This is one of my favorite meals for those busy nights when I don’t feel like cooking and I don’t feel like fighting my kids. It’s super quick. I almost always have all the ingredients in my fridge/freezer/pantry. My kids and husband absolutely love it. It’s low in calories and high in protein (not-so-quick note about that–I entered this using the Weight Watchers recipe builder and the points were about what I thought they would be. Then I entered it on My Fitness Pal and the calories were VERY high; when I used those calories to calculate the points, it was about 3 times the original amount. Puzzled, I used a handful of other calorie calculators and they were all much lower. So. If you enter this into My Fitness Pal and you’re confused about why the information is so off, I ran into the same problem. While I’m not sure what’s going on over there, I’m confident the information I’m including is accurate.)
To get started, chop a medium onion, a medium bell pepper (any color), and 3-4 cloves of garlic.
Heat a 12″ skillet that has a lid over medium heat. Add 1 pound of extra-lean ground beef
and cook, stirring frequently, until about halfway cooked. Add onions, garlic, and pepper as well chili powder, cumin, coriander, salt, and pepper
and cook until the meat is cooked through and the onions are tender. Add 2 cups of V8 juice,
8 ounces of tomato sauce, and 1 cup of water and bring to a boil. Add 8 ounces of macaroni-ish pasta…
and stir to combine and then cover, reduce heat, and cook for 15-ish minutes or until the pasta is al dente. Add a can of drained pinto beans…
and heat through. Remove from heat, sprinkle with shredded cheese,
and replace the lid for 2-3 minutes or until the cheese is melted. Sprinkle with onions and chopped cilantro (if desired) and serve immediately.
