Pizza Casserole

I would call it a success!

Pizza is a common meal in our house. Notice I don't say popular. We eat it more than anything else because it's quick and very easy since it's frozen and ready to pop in the oven..... and I'm sick of it! However, this Pizza Casserole looked very good! It's different! Noodles, sauce, meat, pepperoni and more importantly......Cheese! I found this recipe on a wonderful blog which I am going to share with you so you can check it out and get your own tastey inspiration!

 http://formamas.blogspot.com/2011/08/pizza-casserole.html

In the morning after breakfast I always have a little bit of quiet time on my hands. Yesterday  morning instead of hunkering down with a book while the toddler enjoyed her own quiet time I decided to brown the ground beef that I would be using. That way it would be less for me to do when dinner time rolled around. It seems like dinner time is the most chaotic hour in my house because everyone is trying to get into the kitchen and talk to me or look in the fridge for something to tide them over til it's time to dig in. One less pot to watch would certainly be helpful! So, I cooked the meat, drained it and put it in the fridge until I was ready to assemble the rest later that day.

I used 2 and a half cans of Hunt's spaghetti sauce (reserving the rest for a different meal), 1 bag of egg noodles (I could eat them cooked without sauce), 3 cups of shredded mozzarella cheese, Pepperoni and  1 and a half lbs of ground beef.

Once the noodles were cooked and drained it was time to assemble. I poured a layer of sauce in the bottom of my 13x9 or 9x13 pan and added half of the noodles.......

Then half of the meat and topped that with cheese. Go ahead and Pour sauce on it........Then more noodles, more cheese. Then the rest of the meat......Then the rest of the sauce.......

Now the important part......A Generous amount of CHEESE and PEPPERONI!!!!

Before you pop this into your preheated oven (350) cover it with foil! Bake 30 minutes. Uncover and bake an additional 15. For a thorough how-to head on over to the for mamas blog! She's absolutely right! It is very tastey! My Husband had 3 helpings! I think it's very filling. We had leftovers which I am sure will be even tastier tomorrow! Can't wait!

Over all, I thought this was easy to make! There's a lot of layering involved but it's not that difficult. It looks a little soupy in the photo at the top but it really wasn't!  I think the next time I make it, I will cook up some chopped onion with the ground beef because I do enjoy onions. I just won't tell the rest of the family since they don't love them.........I was also thinking that you could most certainly try this with chicken and alfredo sauce and still top it off with pepperoni.....Maybe add a little broccoli.....Ooooh! My wheels are turning. Well, hope you take the leap and try this for yourself! :)