Wok's For Dinner: Sour Cream Noodle Bake

I cheated a bit on this meal. I got off to a very late start putting dinner together tonight. This was actually supposed to be last night's meal, but got pushed back. My son and husband had baseball practice this evening, at an inconvenient time, 6pm-7:30pm. We ate a late lunch, so no one was in the mood to think about an early dinner. So I decided to work out in the garden, pulling up dead grass, weeds and tree roots from the newly tilled garden expansion. My little girl helped out some, then got bored and headed inside the house. I kept plugging away. The tiller didn't get all the tree roots, and some of them are pretty stubborn!

The menfolk came up as it was getting dark, and I decided to head into the house and get supper together. Instead of baking it, I just mixed all the ingredients together and heated them in a saucepan on the stove. The ground beef and noodles were cooked up on my March freezer meal cooking day, so thankfully it didn't take long to pull this meal together, but it was after 8pm by the time we started eating. I didn't bother making any side dishes with it being so late.

Sour Cream Noodle Bake

Ingredients:
4oz cooked noodles
1lb ground beef
1 medium onion, chopped
1 tsp salt
1/8 tsp ground black pepper
1 Tbsp garlic powder
1 can tomato sauce
1 cup cottage cheese
1 cup sour cream
1 cup shredded cheese

Directions:
Cook noodles according to package directions. Brown ground beef with onion in large skillet. Add salt, pepper, garlic powder and tomato sauce. Combine cottage cheese with sour cream and noodles. Alternate layers of noodle mixture and meat sauce in a 2-quart casserole dish, beginning with noodles and ending with meat. Top with shredded cheese. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-30 minutes or until cheese is melted and browned.

If freezing: Prepare noodles and meat sauce, and mix together. Place in a gallon-size freezer bag and lay flat in freezer. Thaw 24 hours in refrigerator. Prepare for serving by layering in casserole dish with cottage cheese & sour cream mixture, topping off with cheese, and baking as directed above. Or, if short on time, you can simply heat in a saucepan on the stove like me, and sprinkling some cheese on top for serving.