Some nights after a long day, I really appreciate having an easy go to recipe in my “recipe box”. This one has a couple of variations that I have made, different meats added, but the end result usually is the same… Happy and full tummies. :)
Recently school started again and my son is back at school, no more online this year. I think he is enjoying seeing his friends again in person. Even having to wear a mask has become second nature (no complaints from him) because seeing friends and even experiencing the classroom again with the teacher in person is something he has enjoyed – whether he would admit it or not… :) I can tell it’s going well from our nightly discussion on how his day went. This year he is a senior and I have begun to extra appreciate those discussions and will miss them when he graduates.
Anyway, with him back in school and my husband and me back in the office, we are all still adjusting to new routines. For ease, both my husband and son are happiest packing a sandwich for lunch and not dealing with the limited microwave availability. That usually just leaves me consuming up the leftovers so I have started to adjust my weekly meal planning to reflect that, with less big meals and less leftovers. This week though, I mistakenly had two big recipes planned for the week and by the time Wednesday came, I knew if I did the planned new recipe for the week, we would end up with a ton of leftovers that would not get eaten.
So what did I do? I create something new. It’s definitely not fancy or a brand new idea and is a spinoff of my tuna noodle casserole. The real differences are for my tuna casserole I use two boxes of mac and cheese and different spices added. But fancy or not, it was still very good, and VERY easy. Yay!
As always, if you try it, I hope you enjoy it. If you add your own spin to it, I’d love to hear about it!
Cheesy Turkey Mac
1 pound lean ground turkey (or ground beef if you prefer)
1 box of Mac & Cheese (I prefer to use Kraft)
½ cup of milk
2 tablespoons of butter
10.75 ounce can of cream of mushroom soup
½ teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste
Directions:
In a large skillet, brown and break up the ground turkey with the onion powder sprinkled on top until the meat is no longer pink and grease is cooked down. Drain grease if necessary (not usually required if using lean ground turkey or beef). While the meat is browning
in the skillet, cook the mac and cheese noodles in separate pan and drain.
Add the cooked noodles to the ground turkey, along with the cheese packet, milk, butter, and mushroom soup. Add the crushed red pepper as well if you like a little kick! Warm through on a medium/low burner until it is heated all the way through (about 5-10 minutes), stirring occasionally. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Enjoy!
