I made Hamburger Helper.

Not the kind in a box, relax. It was a homemade knockoff, using this recipe from Kitchen Stewardship. I wanted something quick and easy for after running group, but I didn't want to make chili in the CrockPot. (Turns out the night was chilly enough for chili, but I already had this halfway made before we left, so never mind about that.) None of the search results on allrecipes.com were thrilling me, so I went to trusty ol' Google and picked one that I had the ingredients for.

You'll realize there is no picture. Even I have my limits to what I will post. :D But the dish did turn out well, really. It just wasn't ready for a close-up.

I used Sam Mills gluten free corn pasta, lean, local ground beef (fat drained), Vidalia onion instead of onion powder, and HFCS-free ketchup in place of tomato sauce. That was our only grumble about this recipe. Between the ketchup and the sugar (turbinado--I didn't want to overpower the dish with sucanat, though I might try it next time), the sauce was quite a bit sweeter than either The H or I cared for. Reducing the sugar by half if using ketchup might be the way to go. I also omitted the salt and pepper, except for a sprinkle of kosher salt and fresh ground pepper on the meat while it browned--nowhere near the teaspoon and 1/2 teaspoon she calls for.

As far as quick and easy, this fit the bill. I couldn't really detect the cheddar at the end, and it seemed quite creamy enough without it, so when I make this again, I will either use a sharper cheese or omit it altogether. Between that change, using real tomato sauce (or Pomi strained tomatoes), and sucanat in place of sugar, we could have a decent one-pot dish to add to our rotation.