This post contains affiliate links. For more information please read my full disclosure.

Ever since we moved to the mountains, I have struggled with meal time. You see, we have a very small grocery store. It’s a gas station store with very high prices and a limited selection. The nearest decent store is 40 minutes away and when it snows the road closes to that store so I have to drive even further to shop!

I had an appointment in the next town in a couple days so I was trying to make do with what I had in the kitchen until then. You know how it is though; frozen burgers, no buns; rice, no chicken; canned tomatoes, no pasta; you are left with nothing that really goes together! lol!

Easy Cheesy Mexican Rice Skillet Meal

So I combined everything I had, added some spices, and VOILA, Cheesy Mexican Rice was born! It’s so yummy and versatile that I make it all the time now. It’s easy enough that my daughters can practically make it on their own.

Just cook your ground meet (I only had a couple frozen burgers, but that worked!), add canned tomatoes (my kids like the tomatoes with bell peppers and onions), rice, broth and cook until the rice is done (about 15 minutes)! Then add your cheese and you have a full meal in just 20 minutes!

Now, when I actually plan to make it, I like to add some Mexican seasonings and serve it with beans and tortillas! This Mexican rice great in quesadillas too!

I’m not always lucky enough to come up with a great recipe on the fly so I knew I really needed to get my stuff together and start planning my meals. Luckily, I found Plan to Eat, a drag and drop meal planner that builds my grocery list at the same time!

5 Ingredient Cheesy Mexican Rice Skillet Meal

 

Print

Prep time

5 mins

Cook time

15 mins

Total time

20 mins

 

5 Ingredients, one skillet, a full meal in just 15-20 minutes! It's like homemade hamburger helper!

Author: True Aim

Recipe type: Main

Cuisine: Mexican

Serves: 4-6 servings

Ingredients

• ½ lb ground meat (beef or turkey)
• 1 can tomatoes with green chilies (or with bell peppers and onions for less spice)
• 2 cups rice
• 3½ cups chicken broth
• 1 cup grated cheese

Instructions

1. Brown your meat in a large skillet on medium heat. Drain fat if you want to. I don't usually.
2. Add canned tomatoes, stir and cook for 1 minute.
3. Add rice and broth and heat to a boil.
4. Cover and reduce heat to low. Cook until rice is tender. You may need to add more broth depending on what kind of rice you use.
5. Add cheese and stir until well combined.
6. Season with salt, pepper, and any Mexican spices you like. I put cumin, chili powder, garlic, cayenne pepper in mine, but it tastes good without it too.
7. Garnish with cilantro and serve with beans and tortillas (optional)

3.5.3229

If you’d like to start eating healthier and getting organized in the New Year, join Plan to Eat’s Easy Meal Challenge and get 30 Easy Meal recipes to put on your calendar! Don’t forget to add this Mexican rice too!

You might also like this recipe for Easy Stuffed Pasta Shells!

The post 5 Ingredient Cheesy Mexican Rice Skillet Meal first appeared on True Aim.

This post is sponsored by Plan to Eat. All opinions and experiences are my own.

I hated meal planning! It was just one more thing I had to do that took a LONG time and I always forgot something at the store for at least one of my planned meals. That had me scrambling during dinner time all over again!

This year, I started using Plan to Eat and have never been happier! It’s fun and easy to use, but it doesn’t just help you plan your meals. It also helps you keep track of your pantry and builds you a grocery list too!

If you want a simple way to get your family to eat healthier and be more organized in the new year, join Plan to Eat’s New Years Challenge and get 30 easy meals right in your account for FREE!

How to Make an Easy Meal Plan

Plan to Eat is an easy to use online meal planner that allows you to collect and organize your recipes (from the web, cookbooks, or your own collection) and drag them onto a meal planning calendar on the days you’d like to eat them. Their software automatically generates a grocery list for you. It is even organized by store department!

Now is the perfect time to try Plan to Eat by joining their New Year’s Challenge!

I don’t know about you, but these 30 easy meals are just what I need to start my New Year off right! They are recipes that my whole family is going to love and I won’t have to worry about my husband getting bored of the same old thing I make every week. I vow to skip the frozen pizza and processed food at least for a couple weeks with this new easy meal plan!

Want even more inspiration on what to put in your meal plan? Join the Plan to Eat Facebook group and get new recipes to add to your plan!

Are you joining me?

The post Meal Plan – 30 Easy Meals for the New Year! first appeared on True Aim.

