One Pot Turkey and Rice Bowl - A great choice for a busy night. A complete meal in a bowl with lean ground turkey, spinach, black eyed peas and rice with just enough heat.

When I meal plan for the week, I only plan on 5 meals. I know we will order out at least one night (usually Saturday night) and something else will come up another night where I'll just be stuck throwing something together. Usually a Friday night ends up being my "what? it's 7 PM and I haven't cooked dinner yet" kind of night.

Last Friday night was one of those nights. I looked in the fridge and saw some ground turkey I had to use up. I figured at first I'd brown it and toss it with some pasta but when I opened my cabinet, I was met with about 12 boxes of pasta......all with about ¼ of a box left (how the heck does this happen, all the time). Pasta was out and I really didn't feel like cooking so I remembered this recipe called Turkey Robinson on The Food Network. It was a very simple meal of ground turkey, spinach and cannellini beans over rice and I looked at it and decided I could work with that.

One Pot Meals Are The Best Aren't They?

As I mentioned, I didn't feel like cooking and I definitely didn't feel like cleaning a bunch of pans so I was turning this into a one pot meal, for sure! Plus, it gave me one more reason to use my shiny new non stick sauté pan, I told you guys about last week! I'm still in love with it by the way.

I was nervous to figure out the ratio of liquid to rice to get it to cook properly. I know normally it's a 2:1 ratio but since there were other ingredients that might absorb the liquid, I actually went to a 3:1 ratio and it worked out well.

Here's How To Cook It

This dish is easy, brown the turkey, add rice to the pan with some vegetable or chicken broth (more flavor than water but you CAN use water if you want) and pop a lid on and cook for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes I added a can of black eyed peas and a few cups of fresh spinach, popped the cover back on and let it cook another 5-10 minutes. The only seasonings I added were salt, pepper and crushed red pepper flakes. I went a bit heavy on the crushed red pepper because I like the heat but you really need to adjust that to your own liking. If heat isn't your thing, or you think it's too much for your kids, just skip it.

This meal ended up being so much better than I imagined it would be. I thought it would be one of those things I make once and move on, but it's definitely being moved into the monthly rotation of easy weeknight meals. Tell me, what quick "go to" meals do you make on busy nights?

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