We’re always on the lookout for easy weeknight dinners, and we try to make enough of each dish to serve two meals. My mom usually does the cooking, but I try to help out as often as I can, especially when I don’t have meetings.

When it’s my turn to cook, I usually try recipes like this.

Ingredients

• 1 pound lean ground beef – I used 500 grams of ground pork.
• 3 cups peeled and thinly sliced potatoes – I’m terribly lazy so I didn’t slice them very thinly.
• 1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of mushroom soup – Campbell’s FTW!
• ½ cup chopped onion – We got small onions that week, so I used three.
• ¾ cup milk – Most of the time, when I cook, I use low-fat or non-fat milk. For this, I used full-cream because we got two cartons on sale.
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese – I buy this cheese called Chizboy. It’s cheap and it’s obviously not real cheddar, but it’s good enough!

Procedure

1. Preheat oven. I never really check the temperature, but the recipe says 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. In a medium skillet over medium heat, brown the ground meat. To reduce fat, I don’t use oil. I saute the meat in water.
3. In another pot, bring water to a boil. When water is boiling, add potato slices. Boil until tender enough to pierce with a fork but still firm.
4. In a medium mixing bowl, combine cream of mushroom soup, onion, milk, salt and pepper to taste.
5. Alternately layer the potatoes, soup mixture and meat in a baking dish. Sprinkle cheese in between layers.
6. Bake in the preheated oven for about 20 minutes, or until potatoes are tender. Top with shredded cheese, and continue baking until cheese is melted.

If you have no oven

You can use a microwave!

• For step 3, boil the potatoes until they’re cooked through and you can easily cut them with a fork.
• For step 5, bring your microwave setting to medium heat, and microwave the dish for about 10 to 20 minutes, or until the cheese is melted. That’s all you really need to worry about, since all the other ingredients are already cooked.

This is a complete meal on its own, but it would be great with toppings liked crunchy bacon bits or crunchy garlic. Honestly, potatoes and meat can be bland, even with the Campbell’s mushroom soup, so feel free to season with your preferred herbs–you can’t go wrong! And if you like, you can have a nice salad on the side, with a vinaigrette instead of a creamy dressing.

You will very likely have a lot of creamy sauce and cheese leftover after you’ve wolfed down the potatoes and meat, so it might be a good idea to have bread handy to soak that up.