We all have those fave dishes from our childhood that would warm us and fill us with love. Now as adults – and parents ourselves – we’re continuing to make those delish eats, but with a little bit of a modern twist! Here’s a jazzed up twist on my mom’s (kinda boring) goulash!

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Looking back at some of the recipes my family enjoyed through my adolescence, the ingredients were quite simple (and kinda plain and boring)! Sorry Mom! My little family has a slightly adventurous taste in food, so I can experiment with new recipes with them!

Start with the basics and then build on the flavour.

The basics of goulash (in my house anyways) was always pasta, ground beef, and tomato soup. Tasty and satisfying as a kid! But kind of lacking in flavour and depth as an adult!

So, my goal was to spice up this basic dish by adding a few veggies and complimentary seasoning.

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Starting with the ground beef – but this can be substituted for any other ground meat or protein you wish – we used medium. This is a little bit fattier, but has more flavour, and I drained after cooking. Adding the onions and celery to the beef, while cooking, helps to increase the character of the dish while boosting the daily vegetable intake.

After cooking the ground beef mixture I get the pasta going. This recipe comes together fairly quickly, so I wanted the pasta cooked and ready to go. I never know how much pasta to cook and end up preparing way too much. So I turned to google to reference how much pasta to cook for my family.

My search yielded an awesome result! An article from Taste of Home magazine that details how much pasta (dry) to cook per the desired number of servings. The post even goes on to detail recommended amounts for different kinds of pasta! Such great info to help with portion control and to help reduce leftover and waste!

Check out the article here!

Rotini was on the menu for this evening, so I measured out 3/4 cup portions for each of us and added one extra portion in case anyone wanted seconds! As usual, I cooked the pasta al dente!

I hate overcooked pasta!

Instead of just plain tomato soup as the sauce, I added a can of stewed tomatoes to the mix. I used Aylmer Accents Italian Blend Stewed Tomatoes for even more pizzazz! I drained the juice before adding the tomatoes to the pot, but I saved the juice in case the end result was a little dry.

Once the tomato products were in the sauce pan, I mashed the whole stewed tomatoes a bit to release some of the juices and to break down the tomatoes a bit. My daughter isn’t crazy about tomatoes, so I figured mashing them up would help disguise them!

While heating up the tomato mixture, I added a bit of milk for a bit of a creamy texture. Use your own judgement here! You can add milk, cream, cream cheese or sour cream – depending on your taste and how rich you want the dish to be!

Customize the dish to your own taste!

The chopped red bell pepper was added at this point as well. I didn’t want them to cook too much, just warmed up. This is also the stage of cooking where I added the ground beef mixture to the pot to soften a bit and reheat.

Any other additives, like veggies or seasoning, can be thrown in the pot at this point. We love to Clubhouse Blends, such as Korean BBQ and Maple Bacon, when we cook! So we added a little spice blend to increase the flavours a bit!

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Almost done!! At this point, the cooked and drained pasta can be added to the pot. Personally, I hate mushy pasta! This is one of my biggest pet peeves! Adding the noodle to the mixture after everything is heated through helps avoid the pasta getting too soft. If necessary, you can add a bit of the reserved tomato juice to the mixture if you find there’s not quite enough sauce.

That’s it! You’re done! We prepared Pilsbury Crescent Rolls to have with our goulash! But you can have garlic toast, rolls, or even a salad with yours if you wish!

What childhood dishes have you modernized?! Share any favourites in the comment section!