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Easy Meatloaf with Onion Soup Mix

January 11, 2022 by Lindsay 7 Comments

DELICIOUS, savory homemade meatloaf with Lipton onion soup mix! Simple ingredients and some time in the oven make this one of the most foolproof homemade meatloaf recipes out there. The almighty packet of onion soup gives us another winning recipe!

close up image of plate with meatloaf and mashed potatoes.

Ok, let's talk about shortcut ingredients.

Seasoning packets, canned cream-of-xx soups, bottled sauces for slow cooker meals? THEY ARE ALL AMAZING.

And yet, there's a little pocket of humanity that's all "I prefer to make my own, use natural ingredients, shit all over your shortcuts in the name of my clean-eating ego."

Well, no offense to those folks, but pre-made ingredients are AMAZING and can coax some really yummy flavors out of very regular foods.

Example: ranch dip seasoning sprinkled all over chicken before grilling. Definitely do that.

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Creamy Spaghetti with Mushrooms and Bacon

December 30, 2021 by Lindsay 9 Comments

A 10-ingredient pasta dinner that is done in about 30 minutes! This DELICIOUS creamy bacon pasta is so simple to make and has delicious seared mushrooms in a creamy bacon-laced tomato sauce. Delicious for a weeknight, weekend entertaining, or an easy holiday meal! I like this with an easy green salad and focaccia for dipping in extra sauce.

You know how bacon is good on, like, everything?

It's true. Adding even just a little salty, crispy bacon to spaghetti with mushrooms is juuuuust the little nudge into winter dinners we need to get us through the next few cold weeks (or months depending on where you live!)

I love this spaghetti, and I make it all the time. It's a really simple base of seared bacon bits (buy the thick cut kind if you can!), mushrooms browned in the bacon fat (hello), and a creamy tomato sauce that comes together really quickly. The sauce itself is done in just about the time it takes to boil water for pasta, giving us a 30-45 minutes to dinnertime situation.

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Smoked Turkey Breast

October 14, 2021 by Lindsay 9 Comments

Delicious, easy whole smoked turkey breast with just a few simple steps! This is a smoked turkey WITHOUT BRINE for no mess or extra planning. An overnight dry rub and a few hours in the smoker produce the most delicious, juicy turkey breast ever!

plate of sliced smoked turkey with rosemary garnish on navy blue napkin.

One thing about turkey: people either love it or "meh" it and really love sides. I fall on the "sides are preferable" side (lol) of things generally, unless the turkey is really freaking good.

And let me say this: smoked turkey is really freaking good.

(although, if you don't have a smoker, I have a roasted turkey breast and foolproof whole roast turkey that are also really, really good!)

I LOVE smoking turkeys for Thanksgiving or Christmas. The benefits are endless: the oven is free for side dishes to bake, and the low + slow way the smoker works means that the turkey stays super flavorful and juicy.

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Whole30 Beef Stew

September 27, 2021 by Lindsay 8 Comments

This easy beef stew is whole30 compliant, gluten free, and DELICIOUS. One of the most delicious beef recipes for dinner, make a big batch of this and serve it all week for a delicious meal prep dinner! If you AREN'T avoiding gluten, a batch of no-knead Dutch oven bread should be in the plans as well!

white bowl with beef stew, potatoes, and carrots in front of a yellow dutch oven.

OK, here's your plan for the next snow day, sick day, chilly day, comfort-needing day:

This beef stew works with all of those situations and then some, why don't we have more beef stew on Christmas Eve? For Halloween dinner right before or right after trick-or-treating? I adore it; the simplicity of the flavors with the "well, yeah, I simmered it for awhile" satisfaction that makes it feel slightly fancy but totally unpretentious.

The method is simple: sear a bunch of beef chunks until they're really crispy on the outside. Toss some veggies in those drippings, then everything goes back into the pot together with tomato paste, garlic, spices. Broth makes it soupy, then it simmers covered for a bit, then uncovered to finish the dish and thicken the sauce.

The potato here breaks down a bit to thicken the sauce (so we don't need flour), and the end result is just SO delicious. I adore super soft cooked veggies in dishes like this, soaked in the broth mixture and just YES. Someone please make this for me asap, I think I feel a sore throat coming on (not really just want food brought to me).

