Scrounge Up A Comfort Meal Without Leaving Your House

Emily P.
Jun 28, 2016
3 min read

I'm not the first to say that Mondays suck. They suck the life right out of you and leave you counting the hours until Friday. For me, I have two things that keep me going on Mondays; Happiest Vlogs on Earth's weekly YouTube video (highly recommend checking it out) and The Bachelorette. This Monday, after getting home from a particularly crappy day at work, I felt the need to sink into the couch with a plate full of something warm and fattening. My heart told me to go to the grocery store to stock up on treats but my wallet told me to throw something together from the food I already had, so that's what I set out to do.

The first thing I found was some almost expired meat sauce in the fridge I had made earlier that week. Instead of letting it spoil, I decided to use it. I then found a couple half full bags of mozzarella cheese in the produce drawer and baked ziti came to mind instantly.

Dinner

Three Ingredient Baked Ziti:

Ingredients:

Left over spaghetti sauce (or just a jar of sauce, meat not required)

Any kind of pasta

Mozzarella cheese

Step One:

Boil Pasta. Preheat oven to 350F.

Step Two:

Grease casserole pan (I use butter)

Step Three:

Drain Pasta. In a large mixing bowl mix together pasta, sauce and cheese, however much of each you'd like.

Step Four:

Transfer mixture into greased pan and top with extra cheese. Bake in oven until cheese on top is golden and bubbly.

And thats what I had for dinner! Warm, filling, and cheap.

Dessert:

As I mentioned above, this Monday was crappy. Chocolate was a necessity. I looked in my baking cupboard and saw flour, powdered sugar and cocoa powder. Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Chocolate cake, no.. CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES. Cupcakes are nice because you can have one and not feel like you completely cheated on your diet... unless you are like me and go back for 3 more.. The one problem was that I don't have a hand mixer so I wasn't sure how the cake would come out, let alone the icing, but I decided to give it a shot anyways.

Gluten Free Chocolate Cupcakes:

**This recipe makes only 8 cupcakes**

1/2 cup King Arthur Gluten Free All-Purpose Baking Mix

1/4 cup cocoa powder

1/2 cup sugar

4 tablespoons softened butter

1/8th cup vegetable oil (I used olive oil because I'm allergic to soy)

1 tablespoon vanilla

1 egg

1/4 cup water

Step One:

Preheat oven to 350F. Whisk together flour and cocoa powder in a small bowl.

Step Two:

Mix together sugar, butter, vegetable oil and vanilla in a large mixing bowl. Then beat in egg.

Step Three:

Add half of flour mixture to wet mixture and half of the water. Mix. Repeat with the next half of the flour and the water. Mix batter fast with a large mixing spoon for about 2 minutes.

Step Four:

Place cupcake liners in muffin tin (I didn't have any liners so I just cut squares of tin foil and molded them into the muffin tins.. talk about resourceful). Fill them about a third full with cake batter.

Step Five:

Bake cupcakes for 20 minutes then check for doneness with a toothpick.

Step Six:

Let cupcakes cool before icing.

Icing:

2.5 cups powdered sugar

1/3 cup softened butter

2 teaspoons vanilla

1/3 cup melted and cooled chocolate chips

4 tablespoon milk

Step One:

Beat butter in large mixing bowl until smooth.

Step Two:

Add powdered sugar to butter and mix.

Step Three:

Add vanilla, chocolate and milk. Beat until smooth.

Step Four:

If mixture is too thick, add milk. If it's too smooth, add powdered sugar until it gets to the consistency you'd like.

Step Five:

Ice cupcakes with knife or piping bag. I put the icing in a ziplock bag, cut a hole in the corner and used that as a make shift piping bag. This made my cupcakes look kind of like the poop emoji but eh who cares, chocolate is chocolate. You can also just melt some chocolate chips and slather that onto the cupcakes if you don't have the materials to make icing.

All in all a great comfort meal. Pair it with a coke and rum and you've got a grade A night on the couch in store. Let me know your favorite easy comfort foods!

xoxo,