It’s a way to end up with a delicious home cooked meal, side dish or dessert without spending lots of time to get there.

This week’s recipe comes courtesy of  Cooking with Paula Deen.

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French Toast BLT’s

Kentucky Hot Browns.

Being two Kentucky girls, we think it’s high time we share this good old southern dish with the rest of the world. And true in Liz and Kate form, of course we had to figure out a cheater way to keep the same yummy flavor, while cutting the time and effort spent in the kitchen.

Right about now most of you may be saying, “What in the world is a Hot Brown?” Here’s a brief history of the origins of this delicious dish.

In the 1920′s, The Brown Hotel (in Louisville) drew over 1,200 guests each evening for its dinner dance. In the wee hours of the morning, the guests would grow tired of dancing and retire to the restaurant for a bite to eat. Diners were growing rapidly bored with the traditional ham and eggs, so Chef Fred Schmidt set out to create something new to tempt his guests’ palates. His unique creation was an open-faced turkey sandwich with bacon and a delicate Mornay sauce. Exemplifying our unending dedication to serving our guests, The Hot Brown was born! ~The Brown Hotel in Louisville

So without further ado, we present…

Cheater Kentucky Hot Browns

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Ingredients:

• Texas Toast style bread (one slice per serving)
• Deli ham (2 slices per serving)
• Deli turkey (2 slices per serving)
• Mornay or Hollandaise sauce mix (I used 3 pkgs. for 6 servings)
• Tomatoes, sliced
• Bacon, cooked

Directions:

Toast the slices of bread and place in casserole dish coated with non-stick cooking spray.

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Top each slice with 2 slices of turkey and 2 slices of ham. Add tomato slices.

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Make sauce mix according to package directions. Pour sauce over all.
Place under broiler until nice and bubbly and slightly browned.
Top each serving with 2 slices of bacon.

Enjoy!

Other Cheater Recipes!

To the outside world (and by outside world, I mean anyone who has never lived with me long enough to see behind the facade) I’m sure I appear to have my act together.  My kids get to school on-time with matching clothes, combed hair and clean faces (usually).  I cook dinner most nights of the week.

I play taxi driver, get the dishes done and sweep the floor every day.  I sign up to bring food to church socials.  I read my books for book club and I show up to appointments on time.  I don’t wear my pj’s to go shopping.

I am an organized super-woman who can do it all.  (And that is so far from the truth, I’m surprised I wasn’t struck by lightning while typing that sentence.)  It’s not that I don’t do all those things, I really do, but the way I get to the end result is far from organized, simple and orderly.  If I could use one word to describe the flow of a normal day at my house, it would be “chaos”.  And I’m just betting that there are more than a few of you who can relate to this lifestyle.  Even if I doubled the hours in a day, I still could never catch up and get everything done.

So…how to survive and still keep some semblance of sanity?  That is the question.   And perhaps you thought I was going to give you the answer here?  Haha…think again.  If I had that answer, I wouldn’t be using the word “chaos” to describe my life, now would I?  I do have a simple, time-saving solution for a cheater dinner and dessert, for those worst of all days when you notice it’s 6:00pm and you realize the thought of what to make hasn’t even crossed your mind…You know one of those days when you wish you had your own personal chef who could just whip you up a dinner of  Chicken Marsala with garlic mashed potatoes,  steamed  asparagus, homemade yeast rolls and a nice creme brulee for dessert.  One can dream, right?

Instead, we’ll have to settle for the next best thing…Kate’s Cheater Enchiladas and Kate’s Cheater Toffee Pecan Pumpkin Pie.

Kate’s Cheater Enchiladas

Ingredients:

• Package of your fav frozen burritos
• Can of your fav enchilada sauce
• Grated cheese
• Black olives

Directions:

1. Just put the frozen burritos in a microwave safe dish and pour the enchilada sauce over the top.
2. Sprinkle with the grated cheese and olives, and heat in the microwave.

My family can’t even tell the difference between these and the homemade kind that are sooo time consuming and sooo messy to make.  My philosophy is…if they can’t tell the difference and don’t care, why waste the time?

AND while you’re eating dinner, just pop this next dish in the oven and voila…dessert!

Kate’s Cheater Toffee Pecan Pumpkin Pie

Ingredients

• 1 frozen pumpkin pie
• 1/2 stick butter, softened
• 3/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
• 3/4 cup chopped pecans

Directions

1. Heat oven to 375.  Bake frozen pie until edges are set but center of pie is slightly wet, about 55 min.
2. Take out pie and increase heat to 400.   In bowl cream together butter and brown sugar.  Fold in pecans.  Sprinkle onto hot pumpkin pie and bake until topping is browned (10 – 15 min)

Enjoy your Coffee Break!

Kate

Spaghetti & Meatballs with Meat Sauce:

2,430 calories, 128 g fat, 57 g saturated fat

Primo Chicken Parmesan:

2,220 calories, 148 g fat, 52 g saturated fat
Are you kidding me????  Healthier choices…
at Macaroni Grill -

Capeilini Tre Pomodoro:

540 calories, 20 g fat, 3 g saturated fat

Pollo Magro Skinny Chicken:

330 calories, 5 g fat, 1 g saturated fat

Enjoy your Coffee Break!