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Greek Chicken Thighs

September 16, 2021 by Lindsay 2 Comments

Delicious broiled chicken thighs with Greek chicken marinade! This version of honey lemon chicken has a quick and easy marinade and is done in under half an hour because the chicken is broiled quickly. Serve these on their own, in pita for chicken gyros, or as part of a Mediterranean charcuterie board!

crowded board with plate of chicken, lemon halves, tzatziki, pita, and lettuce leaves.

This has recently become one of my favorite ways to serve chicken, especially in the summer - Greek-style with tangy tzatziki sauce, broiled in the oven for a quick and easy weeknight dinner situation.

Greek flavors are some of my favorites, and I love a whole meal that is lemony, oregano-y, and honey-esque. Lemon, honey, olive oil, garlic, and oregano are cornerstone flavors of Greek food and can be mixed and matched in a thousand ways to create different dishes!

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Pan Seared NY Strip Steak

August 16, 2021 by Lindsay 9 Comments

The easiest way to make steak in a cast iron skillet! NY Strip Steak with easy, buttery shallot sauce is the most delicious date night at home steak method. Pair this with your favorite sides for a delicious, easy steakhouse dinner at home!

close up cast iron skillet with cooked sliced steak and shallot sauce over steak

Hi! How is your week going? I think the older we get the more we say it, but what a week. We're struggling to stay afloat in a very busy season, and with a lot of in and out, dinners together to reconnect are definitely part of that plan.

I love a Nice But Very Easy mid-week meal when we're super busy, and this is by far our favorite way to eat steak. We eat it with some kind of roasted veggie that can cook while the steak works, and dinner is DONE in 30 minutes, maybe less.

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14 Back-To-School Dinner Ideas (with meal prep tips)

August 5, 2021 by Lindsay 11 Comments

How are we feeling this week? Or whenever you and yours start back to school (if you do)?

Our district starts in just two weeks, but we're deep in prep for the big day. Beck has asked weekly when school is starting back since it let OUT in May, and now is up to asking about three times per day if tomorrow is the first day of school. She can't wait to start in her new class with new friends, and I'm SO excited for her.

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Corn Risotto with Blistered Cherry Tomatoes

July 14, 2021 by Lindsay 1 Comment

Super easy corn risotto recipe that is perfect for using up summer produce! This version features roasted cherry tomatoes that get a little charred, a lot sweet, and are the perfect topping. This is a vegetarian and gluten free main dish or side option. Pair it with some cast iron skillet salmon for a yummy gluten free pescatarian dinner.

bowl of corn risotto topped with tomatoes on blue napkin

Because everything should have corn and tomatoes in it right now, you know? It's true.

Where we are, produce is so perfect this time of year, zucchini and squash and herbs and corn just everywhere. This corn risotto cozy from the creamy rice and fresh with corn and tomatoes that are amazing right now.

I love this recipe for summer, but it's for sure delicious year round with frozen corn and storebought cherry tomatoes. It's also really nice for late summer when the produce is still there but the temperatures mercifully dip a little bit.

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Vegan Tabouli Salad

July 6, 2021 by Lindsay Leave a Comment

Delicious, easy vegan tabouli salad with marinated chickpeas that is the perfect light lunch! We serve this often as a side dish for grilled chicken or baked tofu, or take it to summer potlucks for a yummy vegan side dish.

gray pottery bowl of vegan tabouli salad topped with parsley and marinated garbanzo beans with blue napkins

I. Love. Summer.

I love the feeling of school being out. I love the heat and humidity, even when I bitch about it. I love the longer days, the smell of gardenias, going to hear music downtown, the whole cliché shebang.

I especially LOVE summer-feeling food. Grilled meat with fresh or raw side dishes, that great mix of healthy and decadent, salads so fresh and crisp that they somehow quench your thirst, you know?

This tabouli is one of those salads for our family, and I can't get enough. My mom used to make picnics of hummus and tabouli and pita long before those things were cool, and bring them to the pool late swim practices in the summer. She made both with a heavy hand of lemon, one of my favorite flavors for dishes like this.

This version of tabouli is a teensy bit jazzed up with marinating the chick peas, but that's super hands off and can be done way in advance - the longer in advance the better, actually. The garbanzos end up creamy but still with texture and so much flavor from the lemon juice, garlic, and crushed red pepper. I honestly can't even.

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Spicy Grilled Firecracker Shrimp

June 29, 2021 by Lindsay 15 Comments

Spicy grilled shrimp at its finest with TWO kinds of hot sauce! Just 5 ingredients and 10 minutes are all you need for this spicy, buttery take on firecracker shrimp.

cooked grilled shrimp on grill pan with lemon slices

Hello and welcome to our favorite 15 minute appetizer! When we're having grilling parties I'm always into a little snack right at the beginning - something delicious that can be thrown on the grill or in the oven while we wait for the main event, you know?

