Easy dinner ideas are my favorite. If you are looking for an easy main dish that your family will love, I’ve got just the thing:
Easy Dinner Ideas
I am always looking for easy dinner ideas and this recipe is a one pot meal that anyone can make. I bet my youngest could make it with a little bit of help. When I told my husband what I was making for dinner he said “Yesssss……that stuff is so good!” Although he knows not to complain about what I cook, he also doesn’t necessarily do jumping jacks when he likes something. So for him to get excited, this one is a winner. His sister gave it to me years ago and I added it into the mix.
With the flavor from the onion mix and the rice and beef, Porcupines in a Skillet is a good, hearty meal. It only takes about 30 minutes start to finish with minimal effort. Don’t let the name fool you!
Quick Dinner Ideas
To make this easy dinner idea, you’ll need:
Porcupines in a Skillet is so easy and delicious – and you probably already have these items on hand! I always have these ingredients in my pantry and fridge.
- ground beef
- dry onion soup mix
- tomatoes
- rice
- shredded cheese
- can of mushrooms, optional
- Skillet or pan
- Spatula or I LOVE my spurtles
See? You only need a couple of things!
What should you serve with this meal?
Besides the main dish, I struggle with side dishes a lot. Growing up, my mom often served our main dish with a salad.
- Simple salad – no need to get fancy, you can serve up a salad, with veggies and dressing.
- Rolls – try these awesome dinner rolls and our family loves Kings Hawaiian Rolls too if you’d rather not make them from scratch.
- Vegetables are always a good idea! My favorite way to make them by roasting them.
Other easy dinner ideas:
If you love this recipe, you’re going to love these other easy dinner ideas. Please click each link below to find the easy, printable recipe!
And a few others to try:
- Chili Macaroni from Somewhat Simple
- Ravioli Bake from Lil Luna
- Easy Goulash from I Heart Naptime
Easy Dinner Recipes
This one is both quick and easy. Plus it’s in one pan. It’s like a dinner trifecta! If you love this Porcupines in a Skilet as much as I do, please write a five star review, and be sure to help me share on Facebook and Pinterest!
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- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 package dry onion soup mix
- 1 1/2 c hot water
- 3/4 c rice uncooked
- 16 oz tomatoes (can)
- 1 c cheese shredded
- 1 small can mushrooms (optional, I don't normally add these)
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In a large skillet, crumble beef and brown.
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Drain and stir in onion soup mix, water, tomatoes (optional mushrooms).
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Add rice and stir.
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Cover and cook on low heat for 25 minutes or until rice is tender.
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Sprinkle with cheese, melt and serve.
Note: I have one kiddo who doesn’t like mushrooms and I’m not totally sure about canned ones (ewww ?!) so I don’t add them to this. I’ll have to try it sometime and let you know how it turns out? I’ll take one for the team.
What are some of your favorite easy dinner ideas?
I just put this in my recipe creator on WW site. If you make this with ground 99% fat-free turkey and omit the cheese, it is only 4 Freestyle points for 1/4 of the entire recipe.
What type of cheese do you use ?
Hi..need some weight watchers easy meals like thia one 💖
How many points would you count this as? And what is the serving size?
Thanks!
Do you just stir in the onion mix or do you stir in the water?
Everything goes into the pot after the meat is cooked.
I have tried to make this twice but I just can’t get the rice to cook. What may I be doing wrong? Could I use Minute Rice instead?
I use to make this 40 yrs ago when our girls were little. I lost my copy but wanted to made it again. It is very good taste and much like what I remember mine. I think I just chopped onion and a couple of spices. We enjoyed it very much. Thank you.
Great, thanks
I’m in the UK but I am loving your ideas. I’m going to try and make this In my slow cooker, do you think this will be ok? Also, why is it called ‘porcupines’? My children will want this explained
Porcupine meatballs in a skillet…easier/quicker than making all the meatballs and pouring the tomato sauce over them. The rice in the meatballs yields the name porcupine.
Really when someone doesn’t understand then its up to other visitors that they will assist, so here it happens.
Feel free to surf to my page: major search engines – Elinor,
Hey! This is probably a silly question, but when you say drain do you mean drain the meat? Or drain the canned tomatoes? :) thanks!
I think it means drain the fat from the meat
Trying this with Rotel tonight. Have everything else on hand just as listed.
I made this dish last night. It was so good and so very tasty. I will definetly keep this in my favorites. I am always looking for hearty meals that have few ingredients and that don’t take alot of time to prepare after work. This hit the spot! Incredible.
What type of cheese do you normally use for this dish?
We made this tonight. It was sooo good. My 3 little ones gobbled it up and asked for seconds (rare occurance). Next time I’m going to do 1 1/2lbs of meat and double everything else so we have enough to go around for my family of 5!
I pinned this when you first posted it and just got around to making it. We enjoyed it very much. I “Mexicanized” it by swapping the can of tomatoes for a 16 oz jar of salsa. Otherwise made exactly as written. Thanks for the recipe, we will have it again!
Awesome Rebecca! Thanks for letting me know. Glad you liked it!
So easy and delicious. I used Uncle Ben’s Minute Brown Rice and the cook time was perfect. Thanks so much for this one!
Oh good to know! Thanks Ashley. Glad that you liked it!
Can I use brown rice?
Marvelous, what a blog it is! This blog gives helpful
facts to us, keep it up.
Making it now. Using brown rice. That could be my problem. It has been cooking almost an hour and rice is still hard. Any thoughts on this anyone? Will keep adding water and cooking. :-)
I made it with brown rice, too, and it took about 45 minutes to cook. To be honest, the rice still wasn’t quite done when we ate it. It had a good flavor, and I’ll definitely make again, but next time I’ll try cooking the rice some before adding into the mix. Then I would probably have to cut down on the water in the recipe.
I usually steam rice before adding it to this. It works better for us that way. Less cooking time plus i know it will be done. ;)
Sounds yummy. Will have to see if I can find a low sodium onion soup mix.
Make your own onion soup mix. Lots of recipes online.
This sounds like my kind of dinner! Would love for you to come over and share at my link party http://mommyondemand.com/create-bake-4/
You forgot to say to add the rice before letting cook for 25 minutes in case you want to edit your post ;)
That’s an ingnillteet answer to a difficult question xxx
Looks easy AND delicious! Thank you for the recipe, girl! XO
Made this last night – it was a hit! Love that I had everything already in the house too.
Yummm! This looks so easy and delicious – pinning so I can remember to add it to the dinner list next week!
Looks yummy! Can’t wait to try it! Pinning for later. xo
Oh my goodness – my mom used to make this for us. It’s one of my favorites. So yummy!
xoxo