Cooking By Lola: Spaghetti for the busy house..and Bruschetta

Well after a long couple of weeks on the road working with the guy...we really needed a home cooked meal. While laying in bed trying to find any sense of normalacy an idea popped in...hmmmmmm Spaghetti! So that's what I did. Here is our favorite spaghetti recipe & an easy bruschetta, Lola style.
I start with:

1 pound of lean hamburger
1 medium sweet onion minced
1 large can of crushed tomatoes
1 small can of tomatoe paste
1 small can of tomatoe sauce
1 package of spaghetti mix
2 tablespoons minced garlic
1 tablespoon of black pepper
salt to taste
3 leaves of fresh basil finely chopped
1 Tablespoon dried oregano
1 tablespoon driend italian seasoning
1 teaspoon garlic salt
8 oz parmigiano reggiano

**please use your dry ingrediants a small amount at a time. You may not use all of it and you may want to add more it's your sauce..your taste**

Bread ingrediants

1 baguette
8 oz parmigiano reggiano
6 ripe plum tomatoes
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon minced garlic
4 leaves of fresh basil finely chopped
salt & pepper *to taste

I use a small chopper to chop my onions..keeps me from crying in the kitchen.

brown your hamburger with your minced onion.

Drain the grease off of your meat before you start your sauce

I add a spaghetti packet. It yumms up the sauce and costs a fraction of what you would pay for all the spices and herbs etc.

I mix together the packet of spaghetti, the salt, pepper, garlic, italian seasoning** & Oregano** Add parmigiano reggiano, add browned meat.

Let cook in crock pot for 3 hours on high.

Open your crock pot and taste your sauce. you may at this point need to add more garlic, salt pepper etc...

I turn it to low and let it keep cooking for 3 more hours.

Towards the end of cooking, approx 40 min before we are ready to eat..I start the bread.

I use a baguette.

I cut diagnally the bread into pieces

place them flat on a cooking sheet.

in a seperate small bowl I add the EVOO, garlic, salt, pepper & basil. I heat it in the microwave for 30 seconds. I added this step and removed the rubbing of the garlic on the bread. When it's warm, remove and usea basting brush to lightly coat both sides of the bread. I turn on my grill and when it's hot..I lay them on the grill for 5 min on both sides (try not to over cook them, they become too hard to eat)

After you remove the bread off the grill, place back on the cooking sheet.Chop your tomatoes, add the oil mix and stir together. Spoon out the mixture and add on top of the grilled bread.