Anonymous wrote:I'm looking for ideas, both quick and easy dinners and anything time-intensive but worth it. What does your family love to eat? What makes your kids say "yay" when they walk in the kitchen and see what's for dinner?
Makes my kids say "yay" with varying levels of effort:
Spaghetti Squash - highest level of effort but requires just time no real skill. This is essentially baked ziti with squash instead of pasta. Cook the squash earlier in the day, separate it and leave it in a colander to get most of the water out. Cook veggies (mushrooms, onions, peppers, etc.) and some Italian sausage, add in pasta sauce (homemade or jarred), stir in the squash and distribute everything well, then layer mozzarella slices on top and bake for 30 minutes or so. Very filling, pretty darned healthy, and my kids have liked it since infancy. One still won't eat pasta but loves this dish.
Enchiladas. Medium level of time but not really labor intensive. Technically I make "pastel Azteca" but I always call it Lazy White Lady Enchiladas. Great for using up leftover smoked pork shoulder. Everybody loves it, it makes lots of leftovers but they all get eaten.
Egg Roll in a Bowl. You can have this on the table in like 15 minutes as long as your meat is thawed. It's the only time we eat turkey outside of Thanksgiving. I like it to mix up the protein a bit, we always double the coleslaw mix and according to my husband the 'macros' are good. Everybody eats it.