In my slow-but-steady quest to eat and cook "real food", sauce packets were one of the first things to go. At first I just didn't make tacos or Hamburger Helper anymore... and I eventually found a good, easy mac & cheese recipe. But I missed the ease of these start-from-raw-hamburger skillet meals.

Well, food blogs to the rescue!

Dad's Cheeseburger Helper is pretty awesome. And not complicated.

And today, I finally found a homemade taco seasoning recipe that tasted right! (When I infrequently make tacos, I had been using some other recipes i found a few years ago. One didn't have the variety of spices you need and used maple syrup - weird... another was more like a mexican-style hamburger helper with rice, and it wasn't quite satisfying either.) There were two keys here:

1. I combined from two recipes I found, to make something that looked right to me.
2. There's starch (cornstarch) to give a little bit of body.

• 1 1/2 T. chili powder


• 1/2 T. dried minced garlic


• 1 T. corn starch


• 1 tsp. onion powder


• 1 tsp. cumin


• 1/2 tsp. salt


• 1/2 tsp. paprika


• 1/4 tsp. oregano


• 1/4 tsp. marjoram

Use 1-2 heaping tablespoons per pound of meat. I also added a can of diced tomatoes - next time, I might also add chopped onion and some beans, to stretch the meat a little farther - my family is eating more all the time! I fear for our grocery budget in the days of teenagers.