Knock Off Olive Garden Five Cheese Ziti

I promise you guys, I am still alive! This week has been super busy! Brody was sick with strep, I came home on Monday with a headache so bad it made me feel nauseous, my work was moving to a new office, my dad had knee replacement surgery, and I had two midterms. It certainly does not seem like much whenever I type it out but I promise you all of that made for a pretty busy week! I didn't even get to go grocery shopping until this afternoon. And by the way, Walmart on a Saturday afternoon? Please shoot me in the face before I do that again. That was cray (crazy for all you non-hipsters).

And let's not talk about how much we ate out this week because it was easier than cooking. No, let's not talk about that at all.

I have one of those dry erase calendar boards that I use to plan meals and I make this awesome knock off Olive Garden Five Cheese Ziti that was on the menu for last night but due to my having to go kill a Physical Science midterm, I left Ben in charge of dinner. And yes, I was nervous. Let's not talk about the enchiladas again. Or the fact that when I was working at my previous job, I was close enough that I could go home for lunch and one day I came home to a box of Kraft mac and cheese with a can of cream of mushroom soup and corn. Um, what? It was terrible. Last night he ended up making a hamburger casserole, and it was actually edible. I was so proud!

So tonight we had the Ziti. It is the bomb.com, forreal! I might be a little biased but I think it is better than Olive Garden's dish. And I love me some OG! To celebrate my birthday a few years ago, I went like 4 times, just in one week. Yeah, it's my fav.

I put meatballs in my recipe, Olive Garden definitely does not do this but I think it adds a little something extra. The frozen pre-made meatballs work perfectly in this recipe. 

Knock Off Olive Garden Five Cheese Ziti

1 jar of alfredo sauce

1 jar of spaghetti sauce, I used prego

15 oz Ricotta cheese

1/2 tsp garlic salt

1 tsp italian seasoning

1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese

16 oz penne pasta

1 bag frozen italian style meatballs, thawed

For the topping:

1/2 cup bread crumbs

1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese

1/2 tsp parsley

1/2 tsp garlic powder

2 cups mozzarella cheese

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cook the pasta until al dente. While the pasta is cooking, mix the alfredo and spaghetti sauce, ricotta cheese, garlic salt, italian seasoning, both cheese's, and meatballs in a large bowl. Mix the bread crumbs, parmesan cheese, parsley, and garlic powder in a separate bowl. Add pasta to the sauce and meatball mix and put into a greased 13x9 baking dish. Top with the other mozzarella cheese then sprinkle the bread crumb mixture evenly over the cheese. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until top is golden brown.

And now, it is bedtime. I am very much looking forward to tomorrow, a full day of having absolutely nothing that I have to do. Except I'm sure that some laundry will probably have to be done. Yay.

Strep throat strikes once again!

So I officially suck at this blogging during the week thing. By the time we get home from work, eat dinner, get lunches and everything ready for the next day, bath, and watch veggie tales 14 times I can't keep my eyes open. Plus Brody is pretty much always on my computer every night watching youtube videos and he doesn't share very well.

Anyway, yesterday we had another one of those awesome "firsts" except this one wasn't so awesome. I was working and all the sudden "Jenni your daycare is on line 2..." Crap, first "your kid is sick come get him" call from his new daycare. So off I went to pick up Brody who had a fever and was just laying around. I called his doctor on my way home to see if he could get in sometime today for an appointment. They called back 20 minutes later and said "If you can be here in 15 minutes the doctor will see him." Awesome, especially considering we live on the other side of town and it literally takes 15 minutes to get there, probably longer because it was 5:15 and traffic is always worse at that time due to everyone getting off of work. So I turbo-ed to the other side of town to find out that he has strep. Again. Yay (said in the most extreme sarcastic voice). By the way, he officially hates the lab guy that does the strep test. As soon as he saw him he started saying "No!! No!!" Oh and he spanked some old man while we were waiting for his medicine at Publix. The old man's response "Hey at least he's not one of those introverts!" Oh geeze.

So today we are playing with garbage trucks and air planes and watching youtube videos. And I am trying to get in some study time since I have to take a midterm in 2 days. Yay, again.

So far we have watched a red jet ski video 7 times, spiderman 5 times, garbage trucks 4 times, and some boat crash video 2 times. 

Happy Wednesday!

Crockpot Spaghetti Sauce

This weekend we had my nephew's 6th birthday party at the Skating Rink, somewhere I used to go like every Friday night in middle school and haven't been back since. It hasn't changed one bit! 

Brody even skated for like 4 minutes, only because he wanted to see the lights on the middle of the floor. And then he pretended to drive the cars for the rest of the party. 

So after the party, my grandparents had planned for us to all go out to eat, but you know those kids in restaurants that won't sit still and run around and crawl under tables and stuff? Yeah that would be my kid. So I said that I would make some spaghetti and we would just eat at home. And by 9:00 yesterday morning dinner was already in the crock pot and I didn't have to worry about anything other than cooking the pasta and garlic bread last night after we got home. Piece of cake.

That's why the crock pot is my favorite kitchen utensil. What else will cook dinner all day while you are at work or out of the house, so that when you get home you barely have to do anything? Seriously the inventor of that should get some kind of award. Or probably just the millions that they made off of the invention, that would be just fine with me. 

This recipe was more than enough for 8 people and enough for lunch today but if you are cooking for less you could always freeze half of it. Just make sure that you let it cool completely before you put it in the freezer.

 And we have a bunch of jarred tomatos from my mother-in-law and my grandmother so I used two quart sized jars, but you could use the canned tomatos from the store.