The best meal I ever had was after coming home from working at a tradeshow. I didn’t want to buy anything because I had plenty of food at home. The show took longer than I expected so I waited too long to grab something on the way home. I fed the baby before I fed myself. I was ravished by the time I opened the refrigerator. Leftover lasagna was all I could find that wouldn’t take less than 10 minutes to put together, but it tasted better than the freshly cooked stuff. Any other day, I would have hated leftover lasagna.

Pasta with Garlic Cream Sauce

1 in 5 children in America live in households without consistent access to adequate food. You can help simply by feeding your family with foods from stores like Safeway and Albertsons who are participating in the Hunger Is Campaign. I’m sure you can relate to the amazing feeling of a good meal after having to go without. Why not offer children in need the opportunity to enjoy the best tasting meal they’ve ever had?

Just like my go to pasta recipe! I went to my local Albertson’s store in Meridian and found that when I purchase everything I need for this recipe, a portion of the proceeds go to help feed children in need – Look for tags on participating items in store.

Purchase of these items in September 2016 will trigger at least $0.10 donation up to $1 million! Then you can whip up a simple and delicious meal for your family!

I love making this easy pasta with garlic cream sauce because it is really quick and tastes like you went out to eat. You can use chicken sausage to make a more substantial meal, or just do kid-friendly sauce and noodles.

I make this pasta for lunch without the sausage sometimes because it is so easy!

If you have a budding little chef, your young children can help you put the finishing touches on the sauce with the parmesan, salt and pepper at the end.

Easy Pasta with Garlic Cream Sauce

 

Print

Prep time

5 mins

Cook time

20 mins

Total time

25 mins

 

Easy Creamy Garlic Sauce with Penne

Author: True Aim

Recipe type: Entree

Cuisine: Italian

Serves: 6-8 servings

Ingredients

• Chicken Sausage (optional)
• 8oz Penne Pasta
• 3 tbs Butter
• 3-4 Cloves Garlic Minced
• 3 tbs Flour
• 1½ Cups Chicken Broth
• 1¼ Cups Cream
• ½ Cup Parmesan Cheese
• Salt and Pepper to Taste

Instructions

1. Cook pasta according to directions on the box. Meanwhile, brown your meat in a large pan that has a lid. Remove from pan and set aside.
2. Add butter and garlic to the pan and cook for 1-2 minutes. Add flour and whisk for 1 minute. Add chicken broth and whisk. Bring to a boil.
3. Add cream and whisk constantly until the sauce starts to thicken.
4. Turn off the heat and add the parmesan cheese, salt and pepper to taste. Put the sausage back in the pan if you are using.
5. Add the cooked pasta to the pan and stir to combine. Garnish with italian parsley or basil if you like.

3.5.3208

I made sure to point out to my children how this meal meant more than just something to fill our bellies. Because we bought certain items, we were also helping other children who do not have as much.

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Albertsons Companies & Hunger Is. The opinions and text are all mine.

The post Easy Pasta with Garlic Cream Sauce – Hunger Is first appeared on True Aim.

Welcome to Mom’s Library

This post is filled with parenting tips, activities for young children, crafts, devotionals, recipes, and more!

Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss the next Library!

Click here to see all Mom’s Library Posts

Kid-Friendly Christmas Recipes

Adventures in Cookie Decorating – Lambert’s Lately

25 Healthy Christmas Snacks Your Kids Will Love – Fit Body, Full Life

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Banana Bread Recipe – 3 Boys and a Dog

Oreo Ball Snowman – Live Over C’s

Cucumber and Smoked Salmon Appetizer – Do It All Working Mom

Would you like to participate?

Please follow me and support your fellow bloggers by visiting some links! Grab a button if you were featured!

* by linking up you give Mom’s Library Bloggers permission to use photos from your post with a link back.

The post Kid-Friendly Christmas Recipes and Mom’s Library #169 first appeared on True Aim.

Science Co-op is tomorrow and I get to host. We love having people over, but don’t always know what to serve. It’s right in between breakfast and lunch, so we like to make something it just can’t be too much of something.

This week is our last meeting before Christmas break so we wanted to do something a little more exciting than carrot sticks and ranch or a fruit platter like we usually do.

I decided to have my daughter whip up some my favorite appetizers and a festive punch to celebrate the holidays with our friends.

This was a great opportunity to have Audrey practice being the hostess.

She did an awesome job with the shrimp puffs. That’s how you know it’s easy. I mean, she’s only seven!

Next, the punch needed to be made. This was the fun part because it fizzes up like a rootbeer float.

