Hillbilly Casserole

I made one of our absolute favorite meals this past week. The offspring has two meals she loves and will actually eat leftovers of. One is Hillbilly Casserole and the other is Mexican Stackup (blog about that one later).

Before making dinner I went into the offsprings room to ask her if she wanted Hillbilly Casserole for dinner but in my head was thinking Mexican Stackup and ended up asking her if she wanted Hillbilly Stackup. She was greatly confused and a little frighten about what exactly was about to go down in the kitchen...so was I. 

This recipe is very easy. Duh. I wouldn't have made it if it wasn't. But it is also yummy and super addicting. There is something about this combination of ingredients that renders us speechless while eating it. Which if you know me you know that is not an easy thing to do. It also is a versatile recipe which is another thing I love about it. You can add things like green peppers and deduct an ingredient like the onions without compromising the true intent of the recipe.

So we begin.....

                Hillbilly Casserole

Ingredients:

1 1/2 pounds ground hamburger

1 cup diced tomatoes

15oz can whole kernel corn

1/2 an onion chopped

8oz can Tomato Sauce

1/2 cup elbow macaroni

1 teaspoon Garlic Powder

Salt & pepper to taste

Start by boiling the water for your noodles. The rest of the ingredients can cook in the 12 minutes it takes to cook the noodles. Next I ignore all of the sizes of each ingredients that the recipe told me to use. I just eyeball how it looks. If I want more corn I pour it in. If I want less noodles then I add less. It is definitely items you can tailor to your families likes and dislikes. 

I end up making the entire box of elbow macaroni. We love the extra noodles tossed with butter and Parmesan cheese.

While the noodles boil brown your hamburger. I use a larger pot for this because I always overflow a smaller pan as I add the tomatoes. Never fails. 

After the hamburger is done add the diced tomatoes (I use a big can), tomato sauce, and corn. I do not drain my diced tomatoes. I like the casserole a little soupy. But feel free to do whatever your little culinary heart desires. Let that mixture of weird flavor heaven simmer until heated through. Then add you garlic powder, salt, and pepper to taste. The original recipe never clearly stated when to add the spices so I just throw them in it to the hamburger mixture before I add the noodles. I am not sure if adding the spices to the meat would change how they work any. I am not skilled enough to know what exactly that would do or how it could benefit the recipe more. Or how maybe adding the spices to both the meat and the mixture will taste. It may end up giving you flavor orgasm in your mouth but who knows I have never altered it. 

Your pretty mixture should look similar to the picture below....like seriously all this stuff is from a can so you can't screw it up too bad...

                          YUM!!

Lastly add the noodles. I found that 1/2 cup of noodles cooked up is NOT enough for this recipe. The recipe was too much meat that way. So, I just add noodles until my carb addicted heart is happy. 

Heat the mixture through and serve!

I am not sure how well this meal will freeze for later because we never have enough leftover to freeze. We eat the leftovers for a few days and then suffer an extreme depression when it is gone. Someday I'll double the recipe and freeze some just to see how well it would do. But until then I am shoving my gullet until my bottoms pop! 

     And that is what is for dinner!