ONE POT CHILI CHEESE PASTA

ONE POT CHILI CHEESE PASTA

yield: SERVES 4

total time: 1 HOUR

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 sweet onion, diced
• 2 garlic cloves. minced
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 1 pound lean ground beef (I used 93% lean)
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 2 teaspoons smoked paprika
• ½ teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 (14 ounce) can fire roasted tomatoes
• 1 (4-ounce) can diced green chiles
• 2 1/2 cups low-sodium beef or chicken stock (or water! any liquid, really)
• 8 ounces elbow noodles (I like whole wheat ones!)
• 6 ounces white cheddar cheese, freshly grated
• 3 green onions, thinly sliced
• sour cream, for serving

DIRECTIONS:

Heat a large pot over medium-low heat and add the olive oil. Stir in the onion, garlic, salt and pepper. Cook until the onions soften, about 5 minutes. Add the ground beef, breaking it apart with a wooden spoon. Cook, stirring often, until the beef is browned, about 6 to 8 minutes. At this time I like to keep breaking the beef apart. I also occasionally increase the heat in order to cook off some of the fat from the beef.

Once the beef is browned, stir in the tomato paste, chili powder, paprika and cumin. Cook for another 5 minutes, stirring often. Pour in the tomatoes, green chiles and stock (or water). Add in the pasta. Bring the mixture to a simmer, then cover the pot and cook for 10 to 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. The pasta should absorb all the liquid and plump up! You don’t want the heat too high, because the pasta can stick on the bottom. If it needs a few more minutes, keep the pot covered.

Once the pasta is cooked and the liquid has been absorbed, stir in the cheddar cheese. Taste and season additionally if needed.

Serve immediately with sliced green onions and if you’re really feeling it, sour cream for serving.

Recipe: Cinnamon Sugar Scones

Who can forget the joy of discovering cinnamon toast as a kid? The enchanted combination of butter, sugar, and cinnamon seemed to pop up all the time: on Sunday mornings, it was the pleasure of a lazy breakfast with family; after school it seemed to cure scraped knees and later heartbreak; and when we first left home, it was the snack of choice at 2 a.m.

Now that we're all grown up, that same comfort and pleasure has grown up with us in the form of warm, freshly baked scones studded with lots of little crumbles of cinnamon sugar and Land O Lakes® Unsalted Butter. Finally, they get brushed with buttery cinnamon sugar and drizzled with cinnamon sugar glaze.

Yet, all this sweet cinnamon-y goodness does not take hours of work. The scones come together quickly and easily. In fact, mixing the crumbly, buttery dough is the perfect job for little hands. Then, unbaked dough keeps in the freezer for whenever a cinnamon toast emergency arises. You can pop the pre-made scones in the oven straight from the freezer.

Throw a spur of the moment brunch for friends, show your grandmother you really do know how to bake, or make a batch ahead to pop in the oven one holiday morning. No matter the occasion, you'll be imparting new cinnamon toast memories on whomever you share them with.

Cinnamon Sugar Scones

Yield: 12 scones

For the scones:
3/4 cup (12 tablespoons) Land O Lakes® Unsalted Butter, chilled, cubed, and divided
2/3 cup demerara or turbinado sugar, divided
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 large egg yolk
1 cup cold heavy cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the cinnamon sugar topping: (optional)
1 tablespoon Land O Lakes® Unsalted Butter, melted
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tablespoons demerara or turbinado sugar

For the cinnamon sugar glaze: (optional)
3/4 cup powdered sugar
3 tablespoons Land O Lakes® Heavy Whipping Cream
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Arrange a rack in the middle of the oven and heat to 400ºF.

Place 4 tablespoons of the butter, 1/3 cup of the sugar, and cinnamon in a small bowl and mash until well combined; set aside.

The 3-Step Method for Easier

Every Sunday I make a batch of hard-boiled eggs and stash them in the fridge to turn into quick breakfasts, lunches, and snacks throughout the week. Cooking the eggs is no problem, but peeling them can be a tedious chore. Over the years, I found that three factors make an egg easier to peel: the age of the eggs, the cooking method, and the cooling method.

Step 1: Choose older eggs.

"What do my egg choices have to do with easy-to-peel hard-boiled eggs?" you might be wondering. Turns out older eggs peel more easily. I'm not suggesting that you dig through the egg case for the oldest lay date, because a week's difference in supermarket eggs won't make a noticeable difference in the peeling of your hard-boiled eggs. But if you typically source your eggs from the farmers market or your neighborhood chickens (lucky you) than you'll want to let those eggs sit in the fridge for a week.

As eggs age they gradually lose moisture through the pores in their shell, and the air pocket at the tip expands. The pH of the egg's outer membrane (a thin layer of protein between the shell and the egg white) also changes, going from a low pH to a relatively high pH, which makes them adhere less strongly to the shell.

