 6-cheese blend (or Italian blend, or parmesan, or mozzarella...white shredded cheese)
-any spices you may like

Directions:
-Boil ravioli/pasta, drain
-Chop up green pepper & onion into larger chunks
-Throw pepper, onion, and 1/3 bag of peas (or however many you like) and dash of olive oil into pan on the stovetop, saute a minute or two, then add in the full jar of Prego and 1/2-2/3 jar of alfredo sauce

-simmer sauce until heated thoroughly, add in 1 cup of shredded cheese & stir until melted into sauce

-pour sauce into noodles & mix well

-serve that pasta up & indulge! I put some on plates, and garnished with some more cheese because if you know me, you KNOW I love lots of cheese :)

awesome heart plate, right?

Tried to be all romantic and bought a tube of Pillsbury garlic breadsticks then shaped them into hearts & baked- yes, went all out cooking with the home-made stuff, right?  But I gotta say, they tasted pretty good too!!!!

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! I'll update ASAP with the recipe I tried for dessert...so good! gotta keep you in suspense! <3  <3   <3 

Hey! don't lick that!

Today I attempted a new recipe that I conjured up based on a few other recipes that sounded good....one loosely based from pinterest (yes, I'm addicted)...luckily for me it was edible and pretty darn good!

Bacon & beer cheese macaroni

(it's hard to match that Kraft mac 'n cheese goodness, so this is different enough to be accepted as "good")

Ingredients:
1 box macaroni noodles
-6-8 strips of bacon
-2 tbsp butter
-2 tbsp flour (all-purpose)
-1 cup milk
-1 cup beer (lite would be best- I kept it classy and used Keystone lite)
-about 1 cup of shredded sharp cheddar cheese
-about 1 cup shredded cojack cheese
-seasonings- pepper, salt, garlic powder, red chili flakes, etc (whatever you like)
-Frenches cheddar fried onions

Directions:

-cook the macaroni noodles (obviously, right?) & drain
-cook the bacon- I do it in the microwave so it gets nice and crispy (although Curt finds it weird?)
-preheat the oven to 350 degrees

-in a large pan, melt the butter, and stir in the flour, milk, and beer on medium heat
            -gradually add the cheese- one handful at a time-and stir until smooth-until all cheese is incorporated
-add in seasoning- I added pepper & onion salt because it is all I had ready!

pour the cheese mixture into the noodles & crumble the bacon into the pot

mix it all up good & pour into a greased 13x9 pan
Bake the macaroni for about 15-20 minutes
----crumble the cheddar onions on top of the macaroni and bake for a couple more minutes

enjoy!

I naturally ate it with some nice garlic toast....love my carbs!  This isn't the healthiest meal, but for an occasional splurge, it's a nice meal!
(ps the "lick that" in the title was not in regards to me licking my fingers while cooking or plate clean after eating....it was just the puppy being nosy!)

Truthful Tuesday

2/5ths through the work week! Or if you're a slacker like me...yours hasn't started ;)
Now I have to be honest, the last two recipes....came from pinterest.  I wasn't cool or inventive or experienced enough to just whip those babies up.  The next recipe- mostly mine, & mostly accidental because I messed up the recipe I was supposed to be making.

So, here we are:
Chicken Enchiladas! (Curt claims they're his fave)

Ingredients:
-1 can chicken breast (you can grill/cook up your own chicken, I like to cheat!)
-1 can cream of chicken soup
-1 (8 oz) sour cream (I use light)
-1 jar picante sauce (or salsa)
-2 c shredded cheese (I use monterey jack or the like)
-8-10 tortilla shells

Directions:
-Preheat oven to 350-375 degrees
-Mix chicken, soup, sour cream, about 1 cup of salsa/picante sauce, and 1 cup of cheese
-grease a 13x9 pan, add a little salsa to the bottom
-spread a little chicken mix on one end of a tortilla shell & roll the tortilla
-place seam side down in pan
-top with remaining salsa (or remaining chicken mixture if you end up with extra OR if you use all the salsa in the tortillas themselves)
-top with cheese
-bake 30-35 minutes

Note: the one thing with this recipe, since I threw stuff together and make it all the time, I don't have a real actual recipe-so I think I cook the enchiladas at 350 one time, then 375 the next...it should really matter-use your judgement.  And there are times I add more cheese or not the whole container of sour cream, etc.  I have faith if I can manage to make these, you can too!!!!!