Mealtime is Quality Time + $100 Giveaway!

Mealtime is an important occasion at the end of a long day, to gather together and decompress, share stories and, most of all, spend quality time together.  But if you're anything like us...two full-time working parents, with a young toddler, two pets and a household to run...you know that mealtime is not only precious but also fleeting.  At the end of our day, we're exhausted, so to cook a full meal is not always realistic.  What's more likely is that we rush home and squeeze in as much time with Ethan between dinner, bath and play before it's time for bedtime.  And oftentimes, when we're cooking, that cuts into time we could be spending with Ethan.

Anyone else with me?!

And of course, you see me post recipes here, which are usually thanks to my dear husband.  He's the cook of the family...I just document and take credit for it!  ;)  But in all seriousness, we don't cook like that every night.  It's usually something easy and healthy and quick!

Enter Bertolli.

Bertolli recently introduced new recipes to its frozen line of skillet meals, perfect for two (or three in our case!) that literally come together in under ten minutes.  It's so easy and takes away all the time that goes into prep and cooking.

Intrigued, we chose to try the Chicken Parmigiana & Penne.

Looks tasty!

The meal comes with penne pasta, parmigiana chicken, tomatoes, and chunks of mozzarella.

And in less than ten minutes... it looks like this!

There was plenty of food for Ryan and me...and even enough for this little guy...

Ethan gobbled up the pasta and chicken...it was a total hit!

What's more important is that we all got to have quality time together the evening we made this meal.  Not only during mealtime, but also for playtime, bath time, story time and bedtime.  It really opened up our evening for quality family time.

I know frozen meals aren't for everyone, at least not all the time.  But for us, it was a great compromise.  The pasta tasted great {even Ryan, the resident chef, gobbled it right up and couldn't stop talking about how good it was.  That's a score in my book!}, it was quick and easy, and it fed everyone for dinner.  It was a great win-win for us.

In celebration, Bertolli and BlogHer is offering one reader a $100 gift card.  For a chance to win, all you have to do is tell me...

Which Bertolli meal is your favorite or which would you most like to try?

Be sure to check out their website for their meal selections or Facebook for updated info.

xo natasha

This is a sponsored post, but as always, all opinions expressed are my own.  And in this case, who doesn't love great Italian food?!  ;)

Sweepstakes Rules: 
No duplicate comments.
You may receive (2) total entries by selecting from the following entry methods:

1. Leave a comment in response to the sweepstakes prompt on this post
2. Tweet (public message) about this promotion; including exactly the following unique term in your tweet message: “#SweepstakesEntry”; and leave the URL to that tweet in a comment on this post
3. Blog about this promotion, including a disclosure that you are receiving a sweepstakes entry in exchange for writing the blog post, and leave the URL to that post in a comment on this post
4. For those with no Twitter or blog, read the official rules to learn about an alternate form of entry.

This giveaway is open to US Residents age 18 or older. Winners will be selected via random draw, and will be notified by e-mail. You have 72 hours to get back to me, otherwise a new winner will be selected.
The Official Rules are available here.
This sweepstakes runs from 11/7/2013-12/4/2013.
Be sure to visit the Bertolli brand page on BlogHer.com where you can read other bloggers’ posts!