Step 2: Steam your eggs.

Two unconventional methods will give you easy-to-peel hard-cooked eggs, and both involve steaming. The first is a simple stovetop steam, where a few inches of water is brought to a boil and a steamer basket of eggs is lowered into the pot. Let the eggs steam for 20 minutes.

The second method is pressure steaming. The eggs are cooked on a steamer basket or rack inside a stovetop or electric pressure cooker. Reportedly, in both cases, the steam vapor enters the shell, loosening the membrane that is responsible for hard-to-peel eggs.

Try it: How To Cook Eggs in an Electric Pressure Cooker

If you prefer to boil your eggs, but still want them to be easy to peel, start them in boiling water. This goes against our favorite method for perfect boiled eggs, which starts in cold water. Unfortunately, a cold water start actually binds the egg's membrane with the egg white as the water and eggs slowly come to temperature together. That being said, if you love the texture of eggs started in cold water, then using older eggs and shocking them using the method below will still give you easier-to-peel hard-boiled eggs.

Try it: How To Boil Eggs Perfectly Every Time

Step 3: Cool the eggs completely.

Shocking hard-boiled eggs — that is plummeting them into a bowl of ice water — right after boiling also makes an easier-to-peel egg. The rapid cooling of the eggs contracts the egg whites, releasing them from the egg's membrane. It also firms the egg white proteins, making them easier to peel. Cool the eggs for at least 15 minutes for even easier peeling.

What the Toughest Race Taught Me About Meal Planning

I've tried and failed at meal planning more times than I can remember — not for a lack of understanding its benefits, or for making the effort, or wanting to succeed. When it comes down to it, I never had a plan that was right or sustainable for me and my family.

After signing up for an Ironman, I knew that this had to change immediately. Between work, life, and training, I knew if my husband and I wanted to avoid hangry meltdowns and nonstop takeout, meal planning had to happen. Here's how I finally made it work, and stuck with it.

Failure Bred Success

When my now-husband, Lucien, and I registered for Ironman Mt. Tremblant two summers ago, we were training for a couple Half Ironman races and preparing for our wedding. To say it was a busy time is an understatement. I wrote off meal planning as just one more thing to do, and told myself I didn't have time for it.

Huge mistake. In short, dinnertime was a constant disaster and rarely satisfying. Most nights it was a last-minute rush to throw something together. Other nights felt like total defeat as we resorted to pizza or Chipotle. As we headed into Ironman training this year, we both knew it was time to make meal planning a priority — for the sake of our hungry stomachs and our marriage.

The Plan That Worked for Us

What do we need meal planning to help us accomplish? Answering that question was our first order of business. As it turns out, it was the easiest to tackle. For starters, we wanted to avoid a repeat of last summer.

Outside of work, nearly all of our energy was getting dumped into training. I remember the first time I heard that it wasn't uncommon for Michael Phelps to eat upwards to 10,000 calories a day; I just couldn't wrap my head around it. One Ironman later and I totally get it! We certainly weren't eating that much, but our caloric needs were much higher than normal. Food was our fuel, so the core of our plan had to be about functional cooking and eating. We needed an arsenal of healthy and satisfying meals and snacks to carry us through the whole day — from breakfast to bedtime.

Since everything else in life was happening on a schedule, I felt like it was also the most logical way to approach meal planning. From there, a three-pronged approach to meal planning was put in place. Our goal was to make it sustainable and to ensure it worked for us.

Our 3-Prong Plan

• Customize a plan for success: Creating a bank of recipes is key.
• Shop on Saturdays: Or, accept what works for you.
• Sunday prep: The no-fail approach to a successful week of meals.

Step 1: Plan (and Then Test, Adjust, and Plan Again)

I happily took the reigns on this step — and my husband was just as happy to let them go.

For starters, I created a bank of recipes we could draw on each week. It was a roster of dinners we'd cooked enough times that we didn't need to look at a recipe to make them happen. These meals were anything but sexy or adventurous. Full of lots of chicken, sweet potatoes, and all the green vegetables, they were purely functional.

But there was already a flaw in the plan: I thought only about dinner. It took a couple weeks of grazing throughout the morning because breakfast wasn't quite filling enough and an equally sorry state of affairs after trying to wing lunch that we had to expand the plan.

Seeing how easily daytime meals fell apart when there wasn't a plan in place was a wake-up call for how important thorough planning would be if we were to stay on track. Each week I chose the dinner recipes for the week ahead and made a list of the items we'd need for breakfasts, lunches, and snacks.

The big takeaway here was the expansion of meal planning to all the meals of the day. It took some failure to realize we needed to tackle more than dinner, but we got there. From there we established a bank of recipes to draw upon for dinner and a pantry of ingredients to help us make smart breakfasts and lunches.

