On top of spaghetti, all covered with...vegetables?

Spaghetti with vegetables? Yep! Seriously, there is a lot of vegetables in my spaghetti! I was recently perusing Pinterest looking for cheap meal ideas and I came across a lady who blogs about her cheap freezer meals that feed her family of four.  If you have time please go check her out, she has a lot of ideas and not just about food either! While I was reading her post I discovered how she sneaks so many vegetables into her family's meals without them knowing it!


*Gasp* What? She feeds her family veggies and they don't know it? 


Oh please, tell me more! Don't worry! I will!


The lady over at A Turtles Life adds grated carrot to a lot of recipes, she claims it bulks up her meal, it doesn't really change the taste, and it's cheap and healthy. She does this with ground beef and uses that beef for sloppy joes, spaghetti, whatever you would use ground beef in. So, I decided to put her idea to good use as we have recently been looking for ways to reduce our food costs while not reducing our portions, (we really don't have that much to begin with) or quality, while still trying to keep it nutritious.

My beef! And my ice.

On my last trip to Kroger (my favorite store EVER) I scored 6lbs of ground beef for $11.18 on manger's special! I love manager's specials, and seek them out like it's my job. Well, I guess it sort of is in the job description of the family grocery shopper. Every time I find a manager's special I get all giddy and a huge smile on my face like I just won the lottery, people look at me like I'm crazy but I love finding a good deal. Who doesn't? The beef was in those logs, which I usually don't buy because for some reason they seem to have less flavor than the beef that has been wrapped in the Styrofoam.  But for the price I couldn't pass it up and if I'm just putting it in something such as spaghetti or tacos the flavor, or lack there of, really doesn't matter that much.  As soon as I got home, I immediately separated the beef into 1lb portions, wrapped what I wasn't going to use right away, and froze it. 

A few nights ago I pulled one of those frozen pound puppies, thawed it out, and let the experiment begin. I grated a large carrot (I will grate it a little finer in the future, it was a tad large for my liking), finely diced half of a large green bell pepper, and grated approximately 1/3 cup of onion. These measurements are rough estimates and you could certainly add more or less depending on your personal tastes and preferences.

***Chunky Girl Tip*** Cut an onion in half and freeze in a tightly sealed zipper bag.  Pull the onion out immediately before using it, grate as much as you need, and toss it back in the freezer. It will look very similar to shaved ice. The frozen onion will melt into whatever it is that your cooking so you have the onion flavor without chunks of onion.  This is very beneficial when making sauces such as barbeque, gravy, etc.

This Italian herb seasoning is my favorite, it has such a wonderful aroma! I added the seasonings to the meat and the vegetables in a large skillet and cooked it over medium to high heat to until the beef was browned evenly. 

 I wish you could have smelled the yumminess that was exuding from this while it browned up!

While my meat is browning I have my water for my spaghetti heating up, my oven preheating for my garlic bread, and my spaghetti sauce warming as well so all I have to do is add my drained beef and it's pretty much done!  For the spaghetti sauce I use a Kroger spaghetti sauce. I could make my own, but honestly in this case, it is cheaper, easier, and faster to use store bought. My favorite is their Homestyle 6 Cheese.

When my beef is done I drain it on a paper towel in a colander over a bowl lined with aluminum foil, then I quickly add it to my hot spaghetti sauce.

***Chunky Girl Tip*** Put a paper towel in your colander to soak up excess grease from your meat.  Line the bowl you are draining your meat into with aluminum foil and allow to sit over night to harden.  In the morning simply slide the aluminum foil out of the bowl into the trash.  You don't have to wash the bowl and you aren't putting any grease down your drain! 


Your spaghetti water should be at a boil now, this is when I add about a tablespoon of kosher salt to the water before I add my spaghetti noodles.  This flavors the water and the spaghetti.  

My arsenal! 

From left to right: spaghetti, angel hair pasta, penne pasta, kosher salt, fresh finely ground black pepper.

Place your garlic bread in the oven, and cook the spaghetti until al dente.  While I'm waiting on the noodles and the bread I typically make a salad for everyone.  I used the other half of the green pepper for everyone's salad, waste not, want not! When the spaghetti noodles are done I drain them and then return them to the hot saucepan and add a little olive oil or a little butter, this keeps the noodles from sticking to each other or the pan.

When you're all done it should look a little something like this!

 

Do you see any vegetables in there? I don't! Did I taste any? None that I could distinguish! Did my family eat it up like it was the best spaghetti they ever had? Absolutely!!! 


My verdict on the grated carrot? It did absolutely everything she said it would, we have a winner here!