The other day I was playing around on my iPhone when I came across an app for allrecipe.com’s Dinner Spinner. It is the neatest little app and I am officially in love. I am in the process of reserving a flight for me and the dinner spinner. We are running off together and never coming back. Goodbye forever.

Before I go, I thought I would share a recipe that I discovered while sitting in the car at the grocery store parking lot wondering what the heck I was going to make for dinner that night. Dinner Spinner totally saved the day.

Country Pasta with Mozzarella is a delicious little recipe that I need to go make again, right this minute, because my husband ate it all before I could stop him. Doesn’t he know that the pasta is mine and he was supposed to eat all the grilled meat and leave me the girl food? It must be the bacon in this pasta that made him forget the rules.

This recipe is simple and quick. I made it as a side dish with grilled chicken, but it’d be a perfect lunch on it’s own.

First things first, let’s boil up about 8 ounces of pasta. I used farfalle. I love the shape. The original recipe called for rigatoni, but, let’s be honest here, rigatoni is boring.

While the pasta is boiling, chop up two cups of fresh broccoli, eight slices of bacon, and a couple cloves of garlic.

Dump the bacon in a large frying pan and cook until it is almost crispy. Dump in the garlic and broccoli and cook them in the bacon grease for 4 to 5 minutes, until the broccoli loses a bit of the raw crunch. Don’t freak out about the bacon grease either. This is Buns In My Oven, you wouldn’t be here if you didn’t love bacon grease.

Dump your al dente pasta right in the pan with the bacon and broccoli (and bacon grease, I SAID don’t freak out!) and top it with 2 cups of shredded mozzarella cheese, 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese (I used the powdered stuff, it was delicious), 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper, and 1/4 cup of fresh chopped parsley.

Stir it all up over very low heat and don’t panic. It will be a big gloppy mess. The mozzarella gets all stringy and melty and it isn’t pretty. Pasta doesn’t have to be pretty though, just close your eyes and take a bite. You won’t regret it.

Real quick, let me tell you about all the different ways you could make this dish your own. You could make this a main dish by adding cooked, chopped chicken. You could replace the bacon with the chicken (you’d need to add a tablespoon or two of olive oil to cook the broccoli in) or you could just use the chicken in addition to the bacon. You could substitute asparagus for the broccoli. You could chop up a bell pepper and cook it in with the broccoli. You could chop up a sweet yellow onion and add it while the bacon was cooking, but only do this if you aren’t married to my husband, because he would probably throw a fit about the addition of onion. You could play with the cheeses, adding different varieties or swapping the mozzarella for something else entirely. I’m thinking cream cheese would be beautiful in this dish.

Country Pasta with Mozzarella
Recipe from allrecipes.com

• 8 ounces farfalle pasta
• 8 slices bacon, cut into 1 inch pieces
• 2 cups broccoli florets
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
• 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley

1. Cook pasta according to package directions and drain.

2. In large skillet, cook the bacon until almost crisp. To the pan, add broccoli and garlic. Cook until the broccoli is slightly tender, stirring often, about 4 to 5 minutes.

3. Pour in the cooked pasta, mozzarella, parmesan, cayenne and parsley. Stir together over very low heat until the cheese is melted.

I don’t want to alarm anyone or anything, but I am married to a very picky eater. He has passed his pickiness onto our 9 year old son and I have a feeling that one day soon our 4 year old daughter is going to start proclaiming that everything except for hot dogs and chocolate is GROSS! It’s a sad life to live, I tell you.

The one vegetable that everyone will eat is corn. Corn on the cob or corn off the cob, it doesn’t matter so long as it is yellow and has a bit of butter and salt on it. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you how very boring corn can get after eating it once a day for the past 27 years of my life.

Well, I am through eating boring old corn every single day.

Let’s make corn exciting again, shall we?

First, chop up six slices of bacon into  bite size chunks. Pop them into a pan and let ‘em cook.

While the bacon is frying, dice a couple bunches of green onions. If your family is really picky you can leave these out. You could also use a yellow onion, but there is no way my kids would go for that. As it was, my husband took one bite and said “That green stuff is ONION!” and then he wouldn’t eat anymore. Yes, it’s true. I married a big baby.

After the bacon is nice and crisp remove it from the pan, but leave the drippings. Add in the onion and cook it until it’s nice and soft.

Dump your corn into the pan along with the green onions. I used 2 cans of corn this time, but I normally use one bag of frozen corn. I like the frozen stuff much better than canned. You could also use fresh corn.

Drop in a handful of grated cheddar cheese.

Saute the corn, green onions, and cheese for about 5 minutes, stirring pretty often. Don’t let the cheese burn on the bottom of the pan. You’ll regret it.

After the cheese has melted and the corn is good and hot, go ahead and dump in 1/2 cup of milk, cream, or half and half. I used cream, of course. I’m a bad girl.

Add the bacon back in, give it a stir, and cook over low heat until hot and bubbly.