Slow 15 Cooker Recipes for New Cooks

If you're getting your feet wet and learning your way around the kitchen right now, it's time to break out that slow cooker stashed away in the far reaches of a cabinet or closet. This is one of the most helpful appliances any cook (but particularly new cooks) can have by their side.
A slow cooker opens up the world of hands-off cooking. It can deliver meals that save you during hectic weeks; help you recreate budget-friendly takeout favorites; and make big batches of things like soup, caramelized onions, and juicy shredded chicken. Here are 15 easy recipes to get you started.

The Slow Cooker Essentials

As you'll soon discover, there are so many amazing things your slow cooker can do for you. One place where it totally excels is tackling the basics. Use it to make batches of homemade stock, caramelized onions, and meatballs, and you will feel like a total rockstar.

Soups, Stews, and Chilis

Soups, stews, and chilis are some of my favorite things to make in the slow cooker. These recipes require little work upfront and rely on the slow cooker to do all the heavy lifting.

Weeknight Favorites

This is the lineup to keep on repeat in your meal plan. Not only are these slow cooker dinners totally satisfying, but they're also easy to pull off and can all be made in advance.

One-Pot Recipes to Get My Dinner Mojo Back

Over the past few months my meal plan has been directed almost entirely by recipe testing — both for Kitchn and a cookbook I just finished writing on Buddha bowls. Now that I'm left to my own devices to choose dinner recipes, I'm both excited and slightly overwhelmed with decision fatigue. There are so many recipes I want to cook that it's been tough to decide where to start. I'm easing back in with five of my favorite one-pot dinners for my family of two.

Welcome to This Week's Meal Plan

Planning my weekly meals is a habit I enjoy. Since I'm frequently asked by friends and family what I'm cooking for dinner each week, I thought it'd be useful to share my weekly meal plan here. Whether you're just learning to meal plan and looking for a real-life example of how this works or you're an old pro on the hunt for inspiration, here's a peek at how I'm feeding my family of two this week.

Monday: Tomato-Braised Lentils with Broccoli Rabe

A touch of cream and butter added at the end of cooking gives this wholesome pantry supper a touch of indulgence. Since fresh tomatoes leave a lot to be desired right now, I'll stick with a can of diced tomatoes. I usually skip the broccoli brae topping on this recipe, and instead mix in a couple handfuls of baby spinach.

Tuesday: The Easiest Cheese and Vegetable Frittata

Tonight's dinner is all about using up the bits and bobs of vegetables and herbs in the fridge that are on their last leg. I'll also add some crumbled goat cheese and serve the fritter with a chunk of crusty bread.

Wednesday: Saucy Skillet Salmon

This skillet meal never fails to make me feel like a dinner rockstar. It's surprisingly quick and easy to pull together, yet feels way more fancy than the effort it requires. I'll serve our salmon fillets over the leftover lentils from Monday night with a simple green salad on the side.

Thursday: Lemony Tortellini Spinach Soup

I can't decide what I love about this soup more: the fact that it comes together in under 30 minutes or the fresh lemony tang that fills my bowl and makes me forget it's still below freezing outside. Since I can also count on having a bag of tortellini in the freezer, stock in the pantry, and a mess of vegetables hanging out in the crisper, this soup will be super satisfying and easy to pull together after a post-work yoga class.

Friday: Slow Cooker Salsa Pulled Chicken

Since it's likely I won't feel like cooking on Friday, I'm leaning on my slow cooker for this nearly hands-off one-pot dinner. My husband and I will make our own tacos with shredded cheese, avocado, and Greek yogurt for toppings.

Spinach Artichoke Dip recipe

Ingredients

1. 1 1/4 cups whole milk
2. 1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
3. 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
4. 1 1/4 cups grated parmesan cheese
5. 2 10-ounce bags spinach, stems removed
6. 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
7. 2 tablespoons minced onion
8. 1 clove garlic, minced
9. 2 teaspoons all-purpose flour
10. 1/4 cup sour cream, plus more for serving
11. 1/2 cup shredded white sharp cheddar cheese
12. 1/2 cup frozen artichoke hearts, thawed, squeezed dry and roughly chopped
13. Kosher salt

Direction

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Stir in the spinach and cook until bright green, about 30 seconds. Drain and rinse under cold water; squeeze out the excess moisture, then finely chop.

Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion, garlic and 1/2 teaspoon salt and cook until the onion is soft, about 2 minutes. Add the flour and cook, stirring, until lightly toasted, about 1 minute. Whisk in the milk and cook, whisking constantly, until thickened, about 1 minute. Remove from the heat. Stir in the lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, parmesan and sour cream.

Return the pot to medium heat. Add the spinach, cheddar and artichokes and stir until the cheese melts and the dip is heated through. Serve warm with tortilla chips, salsa and sour cream