Canadian cuisine

I pulled out one of my mom's recipes for dinner this week: "California casserole". It definitely still qualifies as comfort food, though what Mom liked most was that she could stick in the oven before a soccer game/music lesson/other kid activity, come back 2 hours later, and take it straight out of the oven for dinner.

1 onion, peel and chop. 1 pepper (green or red), remove stem and seeds then chop. Mix in bowl with 1 pound ground beef, two 14oz cans of diced tomatoes, 1-2 cups grated cheddar. Salt and pepper to taste. Stir in 16oz of dry pasta (macaroni works well). Put mix into casserole dish, cover with foil, and bake for 1 h at 350F. Or 2 h, it'll be fine, though 325F might be better for the longer time. Remove from oven. Eat.

Using the same ingredients, you could make spaghetti with a nice meat sauce...but that would involve stirring sauce on the stovetop and boiling water and draining pasta. Far better to throw everything into one bowl, then into one casserole dish, and cook it once.

I'm not sure anyone here would call it "California casserole", mind you. As we (myself now included) know, only Midwesterners make casseroles. And it's hard to say what is exactly Californian about this casserole. But hey, comfort food is comfort food.

And comfort food was needed after bike commuting today. My timing can be really off: it's been beautiful fall weather up until, oh, Monday, but now, today, in the rain both ways, I make a point of riding my bike to work. At least (a) you always feel fast when you're riding at night, and (b) dinner was a ready-to-be-reheated plate of leftovers (casserole, of course).