Fun Food Friday- Cheeseburger Soup

One of the ways to get points in this challenge I am participating in is to eat 4 servings of vegetables each day. Let me tell you, that is a lot of vegetables every day :). So I've been trying to find different ways to get all my vegetables in and one of those is with this soup. It's full of vegetables! And yet, it's still delicious (okay, I've actually grown to really like vegetables, but still, you see a soup called "Cheeseburger Soup" and yet in the picture of ingredients you see way more vegetables than hamburger or cheese, you wonder how it can really be any good :)). I think it would really be good with some bacon added in, but then I would have to deduct points because bacon is on the unhealthy list :), so we go without, but feel free to spruce it up to your liking. :)

Ingredients: Celery, Carrots, Onion, Potatoes, Ground Beef, Cheese, Milk, Flour (I used wheat flour but white would work too), Chicken Broth, Olive Oil, Salt, Paprika

First you want to cook the vegetables, so add your chopped carrots, celery and onion to a pan...

And drizzle on a little olive oil

Stir it around and cook for 10 minutes, stirring every so often so the vegetables don't get burned

Jonathan thought he was quite funny to "spray me with water" while I was making his dinner :)

I like to put the flour and spices in a dish before I put them in the pan because as soon as you add them you need to start stirring so they don't burn and it's hard to stir and measure out all the seasonings at the same time, so if you just put them all in a bowl together beforehand, you can dump them all in together (hopefully that makes sense, if not, just trust me on this one :)). So to a small bowl add 1 TBS wheat flour...

1/2 tsp of paprika...

And 1/2 tsp of black pepper

I also like to get my liquid together because again, if you stop stirring the flour mixture to get the liquid it can quickly burn. So measure out 3 cups of chicken stock...

And 1 cup of milk

Add the flour mixture to the vegetables...

Stir and cook for 1 minutes, stirring continually

Add the liquid. Cook over medium heat for 10 minutes, stirring often

Remove from heat and blend with an immersion blender (if you don't haven an immersion blender, you should get one, they're awesome :) but you can also use a regular blender or food processor)

Return the soup to the heat and add 2 peeled and diced potatoes. Cook for 10 minutes

Add 1 cup of shredded cheese (I used Colby-Jack but you can use whatever you like)

Stir until the cheese is melted

Then just add 1/2 pound of browned ground beef (I like to brown a bunch together and then put it in bags in the freezer to use for soups, so that's why mine is coming out of a bag. Obviously if you don't have already browned ground beef, you will need to go ahead and brown it at some point during this soup making process :)).

And there you go, Cheeseburger Soup, chalked full of vegetables

Eat it with a salad with Romaine Lettuce and Cauliflower and you're on you way to 4 servings of vegetables! :)

My boys, especially the twins, love this soup!

Micah will eat it as long as I take some out for him before I put the ground beef in, the kid is not a fan of meat, we're working on this :)

 

Cheeseburger Soup

1 tsp olive oil

1 small onion, diced

3 large carrots, diced

2 stalks celery, diced

1 TBS wheat flour

1/2 tsp paprika

1/2 tsp black pepper

3 cups chicken stock

1 cup milk

2 potatoes, peeled and diced small

1 cup shredded cheese

1/2 pound ground beef, browned

 

To a medium saucepan add the diced onion, carrots and celery. Drizzle with olive oil. Stir and cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the flour and spices, stir and cook for 1 minute, stirring constantly. Add stock and milk and cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and puree with an immersion blender (or food processor or regular blender). Return to heat and add potatoes, cook for 10 minutes. Add cheese and beef, cooking until the cheese is melted.

 



Life with the Bussis'- 1.28.15

We've had a pretty good week over here in the Bussis household. Colds seem to have gone away, just a few runny noses but always clear. We've watched a lot of tennis with the Australian Open going on (it's so cute, both David and Jonathan call it "tennis ball" so they'll say "we watch tennis ball Mommy" :)). We also were able to play outside a couple of times since the weather was pretty mild (that has not been the case the last couple of days, however, it's been pretty cold here). Here are a few of the fun things we've done this week:

Something I've noticed since we got back from Mexico is that all 3 boys really play nice together. That's not to say they don't argue, they do, usually because someone has taken a toy from someone, but for the most part they really enjoy playing together. Here they are playing in Micah's room (Micah had been hiding from me :)). I love just sitting back and watching them all interact together and get along, makes me smile :).

One afternoon Micah got up from his nap and said he was cold. I had a perfect solution for him, come snuggle with mommy. :) (Seems strange that he thought it was cold when I was in a tank top :), I had just done my exercise video, so I didn't think it was cold)

It's so much more fun this year playing in the snow with all the boys. Last year the twins were just learning how to walk so they couldn't do much outside. This year nothing holds them back and they love throwing snowballs and sledding down our little hill in the backyard.

They love sledding together

Or hopping on top of Daddy for a ride

Last Friday we had a play date with my friend Kasey and her girls. Micah and Lydia played really well together. Lydia got a little indoor tent for Christmas and at one point she was in there with all my boys. I commented to Kasey that at some point in Lydia's life she and her husband won't be okay with Lydia in a tent with 3 boys :), but for now it's cute :)

 

All the kiddos eating lunch.

