Easy Dinner - Cheeseburger Pasta

This weekend was a bit of a spring cleaning weekend for us. We switched out our winter clothes for summer ones (huzzah!), did some yard work, ALL of the laundry and some other cleaning as well.

That left me one tired girl and not in the mood for cooking. Luckily, I had already planned on making this quick and easy Cheeseburger Pasta from Campbell's.

1 pound ground beef
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) Campbell's® Condensed Cheddar Cheese Soup
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) Campbell's® Condensed Tomato Soup  (Regular or Healthy Request®)
1 1/2 cups water
2 cups uncooked medium shell-shaped pasta

• Cook the beef in a 10-inch skillet over medium-high heat until well browned, stirring often to separate meat. Pour off any fat.
• Stir the soups, water and pasta in the skillet and heat to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium. Cook for 10 minutes or until the pasta is tender, stirring often.

EASY!!! I loved that i didn't have to pre-cook the pasta. But it was a little bland - I thought we had onion and garlic,but we didn't. So I'd definitely recommend adding some spices, etc.  It also reheats well, and the pasta didn't get too soft or soggy. We served it with corn, and the corn was delicious mixed in with it.

Spiced WINNER!!!

the winner is....

#18

Carolina Girl Mommy!!!!!

Congratulations!!!

I'll be e-mailing you shortly. You have 48 hours to reply, or i'll pick a new winner.

Thank you to all who entered! Stay tuned because I'll have a new giveaway up in a few days!!

Cinnamon Chocolate Chip Muffins

On the rare occasion when my boss is out of town on a Friday, the rest of the staff brings in breakfast, andwe have a relaxing "weekly meeting"! Last Friday, we had quiche, bagels, french toast, fruit, OJ, virgin bloody mary's, and I brought in cinnamon choclate chip muffins! Delicious!!!

Here is the recipe, and its modifications by me:

Cinnamon Chocolate Chip Muffins

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon (I used a whole t.)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large egg , beaten
3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract (I was still out of vanilla, so I used maple!)
1 cup semisweet chocolate chip (I added more as usual!!)

1. Preheat oven to 400°F (205°C).
2. Mix together the flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture.
3. In a smaller bowl, whisk together the egg, milk, vegetable oil and vanilla.
4. Pour the liquid mixture into the well of the dry mixture.
5. Mix until just moistened, then fold in the chocolate chips.
6. Spoon into greased muffin cups and bake for 20 minutes.

http://www.cooksrecipes.com/bread/cinnamon_chocolate_chip_muffins_recipe.html

Free Disney Song of the Day 5/10

Walt Disney Records on Facebook has a new promotion called "50 Days of Disney Music."  Today's song is Now or Never from High School Musical 3. I am actually a little ashamed to say that I have never seen number 3! Yes, I like number one and the cheese that is number 2 is awesome, but I just have never caught number 3 on TV... Jeff just can't handle THAT much HSM. Even though it has fond memories for me of watching the debut of number 2 in CA while he was watching in NY, when we were dating long distance... he still can only handle so much! LOL Oh well.

Ohhh... as I was typing this, I was also going through my old e-mails, and I saw that last week Luscious Deals posted the video to NSYNC's I Drive Myself Crazy. Excuse me... I know what I'll be doing for the next few minutes!!

No Menu Plan today!

I hope all of the moms out there had a good Mother's Day!!!

Jeff is working night school and a concert for most of the days this week so no menu plan. Its going to be so chilly this week !!! that I might just make a casserole one day so he can reheat it.

And with no trips planned for awhile, hopefully we can get back into our routine again. It will be nice to not have a mountain of laundry or microwae meals so often!

New Winner Chosen!

The winner of the amazon.com/amazon.ca gift card never replied to my e-mail. So I have chosen a new winner:

#234... MARIE!!!!!

Congrats! I am e-mailing you right now.

Little Yaya's and Blessed Giveaways

Just wanted to alert you guys to some of the many giveaways that Little Yaya's has going on right now. I was lucky enough to win her Blogmania giveaway - a $25 gc to ABC Ties (= new tie for Jeff!) and also a 3D bear cake pan from Wilton. (Using it will be a challenge, but I can't wait to try).

