This black bean and lentil soup is a spicy southwestern soup recipe thrown together with what I had on hand in the house one night… Delish!

During these cold months of winter, nothing goes better for dinner than a warm, hearty soup recipe. This one fits the bill there…

“OK… black beans, tomatoes and ground turkey on hand… what to make? How about my signature quick chili? Great! Oops… I’m missing all the rest of the ingredients… rethink that plan…”

This is the conversation I had with myself one evening recently, when I drifted into the kitchen after a long day at the computer to make dinner. I love my chili, but I had to come up with a different thrown together soup recipe when I realized I didn’t have all the ingredients on hand to make the traditional chili.

A few veggies, some spices and a canister of lentils later, I had a flavorful pot of soup going. You’ll find the full recipe and detailed cooking instructions on my main recipe site, Thrown Together Meals…

Black Bean and Lentil Soup

I hope you enjoy!

My Mushroom Gravy Pork Chops is one of my standard go-to recipes. I make it just about every couple of weeks, in some form or another. I’m posting the basic recipe here, but I’ve previously shared my Italian-version as a Recipe of the Week on the blog too.

You really can vary this recipe for a number of different flavor profiles, so that it fits what makes you and your family happy. It’s fast, easy and fairly healthy too, even though it has gravy.

If you like pork chops, mushrooms and gravy, then go ahead… try it out. I think you’ll enjoy it. Here is the recipe for Mushroom Gravy Pork Chops. Be sure to leave me some comment love about it either here or on that page, won’t you?

And later on, if you want more ideas for using pork, then check out my easy pork recipes page too. Or if you have your own favorite pork recipe, won’t you share it with us?

Thanks… until next time.

I love chili! I grew up on it, but my mom made it the old-fashioned way, with dried beans that had to be soaked overnight, fatty ground beef and large chunks of tomatoes. Much as I loved it (and made it that way myself for years), once I became a single, working mom, I had to come up with an alternative if I wanted to keep eating chili.

So, I developed this easy vegetarian chili recipe. I went vegetarian because my girls became finicky about eating beef during their teen years and neither white chili nor ground turkey were too mainstream in the early 90s… at least not that I was aware of. So I developed this recipe that has lots of protein, but it comes from TVP and beans, rather than from beef.

These days, I often make this recipe using ground turkey because I cook now for my hubby and mother, both of whom like meat, but if you want to stick with the vegetarian version, you certainly can.

You’ll find my Easy Vegetarian Chili recipe here on my Thrown-Together-Meals.com website, along with some suggested variations. It’s certainly not the only vegetarian chili recipe out there, but it is uniquely mine and it’s fast and easy, not to mention healthy! Hope you enjoy…

When I went to London to visit my daughter who was studying abroad a few years ago, she took me to a London pub the first night to try out quintessential pub food. I decided to try Bangers and Mash, as it sounded interesting. I thoroughly enjoyed the mixture of onions, sausage, mashed potatoes and gravy.

Several years later, I discovered a similar Americanized version in a Rachael Ray cookbook. Being one of her 30-minute meals, it’s fast and easy to make, using easily found ingredients. My recipe is strongly inspired by hers, but I go it one better and make my mashed potatoes from instant potato flakes. I like them just as well, and they’re definitely faster.

If you want to make the recipe even more British-traditional, add in some peas to your sausage, onion and gravy mixture. That way, you get in your green vegetables too!

You’ll find my Bangers and Mash recipe here, on my main Thrown-Together-Meals.com website. If you love sausage as much as I do, then take a look too at my easy sausage recipes… or feel free to share one of your own favorite recipes here.

For stick-to-the-ribs heartiness, you just can’t beat Bangers and Mash! Enjoy…