It’s hard to tell from this picture, but the corn is so creamy and delicious. The cheese just kind of disappears into the background and leaves you wondering just what the heck it is that makes this so yummy. The bacon brings a nice smoky flavor to the sweet corn. What I’m trying to say is, go make this. Now.

Corn with Cheese and Bacon

6 slices bacon
2 bunches green onions
1 bag frozen corn
1/2 cup grated cheddar cheese
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream, half and half, or milk
salt and pepper, to taste

Chop bacon into bite sized pieces and fry until crisp. Remove bacon from pan, but leave drippings. Cook diced green onions in bacon drippings until soft, add corn and cheese to pan. Cook over low heat for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Add cream and bacon to pan, stir and cook for about 5 more minutes until hot and bubbly.

Alright, I’m about to show you all something so simple that I feel kind of silly even posting this. I can’t NOT post it though, because, well, this has become one of my favorite foods and no, it doesn’t even contain chocolate or sugar. I’m about to show you how to take a boring bag of frozen vegetables and turn them in to something that you will enjoy. Yes, really. Vegetables. That taste good. Weird, isn’t it?

I am addicted to those steam in the bag frozen veggies, but they kind of freak me out at the same time. I’m not sure how healthy it is to be microwaving that plastic bag and letting your foods cook in all those chemicals, but man, they are so quick and easy to use. If you have a serious aversion to quick, easy, chemical-leaching foods, just go ahead and cook your veggies a different way. Steam them, boil them, microwave them in a glass bowl, whatever. Me, I’ll stick to the steam in a bag veggies and pretend that the extra eyeball I’m growing is pretty.

All you need is a 12 ounce bag of frozen vegetables (I prefer a mixture of broccoli, cauliflower, and carrots, but you could probably do this with just about any combination of vegetables and you’d get good results.), a tablespoon of butter, and lemon pepper seasoning.

Cook your frozen veggies  however you like. While they are cooking, get out a bowl large enough to fit them all in and add in one tablespoon of butter. Let the butter soften up a bit on the counter or pop it in the microwave for a few seconds.

Dump your cooked vegetables into the bowl right on top of the butter and sprinkle the top with some lemon pepper seasoning. (If you want to get all fancy and use real lemon juice and seasonings, go ahead, but the stuff in your spice rack will work just as well. Promise.) You can use as much or as little as you like. I usually sprinke on a couple of teaspoons, then stir it all up to distribute the butter and sprinkle on some more seasoning and stir it again. I probably use about one tablespoon of lemon pepper seasoning.

Oh, man. These veggies taste so good. Lemon just really brightens up the flavor of the vegetables and brings it all to life. Mm. Mmmmmm! Yum.

You can make this using any amount of vegetables, just adjust the butter and seasoning to your liking. Now, go make it. That’s an order.

I don’t know about you all, but I love corn. I could almost eat it for desert. I never have eaten it for desert, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t! When I saw this recipe for Scalloped Corn at The Homesteading Housewife I knew I had to test it out and, oh boy, am I ever glad I did. All the sweetness of the corn just bursts in your mouth and the smoosh-y texture of the cornbread combined with the crunch of the corn is out of this world. Just try it, you’ll see what I mean.

This dish is quick to put together and you can bake it up in your oven while your cooking the rest of you’re dinner.

You’re going to need corn, eggs, melted butter, sour cream, a box of cornbread mix, salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper. (You can also add in some diced dell pepper and onion, but I left this out to keep my picky eaters happy.)

Do me a favor. Don’t freak out about the cayenne pepper. It works so well with this dish. You’ll have no idea it’s in there, but it gives the whole dish a little depth.

Alright, now. Brace yourselves. This is where the recipe gets REAL TOUGH. You get out a big mixing bowl and then dump everything in it and stir it up. Whew. That was difficult. I’m going to need to sit down for a minute and catch my breath.

Oh, look. I survived.

Now dump the mixture into an 8×8 or 9×9 baking dish and pop it into a 350 degree oven.

Oh my. You should smell my kitchen right now. It smells very corn-y. In a good way.

The recipe says to bake this for 30-35 minutes, but I ended up baking this for about 50 minutes. The center was way to jiggly after just 35 minutes, so I just let it keep on keepin’ on until a knife inserted in the center came out mostly clean.

Let this cool for just a minute and then scoop it out with a spoon.

You want some, don’t you?

I’d share if I could.

Scalloped Corn
Adapted from The Homesteading Housewife

• 2 15 oz. cans corn, drained
• 1 15 oz. can creamed corn
• diced bell pepper (I omitted this.)
• diced onion (Ditto.)
• 2 eggs
• 1/4 cup butter, melted
• 1 cup sour cream (I used light sour cream and it worked fine.)
• 1 box Jiffy cornbread mix
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. In a large mixing bowl, combine all ingredients and stir together. Pour into an 8×8 or 9×9 dish and bake for 45-50 minutes or until the center is set and a knife instered in the middle comes out nearly clean.