Cheesecake!

This is my favorite cheesecake recipe, ever....

2 (8 oz) packages cream cheese (room temp)
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 t. vanilla
2 eggs
1 graham cracker crust

Preheat oven to 325. Mix room temperature cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla until smooth and well blended with blender. Add eggs, and mix. Pour into pie crust. Bake 35-40 min until cooked all the way through. Allow to cool, then place in refrigerator for at least 3 hours.

*you can always add a pie filling or whatever you want on top, if you want an oreo cheesecake (my favorite) use an oreo crust, break a couple oreos into 1/4's, and when you pour the mixture into the pie crust, only pour in half the mixture, put a layer of quarted oreos, then pour the rest of the mixture on top, cook, and then add crushed oreos on top of that, do not add oreos on top before baking or it takes FOREVER for the cheesecake to cook.... (found that out the hard way..)

Jenni

Hootenannies

I found this recipe on another blog. I guess she said these are also called german pancakes. No matter what they are called, they are good. :)

Hootenannies

1 stick butter (I took her advice and only used 1/2 stick)
1 c. milk
6 eggs
1 c. flour
1/2 tsp. salt

Place the stick of butter into a 9x13 pan, place pan in the oven, and preheat the oven to 425 degress. Mix together egg and milk. Add flour and salt in and mix well. Take pan out of oven, and pour mixture into the pan with the melted butter, (no need to mix in the butter..) Bake 15 to 20 min at 425. (the sides of the "hootenannies" will rise, but it will not run out of the pan) Cut into squares and serve like french toast.

Original recipe from Real mom kitchen

3 envelope roast

3 lb beef roast
1 envelope of dry Italian salad dressing mix
1 envelope of dry ranch salad dressing mix
1 envelope of dry brown gravy mix
2 cups water

Place roast into crock pot, mix the water, and all 3 mix's together until well blended, and pour over roast. cook on high for four hours, or on low for 8. The longer the better...

I have also done this with a frozen roast, and I usually turn it on high for an hour or two, then I turn it back on low until dinner time ( 8 or so hours) and it works fine.

Parmesan Bake

We found this recipe on the back of a Parmesan bottle while we were dating and to broke to go out to eat, it was so fun to have a date night cooking dinner together and its sooooo easy to make! It is not called this on the bottle that we found, but we could never remember what it was called so this is what hubby named it. Sometimes we cook half of a diced onion with the meat for extra flavor, but its good just the way the recipe is.

1 lb ground beef
1 c. penne pasta cooked, and drained (or any kind..)
1 jar spaghetti sauce
1/3 c. grated Parmesan (we always use more then this)
1 1/2 c. mozzarella cheese shredded

Preheat oven to 375. Brown meat in a large skillet and drain off the excess fat. With meat still in pan, add pasta, sauce, and Parmesan cheese. Mix well. Put mixture into a 13x0in baking pan. Top with mozzarella (we add extra parmesan on top also). Bake 20 min or until cheese is melted.

Jenni

Tator Tot Casserole

1 lb hamburger
2 cans cream of chicken soup (we use cream of chicken because that's what my hubby prefers)
8 0z frozen tator tots
1/2 onion chopped (if I don't have onion on hand, I use a couple shakes of onion powder, it works fine)
1 c. (or as much as you want) shredded cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 350. Cook gound beef and onion in skillet until meat is no longer pink. Add both cans of soup and simmer 5 min. Put into small casserole dish, layer tator tots on top of meat mixture. Cook in oven for 25 minutes, take out and top with cheese, and put back in for another 5 minutes or until cheese is melted.

This can also be a freezer meal, after putting the meat mixture and tator tots in a dish, cover with foil and freeze. When ready to eat it, you can either let it thaw first, or I just throw it in frozen, it takes a little longer but I never remember to defrost food..and add cheese during the last 5 minutes.

Crockpot Southwestern Chicken Nachos

These are my husbands favorite, we have them almost once a week. I got it off of another website, and didnt really change anything but the addition of kidney beans for my hubby. You can also use 1 cup of each dry beans and cook them in the crockpot overnight and just drain them and add them back in with the rest of the ingredients in the morning if you don't like to cook with canned beans. but anyways.. heres the recipe!

Crockpot southwestern chicken nachos:
1 small bag frozen corn
1 can black beans
1 can kidney beans
2 large frozen chicken breasts (if chicken isn't frozen its fine)
1 16 oz jar pace salsa (Or any salsa, I have even tried it with Ro-tel and it turned out good)
shredded cheese, tortilla chips, sourcream, cilantro, avacado, etc.

In the crock pot, put frozen corn on bottom, and place chicken on top. Drain and rinse in colander both cans of beans. Place beans on top of chicken and pour the salsa on top. The original recipe says to cook on high for 1 hour, then on low for 4, I ususally cook on low all day while hubby is at work, 8 or 9 hours. Shred chicken. ( I do this about an hour before I want to eat so it can soak up more of the flavors.) Top tortilla chips with cheese, melt in microwave, and top with chicken mixture, and whatever else you want on top.

You can also put this mixture in Tacos, quesadillas, whatever you choose. Its super yummy.

Recipe originally from Real Mom Kitchen

Jenni

LEMON BARS

2 cups flour
1 cup margarine or butter (I prefer butter)
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
4 eggs
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
Powdered sugar for garnish

Combine 2 c. flour, margarine, powdered sugar, and salt until crumbly. Pat in bottom of a lightly greased cake pan and bake for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Beat together eggs, sugar, lemon juice, 1/4 cup flour and baking powder. Pour over crust and bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes. Sprinkle powdered sugar lightly over the top. Let cool and cut.

NO BAKE COOKIES

In a bowl mix:
3 cups quick oats
1 small pkg. chocolate chips
1/2 cup chunky or regular peanut butter
Set above mixture aside.

In a saucepan mix:
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup milk
2/3 square butter (melted)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
Cook over medium heat until sugar is dissolved.

Pour cooked mixture over bowl of oats, peanut butter and chips. Mix together well and spoon out onto wax paper. Never double recipe. (I use a cookie scoop so they are uniform in size.) Let cool and enjoy!

Karen

Welcome to Cookin’ for College … and Beyond

This blog is a place to post recipes and meal ideas that we can all share! I planned to compile a recipe book for my daughters. As each one got married I’d think, “This is the time to get that recipe book done.” However, I’ve found that when you’re planning a wedding isn’t the ideal time to start another big project and it never got done. Now my baby is off to college and again I’ve thought I should make a recipe book. Well, with technology, my idea is evolving to something a little more open to all of us who want to contribute and benefit. I thought we could just add recipes as comments, but if you don't add Labels (which you can't do in comments) it won't show up in the search. So if you have a recipe to add, please e-mail me or put a comment requesting to be an author and I'll add you as an author. Then you can put your recipe in with Labels and it will be "searchable". If you just have a meal idea rather than a recipe, please label it “Meal Idea” so that when you use the search bar at the top it will bring up all the meal ideas. Feel free to add descriptive word Labels like “Cheap”, “5-Minute” or “Special Occasion” as well. Do the same when you post a recipe. Add as many Labels as people might use to search for your recipe, including of course, the title. Everything you add to describe your recipe or meal idea will make it easier for Blog users to search for and find it later. We'll try this and then tweak the instructions as we figure out what works. Thanks!!