Friday night we headed out to dinner. We ordered the boys dinner right away so they wouldn't have to wait too long, yeah, they had their food before Steve and I had even ordered :). Then we were worried they'd be done too soon and we wouldn't be able to enjoy our food, but they were good little boys and let us enjoy our meal.

David had not found it necessary to sleep at all in the afternoon, so as you can see, he was a little tired out at dinner, but still was a very good boy at the restaurant

We had fun making things with PlayDoh

And being silly while Daddy vacuumed

Jonathan declared "I need to sit and read" and I guess his sleeping bag was the closest "seat" because that's where he plopped himself down and David must have thought it was a good idea too

 

These two love reading. They got these Thomas the Train books for Christmas that have a reader with it and they love to sit together and "read" Thomas

 

Saturday night Steve and I were able to go to a marriage event in our town. It was great to hear about ways to strengthen our marriage and just get to spend a night out together

 

Sunday night I was in the nursery so I took a few pictures of them being cute in the nursery :) Jonathan eating his Smarties at the picnic table (there's a lady at church who gives the boys Smarties every service, they always know to go find her :))

He loves it when he gets to stay in the nursery with mommy :)

David was having so much fun he wouldn't stop so I could get a good picture

 

Micah ended up being a good helper. This little boy was upset when his Dad came down to bring his other brother to the nursery after the service had started and then left so Micah cheered him up with a silly toy. It was so cute to see Micah taking care of him :)

Jonathan always wants to be like Daddy so he got his own computer to be on :)

Today at the library their story was about ice cream so as a treat for the kids they gave them ice cream cups, Micah was a big fan of this :)

 

So as you can see we had a very fun week!

Life with the Bussis'- 1.21.15

My favorite Jonathan saying of the week (the kid doesn't stop talking :)): So one night we took his clothes off downstairs before going up to take a bath. Steve asked him where his belly button was. He said he didn't know, so I showed him where it was. He touched it, looked up and said "My belly button doesn't work!" Not sure what he thinks a belly button is supposed to do. :) Oh Jonathan, with his mouth running all the time, you just never quite know what's going to come out of it.

I'm doing this 90 day TERRAfit challenge where you are on a team and you get points for eating really healthy and exercising. Anyways, I needed to take some before pictures so Micah helped me see if in front of the closet worked

Jonathan wanted in on the picture taking too

Micah got quite a few games for his birthday so we've had lots of fun playing them

It works best if the twins participation in the game is limited to watching from Mommy's lap :)

Silly boys

Trying out the cool bowling set they got for their birthday

All the boys are very encouraging while I exercise each day. They like to join in. Although Micah didn't last long here, he said it wasn't good for his back :) I'm guessing he's heard that one come out of his mother's mouth before. However instead of exercising with me he proceeded to pick up all the toys in that room on the floor, without me telling him, what a kid!!!

 

This is David trying to do one of the stretches (notice he has shoes on. Both him and Jonathan saw me exercising with shoes on so they went and got their shoes and asked to have them on :).

How Jonathan does the stretches :). It's cute to watch them imitate me, but it wasn't so great when I started doing the kickboxing, I had two little guys where I was supposed to be kicking :)

Friday Micah had his 4 year old well child visit. He did such a great job! What a difference from last year when he screamed the whole time with the nurse and wouldn't even let her take his blood pressure. I think Doc McStuffins has really helped :) He did cry when he got his shots, but my mom says I deserve anything I get from my kids because when I was 7 I had to have a shot and it took 2 doctors and 3 nurses to hold me down to get my shot :). Here are his stats:

Height: 3'5.25" (72%)

Weight: 38lb 6oz (71&)

 

After his appointment he got to go on a lunch date with Mommy.

He loves Panera Bread!

And then after lunch he got to go to Toys 'R Us to pick out a toy with his gift card he got from the Geoffrey Birthday Club. And what did he pick out? A RED pontoon Dusty. So now we have racing Dusty, Orange pontoon Dusty and Red pontoon Dusty. There's a Dusty for everyone in this house :)

 

Jonathan was sitting on my lap one afternoon and Steve sat down at the table with some celery and peanut butter for a snack and Jonathan jumped off my lap and climbed right on Steve's, wonder why :)

More games, this time it was Trouble and I have to say, Micah takes great joy in knocking someone back to their home.

 

Micah won here. He was blue. Notice while all his blue tabs are nicely in his finish, all of my red tabs are still in my home :(

But I had this cute little guy on my lap so all was good :)

 

It continues to be hit or miss if the twins will actually sleep during their naptime. There's lots of jumping and chatting that goes on upstairs (I love to just sit with the monitor on and listen to them talk to each other. Yesterday David was saying "Jonathan, scare me" and Jonathan would respond with a roar to which David would respond with a scream, then again say "Jonathan, scare me" and on and on it went :)). And while that's cute, it leaves for some tired boys. Most days one of them will usually eventually fall asleep. This day Jonathan never did fall asleep, so he earned himself a nice and early bed time, which he did not argue about.

Saturday morning we went out to breakfast with Steve's parents. Jonathan knew the fun place to go after he was done with his breakfast :)

Micah showing off his quilt picture he made at storytime at the library.

 

So fun times at the Bussis Home!