Fake-out focaccia is an example of this.

Now, don't confuse this Firecracker Shrimp with the dish by the same name from Panda Express. This is not that, although I'm sure that's delicious too. I've called this spicy grilled shrimp Firecracker Shrimp for YEARS, mainly because it is a very fun summery nibble to add to a grilling party at one of the American summer holidays. Hence, Firecracker Shrimp.

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Vegan Pasta Salad with Roasted Veggies

June 24, 2021 by Lindsay 2 Comments

Yummy vegan pasta salad is the perfect summer side dish! I make this with any seasonal veggies I have on hand, pine nuts, and lots of fresh herbs and lemon vinaigrette for brightness. Change up the veggies, pasta shape, and herbs each time for a fresh take on this yummy, healthy side dish!

large serving bowl of vegan pasta salad with asparagus and tomatoes

I just finished the book Hello, Summer and tbh want to start all recipes like this with OH, HELLO SUMMER, but it feels kind of redundant.

Know that I'm thinking it, though.

This is, to me, the pasta salad to end all pasta salads. It's light, fresh, and full of summery flavors. I love that it's vegan because lots of different types of eaters can eat it, and almost every aspect of it can be switched up based on what you have on hand. Different nuts, veggies, fresh herbs, it all works.

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Easy Shrimp Curry

June 14, 2021 by Lindsay 2 Comments

This delicious shrimp curry features coconut milk, fish sauce, and lots of lime juice for brightness. This is a curry shrimp recipe that's done in just 30 minutes, aka the perfect weeknight seafood dinner! Pair this with plain white rice or naan for dipping and sopping up all the creamy curry sauce.

large skillet of shrimp with creamy curry sauce, napkin, and cilantro

Ohhhh curry, how I love you. It's no secret that we are highly obsessed with all kinds of curry, and a yellow curry with coconut milk appears a few times per month on our dinner rotation.

I often see curry recipes with a bunch of chopping, starting with garlic, ginger, jalapeno, and green onion. I LOVE starting curries with that flavor combination, but wanted to do a quick version using dried and jarred flavors to save time and effort.

This shrimp curry recipe is super easy thanks to coconut milk and yellow curry, and the result is a 15-20 minute curry that tastes like tons of effort without any actual effort. Shrimp cooks in 3 minutes or less, and with some storebought naan this can truly be dinner in under half an hour.

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Connecticut Lobster Rolls

June 3, 2021 by Lindsay 9 Comments

The most delicious warm lobster roll recipe, Connecticut Lobster Rolls! These easy lobster rolls are served WARM and have just six ingredients including tons of melty butter. These are the perfect recipe for all summer long!

Hello and HI, welcome to our summer of all the lobster.

I think in this post-but-still-kinda pandemic era, it's gotten more meaningful to make really fun foods at home. We still maybe aren't traveling or eating out as much, but we still want our favorite restaurant-style foods, right?

RIGHT.

Enter, Connecticut lobster rolls, or the deliciously-named butter lobster roll. SERIOUSLY, friends, how does one even choose a favorite type of lobster roll? There's the New England style, cold with flavors of celery, lemon and mayo, or these warm lobster rolls that are drenched in butter, lemon juice, and served in buttery toasted buns.

Probably both types of lobster rolls is what we need to make this summer count.

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Easy Crockpot Butter Chicken

May 12, 2021 by Lindsay 6 Comments

Indian butter chicken in a slow cooker! This super delicious crockpot chicken curry has just 10 ingredients and no searing or extra chopping. The end result is luscious, creamy, delicious butter chicken with hardly any effort.

Hello, HELLO. I have been dying to tell you about this, 90s-sitcom-drama style.

The thing about Indian curry dishes is that they are not known for their ease of making. The really good ones have lots of ingredients, whole spices, hours of simmering, and generally lots of things that making cooking really fun, in my opinion.

BUT. Sometimes we want curry tonight. Now. Fast. Not a lot of fuss. The crockpot is an ideal cooking vessel for long-cooked stuff that needs time to develop flavors, and I love it because it can (probably, mostly) be left on while we leave the house or wander off to do other things. No checking, stirring, adjusting liquid levels, just easy crockpot chicken curry with 10 ingredients.

