Dinner for four... and then some

Yesterday was Father's Day.  I finally made a decision on what to make for lunch, since the boyfriend's parents were coming over.  It was going to be their first meal at our house, and I wanted it to be nice, I wanted it to be tasty, I wanted it to be impressive.  (Do you understand why I had such a dilemma coming up with something?)

I'm lazy.  I admit it, so I wanted to make something easy, yet delicious.  I didn't want to be stuck in a hot kitchen all morning.  I made crock pot lasagna, and I think it was a success.  I usually have all of the ingredients on hand, so it is a quick meal to throw together.

Here is what you need:
1lb ground beef, browned and seasoned (I sauté diced onion with my ground beef)
1 can diced tomatoes
1 can sliced mushrooms (optional)
1-2 jars of pre-made spaghetti sauce of your choice
6-9 uncooked lasagna noodles
grated parmesan cheese
1 bag shredded mozzarella cheese

Brown the ground beef.  Drain 1 can of diced tomatoes and add to the ground beef.  Stir to mix evenly.  Spray the crockpot with pam on the bottom and all sides.  Pour a little of the sauce in the bottom.  Add a layer of beef mixture, layer of mushrooms, layer of sauce, sprinkle with parmesan cheese, layer of mozzarella, layer of noodles.  Repeat layers until crockpot is full.  Your last layer should end with mozzarella cheese as the top layer.  I usually use 3 lasagna noodles per layer.  Cook on high for 4 hours.  This lasagna will come out bubbly, noodles perfectly cooked and have the perfect browned cheese edges we all like from pan lasagna.

I served this with a simple side salad and garlic bread.  I think we were all pretty full after lunch.

Lucky for me, I didn't have to make dessert!  His parents brought banana pudding, which was the perfect ending to lunch!  Father's Day was great, good company, good food, good times.

After they went home, the boyfriend and I geeked it out on the couch with a Firefly marathon, topped off with the movie Serenity.

Saturday I took my dad out for Father's Day breakfast at a local favorite of ours.  I had a delicious omelette and he enjoyed a waffle topped with fresh strawberries and bananas.  It kind of inspired me to want to cook breakfast more on the weekends.  I don't even think I cooked on Saturday night, instead we picked and snacked on stuff we had.  Probably not the healthiest weekend food wise, but it was enjoyable overall!

Tonight was easy... you see, the crockpot I make the lasagna in is a large one.  I only fed four people yesterday... so we have a lot of leftovers, lasagna was for dinner again tonight.  I think it may make it one more day before we get too sick of it.  OH! I even managed to take a picture this time... maybe I should try to remember to do that more often.