Beefy Tortellini Skillet

My husband loves pasta, so we tend to eat a lot of it. Sometimes I get tired of eating the same old pasta dishes. This past year, we tried a few new ones: Creamy Cajun Chicken Pasta, Creamy Caesar Chicken Pasta, and Chicken Florentine Skillet. All of these are skillet dinners that are prepared in a single dish. I love these types of meals because they are easy to prepare and don’t dirty a ton of dishes.

We recently tried a new one-dish pasta entrée. This one called for beef (which was a nice change for us because we don’t eat it all that often) and cheese tortellini. It was very easy to prepare and had a great flavor. I look forward to including this Beefy Tortellini Skillet on our coming menus.

Ingredients

(Significantly adapted from this recipe.)

• 1 lb. boneless beef sirloin steak, diced into small pieces
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 2 teaspoons Montreal steak seasoning
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 ½ cups beef broth
• 1 package (19 oz.) frozen cheese tortellini
• 2 oz. cream cheese
• ½ cup finely shredded Parmesan cheese
• A couple dashes dried parsley flakes (optional)

Instructions

Place the beef, flour, and steak seasoning into a baggie and shake until the beef pieces are coated in the flour mixture. Heat the vegetable oil in a high-walled skillet or Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add the beef to the skillet and cook, stirring frequently, for approximately 5 minutes (the beef should be seared at this point).

Add the beef broth; reduce the heat the medium. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes (do not boil or the meat will toughen). Stir in the tortellini. Cover and simmer for an additional 5 minutes or until the tortellini are tender. Add the cream cheese and stir gently until it is thoroughly incorporated into the sauce. Remove from the heat. Sprinkle with the Parmesan cheese and dried parsley flakes. Yield: 4 servings.

Notes

As I noted above, this dish is very easy to prepare. You don’t have to spend a lot of time chopping, mixing, etc., and there are only a few dishes to clean up once you are done. This dish is hearty, and it has a great savory flavor. It isn’t spicy or tangy, so it is a nice option if you have picky eaters. Of course, if you want to jazz it up a bit, feel free to add some diced onion, additional spices, a can of Italian diced tomatoes, etc. In fact, next time I prepare it, I think I will add a little chopped spinach when I stir in the cream cheese.

If you don’t have sirloin steak on hand, then you can prepare this with ground beef. Doing this will save time because you do not need to simmer the ground beef. Simply brown the ground beef, then add the flour, steak seasoning, beef broth, and frozen tortellini all at once. Cook until the tortellini are tender, then follow the instructions above for adding the cream cheese and the Parmesan cheese.

What yummy dishes have you tried recently? I’d love to hear about them, especially if they are easy to prepare!

Shared at the following:

Weekend Potluck, Encouraging Hearts and Home, and Busy Monday.