Shay's Flowers: Veggie-full Spaghetti

I don't know what it is about kids and spaghetti. I don't think I can name a kid that doesn't love it, including mine. If I say we're having spaghetti for dinner, you would've thought I just told them they could have ice cream for dinner.

As usual, I use every opportunity to get them to eat as many vegetables as possible, and this is one of my best kept secrets. Not to mention is a great way to use all those veggies that are on the verge of going bad. My criteria is: if it's a vegetable and you can dice it up......then throw it in! Onto the fun part, cooking!!

I started by rummaging through what I had in my vegetable drawers that I needed to get rid of. The lucky winners were squash & zucchini (a staple in our everyday in case you haven't noticed), sliced carrots, bell pepper, onion and of course garlic.

I diced everything except the garlic into bite size, non-recognizable pieces :). If you have a pickier eater, you may want to dice them smaller.

Then I got some olive oil going in a pan (about 3 tbsp) and threw some minced garlic in to sauté for a minute.

Time to put all your diced veggies in! It may seem like a lot, but they will cook down.

While the veggies are cooking, I get my tomato products and pasta ready to go. I used one large can of pasta sauce and one can of stewed tomatoes to keep it nice and chunky. Feel free to nix the stewed tomatoes if you like. Also, if you like a soupier sauce, you may add some more of the pasta sauce. Be mindful though, these canned tomato products have quite a bit of sodium in them.

I use the veggie pasta all the time now. It tastes great and the whole family loves it. The only thing I can slightly complain about is that it can get a little gummy if you cook it too long, so keep eye on it.

Next, throw in the ground beef. I used 1 lb regular ground meat and 1 lb lean. Some might not like the idea of putting raw meat on top of their vegetables, so feel free to brown the ground meat separately. I myself, love the flavor that infuses with the meat when it cooks with the veggies. Either way will work:)

Now when it comes time to break up the ground meat I have the found the best thing ever!! It's by Pampered Chef (surprise, surprise) and it provides pure perfection when trying the get ground meat into a good fine texture . LOVE IT!!

Once the meat has browned and the veggies are soft, add in the pasta sauce and stewed tomatoes and let simmer for about 10-15 minutes on low heat. Because there is already plenty of sodium in the canned tomato sauce, I usually don't add any additional salt. Feel free to add fresh basil or oregano, and plenty of pepper of course :)