Ever since our “little bit” was born, as you can imagine, we haven’t had much time to cook. Nevertheless, the 2 months when I was home, I made a lot of effort to make good, delicious meals. Most of the time, though, there just wasn’t enough time during the day. You’d think, while on maternity leave, I’d be laying around, watching daytime TV. I wish! This babe of mine refused to sleep during the afternooon. Seriously. Aren’t babies supposed to sleep, poop, and eat? Well, somehow my baby didn’t get that notice.

So, 2 months after her birth (today!), I’m going to attempt to get back into the kitchen for real, with pictures and everything. A few weeks ago, I made pork chips and kale. I used to hate pork chops and anything pork related. Then I started eating bacon (yes, I lived a good 25+ years hating bacon), then honeybaked ham, then slow-roasted pork, then pulled pork, then…well you get the point. This is all thanks to my husband and some friends.

This post, however, has nothing to do with ham. It does have something to do with cooking a delicious  meal in under 30 minutes. It’s cheap, it’s fast, and it’s satisfying.

Husband and I currently have an empty-ish refrigerator but we almost always have ground beef in the freezer. So, when thinking about dinner yesterday afternoon, I suggested doing something with the ground beef. I sent him a couple of recipes and then decided on Hamburger Stroganoff. I don’t think my husband was too crazy about the end result, but I absolutely loved it. 

Husband changed the recipe a little bit, so that’s why the pictures below may look different from your end result. Husband didn’t use as much water, cooked the onions and mushrooms together, and didn’t add as much sour cream. Also, as you can see, our sour cream might have curdled a little. It didn’t affect the taste though. I am also a little crazy about scallions and will add them to almost any meal possible. So I sprinkled some on top of my plate.

Hamburger Stroganoff
(recipe from SimplyRecipes.com) 
Serves 4

Ingredients

• Butter
• 1 lb ground chuck
• Salt and pepper
• 1 yellow onion, chopped (about 1 cup)
• 8 ounces sliced cremini mushrooms (can substitute button mushrooms), sliced
• 1/3 cup of dry sherry, dry white wine, or water
• 1/2 cup chopped parsley, loosely packed
• 1 1/4 cups sour cream (room temperature)
• 1 teaspoon lemon juice
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika or more to taste
• 8 ounces egg noodles

Directions
1 Put a large pot of salted water (1 teaspoon salt for every quart of water) on to heat, for the pasta.

2 Heat a large sauté pan on medium high heat. Melt 1 teaspoon butter in the pan and swirl it around. Sprinkle the bottom of the pan generously with salt. Working in batches as not to crowd the meat (crowding it will make it hard to brown), break up the ground beef and add it to the pan. Sprinkle the meat with salt. Do not stir the meat, as stirring will prevent browning. Once the meat is well browned on one side (a couple minutes, depending on how hot the pan), use tongs or a fork or a metal spatula to flip to the other side. Once that side is browned as well, use a slotted spoon to remove from the pan and set aside. Continue to brown the meat in batches, adding a teaspoon of butter to the pan with each batch if needed, and salting the pan and the meat, until it is all browned. Remove meat from pan. Drain excess fat from pan.

3 Lower the heat to medium. Add the onions to the pan. If you are working with very lean meat, you may not have any residual fat in the pan. If this is the case, you’ll want to add in a tablespoon of olive oil or butter to the pan. Cook the onions, scraping up the meat drippings, until soft, about 5 minutes. Remove onions from the pan (add to the meat).

4 Depending on the cooking times of your particular brand of pasta, this is likely a good time to add the pasta to the (should be now) boiling, salted water.

5 While the pasta is cooking, add a tablespoon of butter to the pan, increase the heat to medium high. Add the sliced mushrooms. Sauté until nicely browned (about 4 minutes). Add the sherry (or dry white wine or water) to the pan to deglaze the pan, scraping up any browned bits. Let the sherry reduce by at least a half, then lower the heat to low.

6 Remove the pan from the heat. Mix in the sour cream and paprika until smooth. Return the pan to very low heat, and not let the sour cream boil (or it may curdle). You may add a few tablespoons of water to the mixture to thin it out a bit at any time. Stir in the lemon juice, and about 1/4-1/2 teaspoon of salt (taste). Stir in the meat and onions. Stir in the chopped parsley. Add more salt, pepper, and/or paprika to taste.

7 Keep the stroganoff on warm heat until the noodles are done cooking. When the noodles are ready (al dente) drain.

Serve the stroganoff on top of egg noodles.