The kids are cookin' up a storm!

The kids have been cooking a lot lately. For lunch twice this last week Jaden and Jerah actually worked together [*shock*] to cook lunch for themselves—and yes, I realize that it was noon and they're still in their pajamas!

One day last week they made noodles with homemade sauce. They looked in the pantry, determined what was available, and went from there. So they pulled out some tomato sauce and a can of diced tomatoes, then started adding spices that they thought would taste good. When it was done, I had a bowl of the noodles and the sauce and it was actually pretty good. That was pretty amazing considering what was in it—Jaden told me they'd even a little bit of cayenne pepper in the sauce!

We skipped our traditional Kid Chef Night last Saturday, but it resumed again tonight with Joely making lasagna. I've actually never made lasagna from "scratch" before, so this was even a first for me. The lasagna turned out so well that Jeff even liked it (and he is not much of a lasagna fan); in fact, Jeff said that it was some of the best lasagna he'd ever had—if all lasagna tasted like that, he'd eat it all the time!

That simple lasagna recipe will definitely go into our rotation of meals; it was so simple to make, and it tasted so delicious. I've posted the recipe for it at the bottom of this post.

I also discovered another great use for the large cutting board that I use to cover the stove. Joely made a loaf of garlic bread with the lasagna, so I just pulled the whole loaf out of the oven, put it on the cutting board, and then carried the whole cutting board to the table to cut and serve it. The board was the perfect size for the bread and it was simply so convenient!

For dessert Joely made an equally scrumptious chocolate pudding cake. Again, I've never made anything quite like it, but it was so easy and tasted so good.

Here's the super-simple recipe for the lasagna Joely made (we adapted it somewhat from the original recipe).

Easy Cheesy Lasagna

Ingredients

• 1 pound ground beef
• 1 large can/jar of spaghetti sauce
• 16 ounces cottage cheese
• 8 ounces shredded mozarella cheese
• 6 lasagna noodles
• Grated parmesan cheese (optional)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Brown the ground beef in a skillet over medium-high heat. Remove from heat and drain the grease.
3. Spoon 1 cup of the spaghetti sauce across the bottom of a 2 quart casserole dish.
4. Mix the remaining spaghetti sauce into the beef and heat the mixture thoroughly over medium heat.
5. Place 2 lasagna noodles (uncooked) over the sauce layer in the casserole dish.
6. Layer the rest of the ingredients in this order:
   • 1/3 of the beef mixture.
   • 1/2 the cottage cheese
   • 1/3 of the mozarella
   • 2 lasagna noodles
   • 1/3 of the beef mixture
   • The rest of the cottage cheese
   • 1/3 of the mozarella
   • 2 lasagna noodles
   • The rest of the beef mixture
   • The remaining mozarella
7. (optional) Sprinkle some grated parmesan over the last layer of mozarella
8. Cover the dish with a lid or foil and bake for 1 hour.
9. Remove from oven and let it sit covered for 15 minutes before serving.

Serves 4-6 (depending on the appetite!)