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Quick 1-Skillet Lemon Pepper Pasta

May 10, 2021 by Lindsay Leave a Comment

Vegetarian one pot pasta, yes please! This one pan lemon pepper pasta comes together in under half an hour with just 7 ingredients. Classic lemon pepper seasoning flavor meets creamy, buttery pasta in this easy one pot pasta method. Pair this with an easy lemon vinaigrette green salad for a complete vegetarian meal.

Quick like....20 minutes tops, no chopping of any kind unless you count zesting a lemon, which you could fully skip if you'd like.

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Chicken Cordon Bleu Meatballs

April 28, 2021 by Lindsay 2 Comments

Favorite chicken cordon bleu flavors in these utterly delicious and simple Chicken Cordon Bleu Meatballs! Lean ground chicken and a little Swiss cheese get blended quickly with some ham (leftover glazed ham or deli ham!) and easy pantry spices for major flavor in this tender ground chicken meatball. There's an easy sour cream dip with mustard for dipping + extra credit.

low carb ground chicken meatballs healthy with dipping sauce

These are chicken balls with ham and cheese.

They were, as all good ideas on this blog are, Jay's idea, and they were a fantastic one. I love the nostalgic flavors of chicken cordon bleu, crispy exterior, gooey interior, but the process is pretty arduous and a meatball is just so friendly and celebratory, right?

For the sake of holidays or parties, you can totally make these in advance, bake them, then reheat them in the oven until the cheese melts again so all the mess + raw meat nonsense can happen well in advance of serving these.

The ingredients are simple, and you can use deli ham or leftover holiday ham from Easter or Thanksgiving if you ever have any lying around.

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Easy Mexican Ground Beef

April 26, 2021 by Lindsay 3 Comments

Delicious Mexican ground beef that can be used in tacos, burritos, or over nachos! This is one of those foolproof recipes that is delicious, and features your own homemade taco seasoning, hard shell tacos with no seasoning packet! This ground beef is extra delicious with sour cream guacamole.

For Taco Tuesday hard-shell tacos, DUH.

We are a week away from Cinco de Mayo! This is excellent news because MEXICAN FOOD OBVS. Mexican and Indian are my true all the time, tried and true, even love the leftovers, favorite cuisines of all time. We eat a variation of each at least once per week, and I love that Mexican food specifically lends itself to so many different types of foods, uses for extra veggies, all of the good stuff. Plus: flavor. condiments. cilantro.

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Easy Chili Lime Salmon

April 19, 2021 by Lindsay 2 Comments

Chili lime salmon with honey is a DELICIOUS version of my best ever cast iron skillet salmon. Just 6 ingredients, 15 minutes, and gluten free, dairy free salmon dinner can be yours!

It's 6 ingredients of love, basically. How are we feeling about a 20 minute salmon dinner that feels slightly Mexican, slightly fine for any side dish you like, slightly practically perfect in every way?

We feel great about it, right?

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Pan Fried Tofu with Thai Peanut Sauce

April 8, 2021 by Lindsay 2 Comments

Our 100% favorite plant-based weeknight dinner that we eat at least every other week! Perfect spicy peanut sauce (make it in advance!), crispy pan fried tofu, and slaw with whatever greens you have make for the most delicious vegan rice bowl dinner that is healthy and comforting.

I don't think I've ever said this about anything before (I probably have), but this is hands down our favorite dinner.

We have other things that we love, other things that are in regular rotation, for sure, but this is our dinner. One that we've tweaked and crafted over the years and every time we have it we kind of sink into this "it's healthy but comforting" haze of joy.

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5-Ingredient Ham and Cheese Quiche

April 1, 2021 by Lindsay Leave a Comment

Easy ham and cheese quiche recipe with my favorite basic quiche recipe! Use your favorite melty cheese, some savory ham, and enjoy this brunch recipe that is done in just about an hour (mostly hands off). I serve this with my favorite green salad, but this is also a great addition to a Mother's Day Brunch or Easter Brunch spread!

Ooohhhh I'm loving this spring, friends.

Spring is a really nice time for a pandemic to think about ending, you know? We're still in it, for sure, but we're also seeing signs of life. A little more color, a little more vibrancy, all around.

Spring is a great time to bring out some new brunch recipes because Easter and Mother's Day just really go great with a nice brunch, you know? I LOVE a quiche for any kind of brunch (or lunch, or dinner), but ham and cheese quiche may very well be one of my favorite flavors.

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