That’s kind of what it is. You can make any kind of punch you can think of with just three simple ingredients; 7up, juice, and sherbet. I just had Audrey add one part of everything and then taste test it to make sure it’s not too sweet or not bubbly enough.

This time we used cranberry cocktail and raspberry sherbet, but I’ve had pineapple juice with mango or pineapple sherbert; pink lemonaid with lemon sherbet; even grape juice with grape sherbet. Although, grape sherbet is really hard to find.

Just add whatever flavors you like and experiment to see how much of each ingredient tastes right to you.

Of course with 9 people coming over plus our family, we had to use some SOLO cups and plates to help with clean up afterward. I didn’t know there were so many different SOLO products including paper, heavy duty, and premium strength.

My younger children have a hard time carrying around bigger round cups, so I usually have to get a smaller sized cup for them, but the SOLO cup is the only one with a squared design and that helps my little ones have a better grip.

I especially love the new ‘It’s My Solo’ cups that come with a label that you peel back and scratch your name on. That way everyone can keep track of their cup and none get wasted.

This helped with prep-time, so we were done with everything in just 30 minutes!

Easy Shrimp Puffs

 

Print

These shrimp puffs are addicting and so easy!

Author: True Aim

Recipe type: Appetiser

Cuisine: American

Ingredients

• 2 containers of refrigerator biscuits
• ½ lb of baby salad shrimp
• ½ cup mayo
• ¼ cup cheddar
• 1 tsp dill
• 1 clove garlic minced

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and prepare a mini muffin tin with cooking spray.
2. Rip each biscuit in half and press dough up the sides of each muffin cup. Sometimes if the biscuits are uneven and one is bigger than another, you'll want to rip the big ones into thirds.
3. Combine the next 5 ingredients and spoon about 1 tbs of the shrimp mixture into the center of the biscuits.
4. Bake for 20 minutes or until lightly golden around the edges.

3.2.2802

Well, almost anything. I don’t know if I would be ready for an epic battle like the one in the video below!

How about you? Do you have any quick finger-food recipes that you like to whip up?

Watch more SOLO® Up for Anything videos, join the conversation on SOLO’s Facebook page, or check out SOLO’s Pinterest page for more inspiration.

The post Easy Appetizers: Shrimp Puffs and Raspberry Punch first appeared on True Aim.

What all the verbiage of “cookie-gate” obscured was the true value in cooking with your child.

The world is a complicated place. We often never see how things are made, from the family car to a loaf of bread. Anytime a parent can expose a child to the many facets of how things work, they help prepare their child for the big wide world.

Of course, baking the food we eat is only one aspect of our lives. Changing the oil in the lawnmower, building a tree house or putting money aside in a piggy bank all offer valuable lessons in mechanics, construction and finance.

But baking is easy, accessible and a great introduction to chemistry (baking soda makes the cake rise), agriculture (from where the flour, eggs and milk come), production and assembly (the coordination of systematically following a formula to make a batch), and even marketing (“is the homemade one better than the store bought one?”), all with the added bonus of learning fractions.

A retired school teacher once told me after decades of teaching fractions with measuring cups, they now teach fractions using a pizza as the visual aid because so few children have baked. But she felt the hands on experience of filling and emptying the measuring cups was a far more tactile and understandable introduction to the concept of fractions for a young child.

So with that in mind here is an easy, fun recipe for shortbread cookies that has long been a favorite in our family. It has all the basics: an easy recipe of ingredients you usually have in the pantry, the fun of rolling out the dough and using cookie cutters, and the delight of decorating with sprinkles and frosting.

Lessons in fractions, agriculture, production and artistic expression all hidden inside one simple recipe.

How to Make Shortbread Cookies

3⁄4 Cup of butter

3⁄4 Cup of sugar

1/8 Teaspoon of salt

2 Teaspoons of vanilla

2 Cups of flour

Method: Cream butter and sugar together in a mixing bowl with a mixer or with a spoon. Add and mix in the salt and vanilla. Add and mix in the flour.

If you aren’t using a mixer you may have to knead the last of the flour in by hand (little ones love this). Roll dough out on a floured surface about 1⁄4 an inch thick and cut out shapes.

Place cookies on a greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Allow baked cookies to cool for one minute on the sheet.

Then remove them from cookie sheet and continue cooling on a rack. Ice with homemade or store bought icing and decorate. Enjoy!

Printing off some thank you cards like the ones below to go along with your cookies as a gift makes another lesson of appreciation!

Dianne Miller is a landscape painter who lives in Virginia with her husband and two daughters. Her work includes the Little Bunny series written for her children when they were preschoolers. The simply written and illustrated books gently guide Little Bunny through the challenges of life. Click here to find tons of original, free printables and the Little Bunny series.

