Comfort food can make your day

Today, I got a hankerin' for something from my childhood. While walking through Costco (yes, we went to Costco again), it struck me, and I just couldn't shake it.

When I was little, my grandparents used to make this macaroni. I remember having it most at our camp, but my Nanny made it at our house too. It consists of: macaroni, fried hamburger meat (loose), and diced tomatoes. That's it. Once it is cooked and on your plate, you then season with salt and pepper, usually with lots of pepper. It might sound ghetto, and it is. My family didn't have a ton of money when I was growing up, so we had tons of simple meals like this. But this one, it tastes SO GOOD.

When it popped into my head at Costco, I mentioned it to Sexy Boyfriend. He said that he used to have this macaroni when he was little too. We left Costco, and stopped immediately at IGA to get the ingredients, all the while I interrogated him to make sure we were talking about the same thing.

"You don't add any spices."
"Nope."
"And you can't put too much of the juice from the tomatoes in there either, it has to be just the pieces of the tomato."
"Yep."
"And the meat gets drained, but not completely drained."
"Yeah, and we used to put some cheese on it."
"Blasphemy!!!"

Anyway, once it was ready, I was a little nervous that it wouldn't be as good as I remembered it. Especially since I made a HUGE ass pot of it, and I really had my hopes up that it would be my yummy lunch all week. But it tasted just as good as when I was small. We both ate our whole platefuls non-stop. At one point Sexy Boyfriend (who did not put cheese on it, by the way, I think in deference to my trip down memory lane) turned to me and said "I wish I had a spoon so I could shovel it in faster."

We have named this macaroni "Camp Macaroni". I can't wait for lunch tomorrow.