Crockpot Spaghetti Sauce

1 lb ground hamburger meat

1 lb ground pork

2 tbsp butter

1 celery stalk, chopped

2 carrots, chopped

1 small onion, chopped

2 tbsp garlic, chopped

1 small bell pepper, chopped

2 quarts jarred tomatos

2 cans tomato sauce

1 can tomato paste

2 1/2 tbsp dried italian seasoning

1 1/2 tbsp dried parsley

2 tsp black pepper

2 tsp salt

1 tsp onion powder

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tbsp sugar

Brown the hamburger meat and ground pork and drain the grease. While that is draining, melt butter in skillet and saute the celery, carrots, onion, garlic, and bell pepper until the onions start to become translucent, about 5-10 minutes. While those are cooking, add the tomatos, tomato sauce, tomato paste, and seasonings to the crock pot. Add the sautéed vegetables and browned meat to the crockpot and cook on low for 8 hours. The longer it cooks the better it will be. Serve over your favorite pasta.

Caramel Apple Milky Way Cookies

Do you guys know what today is? October 6th. What?! 47 days until Thanksgiving. 79 days until Christmas. Oh my goodness. Where has this year gone? I haven't even changed our calendar to the October page yet. Oops!! Oh and I have midterms in 6 days. Awesome.

Anyway, yesterday in my Target adventure I found some other things that I haven't told you about yet. Caramel Apple Milky Way's, Pumpkin Cheesecake cookies, and Caramel Apple Pie cookies. Oh my gosh. I don't know why I'm on this caramel and pumpkin kick lately... It probably has something to do with the fact that it is Fall, duh! I just wish the weather would get the memo instead of continuing to be 85 degrees outside.

On your next trip to the store I need you to get the Caramel Apple Milky Way's and make these cookies. And get those Honeycrisp apples if you still havent gotten any of those. Oh and get the candy corn M&M's and Oreo's if you can find them and let me know how they are because I can't find them ANYWHERE and I'm very kind of sad about that. 

By the way, you might want to walk to the store because you are going to want to eat every single one of these cookies. Trust me, they are THAT good. My grandmother was here again this weekend and she was sitting at the kitchen table right by the cookies, she said she had to move to the living room because she couldn't stop eating them. 

I used the recipe on the bag of Nestle Chocolate Chips but instead of using chocolate chips I just put in the Milky Way's. 

Caramel Apple Milky Way Cookies

Yields about 3 dozen cookies

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

2 sticks of unsalted butter, softened

3/4 granulated sugar

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla

2 eggs

1/2-3/4 bag of Caramel Apple Milky Way candies, chopped

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix together all ingredients in a bowl except for the Milky Way's until combined. Fold in candy pieces. Roll about a tablespoon of dough into a ball and place on greased cookie sheet 1-2 inches apart. Bake for 11-12 minutes.

I'm going to go eat some more cookies think about going running because I'm pretty sure I've consumed enough brownies and cookies this weekend for 4 people. And I don't regret a single calorie of it. Ok I lied, maybe just a few of the calories...

Ghirardelli Dark & Sea Salt Caramel Brownies

Today was a super exciting day. Wanna know why? I needed to get my nephew a birthday present and where better to go than the greatest place on Earth? Disney world! Just kidding, I went to Target! I tried on some Star Wars masks while the hubs helped me look for a present. 

Luke, I am your faaaatherrr. Oh and I was smiling, you just can't see it.

So today while we were wandering through Target I stumbled upon the candy aisle, and it just wouldn't have been right if I had kept on walking. I saw some of Ghirardelli's Dark & Sea Salt Caramel squares and I have something to tell you guys... You know that salted caramel trend that has been around for a little bit now? I have yet to have any kind of salted caramel anything until about 1:00 this afternoon. It just never sounded appealing to me. But when you are in Target everything sounds amazing, every. single. thing. And they were on sale, so I bought two. And after I had three one I thought, I bet this would be good in some brownies! 

There are two kinds of people in this world. There's people who like the edge of the pan brownies and people who like the middle of the pan brownies. I don't know about you guys but I'm a middle kind of girl myself. Sometimes, I can be super picky about my food and brownies fall into that super picky category. With brownies are cookies, they have to be soft. Who likes a hard cookie? Definitely not me, if I am making them and the directions say to bake for 12 minutes I will bake them for 10 so I can be sure that they are soft. One other thing in my picky category are french fries, they have to be soft as well. Not undercooked but just soft. Hubs makes fun of me when we have fries because I will poke every one of them to find which ones I will eat. I know, I am weird. 

Ghirardelli Dark & Sea Salt Caramel Brownies

1 box brownie mix, whatever kind is your favorite

16 Ghirardelli Dark & Sea Salt Caramel squares

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare brownie mix according to the directions on the box. Pour half of the batter into a greased 8x8 pan. Lay the Ghirardelli squares on top of the batter in a single layer, side by side. Pour the rest of the brownie batter on top of the chocolate squares. Bake for 35 minutes. Let cool before cutting into the brownies, although I know this will be a hard step.

P.S. I'm sorry that I've been slacking on the posting this week. After going back to work this week, by the time I get home and we all eat and get lunches and everything ready for the next day I'm beyond ready to go to bed. Plus I was kind of busy riding my nephew's dirt bike that he got for his 6th birthday on Thursday...

Wordless Wednesday

One of my favorite pictures of Brody ever! He was supposed to be sick with Strep but the strep had nothin' on him, obvi!

The first 5 days...

True story...