The post Cooking with Kids: Cookie Lesson first appeared on True Aim.

As my family grows, so does the grocery bill.  You have to see it to believe just how much my little 2-year-old can eat.  Along with my bottomless pit toddler, I have a 5-month-old that needs a lot of attention.  So, I need simple dinners that don’t break the budget.

I’ve learned over the years that there’s nothing cheaper than having chicken and potatoes for dinner.  Tight times around the 1st and the 15 calls for creative uses of these ingredients.  The key is mixing these ingredients up in a creative way so you don’t get sick of having the same thing every night.  Enter the one pan stuffed chicken dinner.

I love this dish because there are so many different flavors you can create, but the method is the same.  This makes it easy to serve chicken and potatoes lots of times during the month.

To make this version of one pan chicken I #RollIntoSavings at Walmart with some Kraft products that are on rollback right now.

We save even more by growing our own herbs like basil and rosemary, but you can use whatever herbs you have on hand, or no herbs.  Carrots round out our meal.  They are inexpensive too, but if you have a garden, green beans, Brussels sprouts, onions or squash make great accompaniments.

If you don’t have time to flatten your chicken breast, simply leave it whole and put the stuffing and cheese on top instead of rolling it up. You really can’t lose with this recipe.

Lining the pan with the veggies helps keep the chicken moist and the yummy Kraft Italian Dressing adds great flavor.  You could also try other dressings too.  I would really like to try BBQ sauce.

One Pan Basil Stuffed Chicken

 

Print

Prep time

20 mins

Cook time

40 mins

Total time

1 hour

 

There are so many ways to make this one pan chicken dinner, here's a bright summer twist.

Author: True Aim

Recipe type: Main

Cuisine: American

Serves: 4-6

Ingredients

• 4-6 Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breasts
• 2-3 Bakers Potatoes cut into 1 inch pieces
• 3 Carrots roughly chopped
• 1 tsp Chopped Garlic (optional)
• ½ cup Chopped Basil or Baby Spinach
• ¼ cup Kraft Mayo
• 2-4 Kraft Natural Cheese Slices
• ½ Cup Kraft Zesty Italian Dressing
• 2 tbs Parmesan (optional)
• 2 tbs bread crumbs (optional)

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees and prepare a baking pan or glass dish with nonstick cooking spray.
2. Place potatoes and carrots or other vegetables on the bottom of the pan with the garlic and season with salt and pepper.
3. Mix the basil and mayo together in a small bowl.
4. Flatten your chicken between two pieces of plastic wrap with a rolling pin or tenderizer. Put 1-2 tbs of the basil mayo on one end of the flattened chicken and cover with half a slice of cheese.
5. Roll up the chicken starting with the mayo end first and set in the pan seam side down. Secure with a toothpick if needed.
6. Pour the Italian Dressing over the chicken and vegetables. Top with bread crumbs and Parmesan if you are using.
7. Cover with foil and cook for 40-45 minutes.

3.2.1311

The post Simple Dinners: One Pan Basil Stuffed Chicken #RollIntoSavings first appeared on True Aim.

I know so many people who had no idea how to cook when they got out of school.  What happened?  They ate out, a LOT.  Then what happened?  Eventually their health caught up with them and they realized something had to change.  Then they learned to cook.

I don’t want that for my children.  I want them to know about food and how to cook from the beginning.

I’m not too worried about perfecting any skills because cooking with your children is more about confidence.  When they have experience in the kitchen it brings a confidence that gives them more freedom and more variety.  They catch the I-Can attitude that transfers to other areas of life and enables them to refine their skills on their own.

To get your children started, I’m sharing my favorite recipes for my kids to cook.

Top 10 Recipes for Kids to Cook

I like these recipes the most because they are easy, healthy, and require little adult supervision.  The key to cooking with your children is to repeat.  Repeat the recipe many times with them so they know how to do it by themselves.  Then, introduce variations of the same recipe to show them how they can make it their own.  Give them choices and start turning them into little chefs.

Allow them to take the reigns.  My daughter makes breakfast on Saturday and I let her come up with whatever she wants.  Sometimes it’s just cereal.  Other times it is scrabbled eggs and toast.  Often it’s messy but the knowledge and confidence she gains is worth it.

Incredible Edible Egg

Speaking of eggs, this is one of the easiest healthy things kids can learn to cook and their are lots of different ways to cook an egg.

Boiled Eggs

This is the easiest and safest way for kids to cook boiled eggs.

