This is one of my favorite, “in a hurry” or “I don't feel like cooking” dinners to make. In 15 minutes, you can have a real food dinner with the help of a few convenience, but still healthy, items…prepared red sauce, frozen chopped spinach and Italian sausage seasoning.
The best part. Leftovers. This makes enough to feed my family dinner and then, leftovers for two, the next day. You can always scale up or down to meet your family's needs.
We like to eat this with even more veggies on the side, oven-roasted asparagus complements this well. You could turn this into “spaghetti” by adding zucchini noodles.
I use a prepared organic red sauce from Costco. It comes in a glass jar with the following ingredients: Italian tomatoes, olive oil, white onions, basil, garlic and sea salt. Notice there is no added sugar. There are lots of healthy options out there, however, the two most important ones when it comes to red sauce is this:
- Look for sauce that is contained in a glass jar. The reason? Cans are lined with BPA, a known endocrine disruptor, that is not healthy for any body. The BPA leaches into foods, especially those that are acidic, like tomatoes.
- Look for sauce with no sugar added. Tomatoes have naturally occurring sugars, however, that doesn't stop food manufacturers from adding sugar to sauce. Read the ingredient labels and you will see high fructose corn syrup is added to most pasta sauce.
I amp up the nutrient density, of many of our meals, by adding frozen chopped spinach. It adds virtually zero taste. According to the EWG's Dirty Dozen List, spinach is one of those veggies you want to buy organic. If you struggle with getting in veggies, keep a bag of frozen chopped spinach on hand. It can easily be thrown into omelets, protein shakes and one of my faves, beef bowls.
I have a drawer full of spices, however, there is one we go through regularly and that is Penzey's Italian Sausage Seasoning. I am sure I could “hack” the combination and come up with my own, after all it is just salt, fennel seed and black pepper, but for now I pay for the convenience.
Ingredients
- 2 lbs. Ground Turkey Thigh
- 1 lb. Frozen Chopped Spinach
- 2 Tbsp. Italian Sausage Seasoning
- 24 oz. Prepared Red Sauce
Directions
- In large stock pot, combine turkey thigh, chopped spinach and Italian sausage seasoning.
- Cook over medium-high heat, turning periodically, until turkey is cooked through and spinach is wilted. About 10 minutes.
- Do not drain.
- Add red sauce and heat through. About 5 minutes.
- Turn heat to low until ready to serve.
