Easy Chili Mac
It may seem odd to you, but I didn’t know people ate macaroni & cheese as a main dish or entrée until I was at least 13. In my house mac & cheese was always a side dish until one day I was fishing around for a new idea for dinner when we had next to nothing in the pantry besides mac & cheese. Now I still wouldn’t serve mac & cheese as a dinner entrée but I did think, well what if we make it into chili mac? That’s how I invented easy chili mac. You’ll make the macaroni & cheese according to package instructions with a couple of exceptions, instead of cow milk, I want you to use the soy milk. Soy milk is better tasting and better for you. If you don’t believe me, try it in your coffee and cereal. You’ll truly love it. The other exception is the butter. For this recipe in particular you can use margarine. Margarine is terrible and butter is amazing but for this recipe it doesn’t matter. You need a little fat to make the mac & cheese and the margarine will do just fine for this and save you a few bucks.
Easy Chili Mac Ingredients
1 box macaroni & cheese (any kind will do, generic is perfect)
1 package (1/4 lb) ground beef, chicken or turkey
1 can 28 oz crushed tomatoes
As mentioned, begin by preparing the mac & cheese according to package directions with the two exceptions previously mentioned, milk and margarine.
While the water is boiling for the mac & cheese, brown the ground meat in a skillet and season with garlic salt and a little chili powder. Once brown, add the crushed tomatoes and simmer on a very low heat while you are completing the preparation of the macaroni & cheese. Once the mac & cheese is complete, add the ground meat & crushed tomato mixture to the mac & cheese. Stir to combine and serve.
Couple of notes: You may have noticed I did not suggest you drain the ground beef. It is always better to drain ground beef but it I’m not sure you should waste it. Unless you produce a tremendous amount of fat, I’d leave it in. It adds a lot of flavor to your food. Most decent ground meat has very little fat now anyway you may not get enough to drain. Since I use turkey, I never have enough to drain. You may drain the meat as you wish. If you do decide to, drain about half of it into your “save the grease” can.