World's Easiest Stuffed Green Peppers

I'm always on the lookout for quick and easy meals, especially since I don't like to cook particularly and my children are inevitably picky eaters. One meal that I can get them to eat is Stuffed Green Peppers. I inherited this gem of a recipe from my mom but I'm not sure where she got the original.

What You'll Need:
2 large green peppers, sliced in half horizontally to form "cups" and seeded
1 lb. ground beef
1 cup rice (you can even use the microwave variety or the boil in bag variety if you want)
1 can Sloppy Joe sauce
1/4 log of Velveeta, dice (you can use more or less depending on how cheesy you like it)

What You'll Do:
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees (or 175 celcius).

2. In a medium or large saucepan, place cut and seeded green peppers. Cover the peppers with water, and bring to a boil. Boil for about 10 minutes (just until the peppers are no longer firm, but have a little give when you poke them with a fork). Remove cooked green peppers from the water and place in a 8 or 9 inch square glass baking dish.

3. Meanwhile, make your rice according to the directions, especially if you need to boil water for them and they take awhile.

4. Also, start cooking your meat in a skillet on the stove. Be sure to thoroughly cook the meat, and then drain the fat away. Then add in the can of Sloppy Joe, making sure to stir well.

5. Dice the velveeta into small squares. Stir into the Sloppy Joe/ground beef mixture (it doesn't have to melt now; it will in the oven).

6. Fill each green pepper half with cooked rice and the meat mixture (you can do half of each mixture or more of one or the other, depending on your preferences). You can even thinly slice more Velveeta and top each pepper with it. Bake for approximately 30-45 minutes. Enjoy!

Easy Oreo Cheesecake Cupcakes

So I found this recipe online, yes at Pinterest again (it's not like I'm addicted or anything...). You can find the original recipe and post here at Handle the Heat. Their photo of the cupcakes looks so much better than mine as well. Here's their photo:

Here's mine:

Okay, so mine isn't nearly as pretty, but trust me, they were tasty. I took some in to my coworkers and I was told that they were pretty bad@$$. And they're incredibly easy to make, the only hard part is that you have to refrigerate them for awhile.

What You'll Need:

42 cream-filled sandwich cookies (read: Oreos), 30 left whole and 12 coarsely chopped

2 pounds cream cheese, softened

1 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

4 large eggs, room temperature and slightly beaten

1 cup sour cream

Pinch of salt

What You'll Do:

1. Preheat the oven to 275 degrees. Line your muffin tin with regular paper liners (the foil doesn't peel as easily away, learned this one the hard way). Place one whole Oreo cookie in the bottom of each lined cup.

2. Beat cream cheese until it's smooth with an electric mixer. Slowly add sugar and beat until combined. Add in vanilla and beat again.

3. Add eggs one at a time, mixing thoroughly. Beat in sour cream and salt. Then add the chopped cookies in and stir by hand.

4. Divide batter evenly amongst your lined cups, filling almost to the top. Bake, rotating the pan halfway through the cooking time, until the filling is set (about 22 minutes). Transfer to wire racks to cool and refrigerate atleast 4 hours (up to overnight). Remove them from the tins just before serving so they hold their shapes.

Voila. Easy peasy and very delicious!