Tummy Tuck Thursday Recipe

As a forenote, I will tell you that this is probably not a make-for-random-weeknight-dinner recipe. It's more of a special occasion meal. Or a side dish that you take to a cook-out when you want to impress everyone with your delicious-yet-healthy culinary skills. OR, you could make it while you are alone and just eat the entire thing by yourself. That is fine too.

Light Steakhouse Mac & Cheese

1. Grease and set aside a 2qt casserole dish with 1 tsp. olive oil
2. Boil some water and cook about 1/2 box (8 oz.) of wheat pasta. If you want to walk on the wild side, use regular pasta. Cook for about 6 minutes or until the pasta is just barely tender. Drain the pasta and save 1 cup of the liquid.
3. Warm up a large saucepan over medium heat. Cook 3 strips of bacon. See, I told you this recipe was good. Bacon makes everything better. Mmmmm bacon. But I digress...cook your bacon in your saucepan and reserve some drippings (about 2 TBS.) in the pan.
4. Remove and crumble up your bacon. Then add 1 container (I think it's roughly 10 oz.) of fresh mushrooms. I chopped mine into small pieces. To be honest, the texture of mushrooms is kind of gross to me. Foods I don't love are more tolerable when chopped into little pieces. It's true.
5. Saute your mushrooms for about 7 minutes until they are nice and brown and then add in 2 cloves of chopped garlic, some pepper to taste (I also threw in a handful of chopped green onion) and 10 oz. of baby spinach. I halved this because it seemed like a ridiculous amount of spinach. Cooked spinach is sort of a childhood nemesis. Another texture thing. You people without texture issues confuse me. Anyway, you can use all the spinach or half it like I did. It doesn't make you weird if you like a lot of spinach...well maybe a little.
6. Once your spinach is all nice and wilted, combine your spinach mixture and your pasta in a big bowl.
7. In a little bowl combine 1/4 c. of plain greek yogurt and 4oz. crumbled blue cheese. Then add this to the pasta and spinach and mix it all around. Stir in about 1/2c. of your liquid or more if the pasta is really dry. Dump all this into your casserole dish. Go ahead and curse me because I somehow convinced you to make a mac & cheese without cheddar in it.
8. In a bowl combine 1/2 cup whole wheat panko bread crumbs (I used regular panko crumbs because the grocery store didn't have wheat ones. I have no idea what this does to the "light" nature of this meal. It might negate the whole thing, but it's dang good just the same.), 2 TBS. chopped fresh parsley and your crumbled bacon. Drizzle with three tsp. of olive oil and mix it all together.
9. Sprinkle your bread crumb mixture over the top of your macaroni and cheese and bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes or until bubbly.
10. Go ahead and love me again because it's the best mac & cheese you've ever had. Okay, okay, so a little cheddar and some whipping cream wouldn't kill it, but it's still pretty darn good.