This quick and easy recipe for Pumpkin Pasta Casserole is perfect for chilly, fall evenings. If you are a gardener, you may only have to buy 2 ingredients to make this recipe: pasta and cheese. If you aren't a gardener, it is still frugal as most of the produce is on sale right now. You can't taste the pumpkin in the casserole. It adds a natural sweetness, nutrients, … [Read more...]
Vegetarian Enchilada Stuffed Zucchini
There is something so satisfying about creating a frugal recipe that the whole family loves. Especially when that recipes helps you make a dent in the zucchini harvest! This recipe makes use of several vegetables from the garden: zucchinis, tomatoes, corn, onions, and peppers. All of the garden veggies make it an especially frugal dish. However, if you didn't garden this … [Read more...]
Skillet Lasagna
I have been making different types of vegetable lasagnas all summer. After the last one, my oldest son said, "your veggie lasagnas are awesome, but I'm wondering when you are going to make a standard lasagna". Obviously making a "standard lasagna" shot to the top of my to-do list! But our life has been crazy and every evening when I looked at the clock I realized that I just … [Read more...]
Slow Cooker Taco Rice Soup
When life is busy it is even more important for my family to find time to eat together. There is something so relaxing about sitting around the table together chatting, laughing, and reconnecting. However, it can be rough to throw together a family dinner when we walk in the door a few minutes before dinner time. Yes, I can throw together a pretty decent meal in 10 minutes, … [Read more...]
Balsamic Tomatoes with Feta and Fresh Herbs
This could be my most favorite flavor combination from this summer. From the bold balsamic to the tangy feta to the sweet basil and the perfect taste of vine ripened tomatoes. It's so raw. And fresh. And delicious! A few weeks ago (before the squirrels took over), I made this recipe with the striped tigerella tomatoes...a new variety for me this year, thanks to my friend … [Read more...]
Mango Avocado Salsa with Sweet Lime Vinaigrette
When I was in Texas over the holidays, I went rummaging through my mom's refrigerator trying to come up with a fun appetizer for a family dinner we were having. I found a mango that I was going to use in a fruit salad, but when I cut into it and discovered it was tangy and not-so-sweet, I decided we needed to add more bold flavors, to help hide the tangy mango! I ended up … [Read more...]
Spinach and Tomato Stuffed Chicken Breasts
Oh please. Please. Please, for all that is good and right in this world. Please, make these. When I asked for spinach recipes last week, I had this one in the back of my mind to try as I asked. Last summer when on vacation with my family, I made for them a similar recipe that used sun dried tomatoes, spinach pesto, mozzarella, stuffed/rolled in the same … [Read more...]
Pesto Bruschetta
Good Monday afternoon friends! You all are in for a treat this fine Monday. You're getting a double bonus on recipes today! This one, plus another tonight for the $5 Dinner Challenge! I was working on dinner over the weekend when Steve pops into the kitchen with a few handfuls of itty bitty tomatoes. Huh? I thought the garden was "done." I haven't officially closed … [Read more...]
Spinach Tomato Saute
Picked a bunch of cherry-type tomatoes from the garden...opened the fridge to figure out what to do with them...and the $2 box of spinach practically fell of the shelf. When that kind of thing happens, I take it as a sign... And here's the result... Spinach Tomato Saute 1 Tbsp olive oil ($.10)2 garlic cloves, crushed ($.10)2 cups grape or cherry … [Read more...]
Rigatoni with Italian Sausage and Red Peppers
Super Simple Supper! This is a one dish dinner. (That brings up an important question...when you hear one dish dinner, do you think of it being a dinner that is SERVED in one dish, or COOKED in one dish?!) So this is technically a one dish served dinner...as the whole meal is in one bowl. But it was cooked in 2 pots...a pot for the pasta, and a skillet for … [Read more...]