Creamy Burger Fajita Spaghetti

I was thinking about making Fajitas-a traditional Mexican dish composed of any type of meat grilled with bell peppers and onions that's typically served with tortillas- but I didn't have any tortillas on hand so I decided to use spaghetti noodles instead.

If you've eaten pasta before you would've probably figured out that with every pasta dish comes some type of sauce.  Mexican Fajitas normally doesn't come with sauce.  Instead, it's topped off with a little lime juice, sour cream, and a splash of hot sauce.  With these ingredients in mind, I decided to make my own creamy sauce with ingredients I had on hand- Cream cheese, white balsamic vinegar, and eggs.  This combination probably doesn't sound so great together but I can assure you that they mix in well.  The balsamic vinegar is reduced into a nice sweet sauce and leaves behind a little acidity the help balance off the other flavors and the cream cheese and eggs bind everything together nicely.

The "burger" part of this recipe comes from the addition of ketchup.  Ground beef and ketchup?  That screams out burger so I decided to add it in as part of this dish's title.  I had so much fun making this dish and even more fun eating it.  It's such a great dinner to eat in front of a movie.  Enjoy!

Ingredients:
1 tbsp oil
2 cloves garlic minced (~1tsp)
1 medium onion diced
1 medium potato cubed 1/4'' 
1 medium bell pepper sliced
a little under 1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar or white wine (Foodfair for balsamic, IGA or CKs for wine)
1tbsp butter
1lb ground beef
3/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
2 tsp paprika
2 tsp dried parsley flakes
3tbsp ketchup
1 tsp brown or white sugar


Topping
2 eggs beaten
cheddar cheese
cream cheese
dash a cayenne pepper or red pepper flakes for heat

1 pack of Spaghetti Noodles (400g or 14.1oz)

Directions
1.  Heat up pan medium high heat.  Add oil.  Add garlic and onion. Cook until translucent.
2. Add potatoes. Lightly salt and pepper.  stir to coat. cook for ~4 min.
3.  Add bell pepper amd stir fry for ~1min.  Push all ingredients to one side of pan.
4. Add balsamic vinegar on bare side of pan. Bring up to boil ~1min or until it reduces into 1/2. Add butter and stir to incorporate. Mix into vegetables.  Push to one side of pan. (turn heat down to low while you prepare spaghetti noodles)
5. Heat a pot of salted boiling water. Cook spaghetti al dente (slightly undercooked).
5.  turn heat back up to medium high. Add beef on bare side of pan in a flat layer.  Add salt, pepper, paprika, parsley on top.  Stir to incorporate and cook ~6min or until beef is cooked.
6. As soon as beef is cooked, mix in with veggies.  Add ketchup and sugar. cook for another 2min. with cover on.
7.  Place both spaghetti and noodles in separate bowls. I only mixed what I was going to eat, saving the rest for later.  Take desired amount of noodles and desired amount of beef mixture and add to pan. medium high heat. mix well. turn heat to low and add on top 2 beaten eggs, cheddar cheese, and cream cheese (for about 2 cups of noodles, I added 2 eggs). as soon as everything is mixed well together, turn heat off. Enjoy!