Since I had about 3 pounds of ground beef I needed to use up, I decided to make 2/3 of it into taco/burrito meat for meals later this week. Then to figure out what to do with the last pound, I Googled "ground beef recipe" and eventually stumbled upon this recipe for Bacon Cheeseburger Macaroni. It looked harmless, and I had almost all the ingredients in my fridge/pantry already. Plus, it involved bacon.
Of course, I have a confession. Shall we all say it together, since I'm sure it's no surprise? "I didn't follow the recipe exactly." I didn't measure one thing. I eyeballed all of it, except for when it came to the condensed cheese soup, because it called for one can. Kinda hard to mess THAT up! The recipe doesn't specify, but I used red onion, because I like colorful dishes. And even though bell peppers don't generally end up on cheeseburgers, I added them anyway, because I know the mister loves them. I also used gemelli (twisty) pasta, not macaroni.
One thing I'd like to point out is that the recipe claims a 15 minute cook time. That will only happen if 3 burners are going at the same time. That would mean the pasta would be boiling, the bacon would be frying and the meat/onions would be cooking all at the same time. I didn't do it that way, and it ended up taking me about 30 minutes, because I cooked the pasta and the bacon first, then started the rest.
I am a fan of all the ingredients in this dish so this was a lot of fun for my tongue. I'm also a sauce girl, so using a little less evaporated milk than was called for made it nice and thick. I didn't substitute any lower fat ingredients, but I'm sure it would work just fine to use low fat milk/cheese/soup and maybe ground turkey.
To sum up, this recipe is simple and has good flavors. It got even better when I added a little black pepper. I will definitely make this again--maybe even as written next time! Nah...probably not. ;^}
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