Here are the recent ones I have entered - try your luck too!!

Win a bag from High Sierra

Win Pirate Brand snacks

Win a Skoy cleaning cloth

Win a $10 gift card to Cold Stone Creamery

Win Snikiddy snacks!

Win a $100 gift certificate to ATG Stores
See all they have available here

Win a Clipa Instant bag hanger

Those are the ones I entered... but she has more! :)

Quick and Easy Candy

A few nights ago, I felt like making something... except it was 7 p.m.,and I didn't want to get into a big whole baking production.So I searched for "No bake cookie" recipes and  found a lot with oats - which I didn't have. I did find a few that were more like candy, but I didn't have all of the ingredients - so I just made my own, based on what I had and what i wanted to use up lol

No matter what - it was easy and yummy. I took leftover butterscotch chips and leftover chunky peanut butter and melted them slowly in the microwave (30 seconds at 70%, with plenty of stirring). Then I stirred in some frosted flakes and dropped them by chunks on a waxed paper lined cookie sheet. Try to make them thin. Refrigerate until solid... then eat!!

The Cheesecake Experiment!!

For avery, very long time, I have wanted a springform pan so I could make cheesecake. Finally I found a special deal on Amazon for a panset that included aspringform pan. I made a cheesecake almost right way!

(Ingredients minus the eggs!)

But which one to make? For arecipie, I turned to my newest favorite baking blog, Brown Eyed Baker

and decided to make the first one she ever made: Oreo! With a twist... I was out of  vamilla!!! So I used peppermint extract instead.

Since this recipie is fro a 9 inch pan,and I have a10 inch, I used a few more cookies for the crust - and no butter. I also used "Lite" cream cheese, which might have been a mistake? It was very, very easy to make though!

In hindsight, maybe I should have used less cookies in the batter too? I'm not quite sure. Looked good on the way in! I baked it for one hour. Mabe that was a mistake too? LOL

Lookin GOOD!! And it was good but... it was kinda chewy. not really light and fluffy. Any ideas why? It was still good but not as good as it could have been lol!!

Here's the recipe, but please go to Brown Eyed Baker and check out all of her other delish recipes!

OREO Cheesecake

(originally posted on The Nest) 

1 cup crushed OREO cookies (about 12 cookies)
1 Tbsp. butter or margarine, melted
4 pkgs (8-oz. each) cream cheese, softened
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
4 eggs
20 OREO cookies, quartered
**NOTE: Regular OREO cookies are recommended, as cake does not set as well with Double Stuff
1. PREHEAT oven to 325 degrees if using silver springform pan (or 300 degrees if using a dark non-stick springform pan). Mix crushed cookies and butter; press onto bottom of 9-inch springform pan. Bake 10 minutes.
2. BEAT cream cheese, sugar and vanilla with electric mixer on medium speed until well blended. Add eggs, 1 at a time, mixing on low speed after each addition just until blended. Gently stir in quartered cookies. Pour over crust.
3. BAKE 1 hour or until center is almost set. Run knife or metal spatula around rim of pan to loosen cake; cool before removing rim of pan. Refrigerate 4 hours or overnight. Garnish with additional cookies, if desired.
Source: Nestie Lalabee0425

 

I'm Back and we have a winner!

I am back from California and Disneyland... and want to go back. The good news is that J is starting to see my side of it. The bad news is the economy isn't going to make it easy. We will see what the future holds.

Thank you all once again for the great response to BLOGMANIA. There is a lot more fun and giveaways to come in my blog so stick around!

Onto the Winners!

The winner of the Amazon gift card is:
THE WINNER NEVER RESPONDED.  Please see new post for the winner.

The winner of the Starbucks  gift card is:

Cathy M!

I willbe e-mailing you both in afew mintues. You have 48 hours to respnd or else anew winner will be chosen.


Also, don't forget to enter my giveawty of Spiced! Spiced-book-review-and-giveaway