Boiled Egg Faces

Then turn those boiled eggs into a fun and creative snack.

Deviled Eggs

Classic and easy, but fancy I love this mess-free version!

Eggs in a Basket

After they can scramble an egg, they can have some fun making designs with them.

Pizza! Pizza!

What kid doesn’t like pizza?  And there are so many ways to make it!

5 Minute Pizza Crust

My kids love to make this pizza because it takes less than 15 minutes to make.

Heart Pizza

Almost anything can be used for crust, like these heart pizzas!

Homemade Pizza Dough

Challenge their skills with traditional yeast pizza dough.

Easy Peasy Snacks

Don’t just let your kids raid the pantry.  They key to snacks is to have healthy food available for them to prepare for themselves.

Dips

These are easy to make and your children can prepare them at the beginning of the week to snack on throughout the week.  Plus, they can help kids eat more vegetables!

Easy Healthy Granola

If my little Emma can mix this up all by herself, so can your child.  Plus this master recipe allows them to choose what goes into their healthy granola!

Sandwiches

These are easy, but they also can be an artistic outlet!

Peanut Butter and Jelly

You can’t go wrong with this combo.  Mix it up by offering bananas, raisins, or thinly sliced apples to put in their sandwich.

Sandwich Art

Give your children the tools and ingredients and see what they can come up with!

What do your children like to cook?

For more ideas, like us on Facebook or follow on Pinterest!

This post is part of the Top 10 Summer Learning Blog Hop!  Please click below for more summer learning activity ideas!

The post Top 10 Recipes for Kids to Cook first appeared on True Aim.

I don’t always have the time to make it, but when I do I always use this super easy pizza crust recipe that is so simple, it’s almost fool-proof.

I think the main reason my daughters like me to make it at home is because they want to help.  Emma, my 4-yr-old, can practically make it by herself, she has done it so many times.

Homemade Pizza Crust Recipe

A secret trick I use to help the dough rise fast, is to preheat the oven to 170 degrees.  After I knead it, I put it in a greased metal bowl covered with tinfoil, turn off the oven, and let it rise in the oven for about 30 minutes.  This cuts the rising time in half.

Just make sure you remove the dough before preheating your oven to cook the pizza.  I made that mistake and got a loaf of bread instead.  Oops!

I love this recipe because it makes 2 large thick crust or 3 medium thin crust pizzas and it is great for calzones.  It’s really versatile.

Easiest Homemade Pizza Crust Recipe

 

Print

Prep time

45 mins

Cook time

10 mins

Total time

55 mins

 

Easiest Homemade Pizza Crust Recipe

Author: True Aim

Recipe type: Main Course

Cuisine: Italian

Serves: 5-6

Ingredients

• 2¾ cup unbleached flour (plus ¼ cup more for kneading)
• 2¼ tsp quick rise yeast or 1 yeast packet
• 1 tsp sugar
• ¾ tsp salt
• ¼ tsp pepper
• 1 tbs Herbs de Provence (or ¼ tsp more salt and 1 tbs of your favorite herbs to taste)
• 1¼ cup hot water (about 110- 115 degrees)
• 2 tbs olive oil

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 170 degrees. Measure flour into a mixing bowl or stand mixer. Add yeast, sugar, salt, pepper and herbs.
2. Prepare your hot water and get your olive oil measured out. With the bread hook attachment, turn the stand mixer on low and add the water and then the olive oil while the mixer is stirring.
3. Mix for 2 minutes or until the dough comes together around the bread hook. If mixing by hand, add the water and olive oil to the flour and stir until the dough starts to pull away from the sides of the bowl.
4. Let the dough sit for 10 minutes and then turn it out on a generously floured surface and knead, adding flour until you get a smooth dough. The dough should not be sticky.
5. Place in a greased oven-safe bowl and cover with tinfoil. Turn off the oven and let the dough rise for about 30 minutes or until it has doubled in size. Remove from oven.
6. Preheat the oven and your pizza stone or baking sheet to 425 degrees. Meanwhile, separate the dough into 2 parts for thicker crust or 3 parts for thin crust. Roll out the dough with a rolling pin to your desired thickness.
7. Place the crust on your preheated stone or pan and add your desired toppings. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until the edges of the pizza are dark golden brown.

3.2.1310

Don’t forget to season your pizza crust with salt and pepper before you put the toppings on to enhance all the flavors!

What do you like on your pizza?

For more easy family recipes, like us on Facebook or follow us on Pinterest!

The post Easy Homemade Pizza Crust Recipe first appeared on True Aim.