Out of disgust and perhaps a slight sense of superiority over the designers of hamburger helper, I’ve experimented and made the following instead. This is not a sauce recipe really, but an oven rice recipe that takes 5 minutes to prep and then you put it in the oven for an hour and ignore it. It makes two cups of rice. Once that rice is 40-45 minutes into cooking, I make a ‘topping’ to put on it. It is not saucy, but the juice is yummy on the rice.
Before that, I either take my dog out for a walk , have a beer, make a salad or complain about my effing dissertation (my sympathies to Micah).

RICE
Heat oven to 350.
Combine everything below in a 9 x 9 x
2 pan.
1 cup of rice,
1 teaspoon olive oil,
1 cup chicken broth,
1 cup water,
2 diced cloves of garlic
1/4 cup diced onion
(about half of a medium onion)
1/4 cup chopped carrots
can also add bell peppers,I even added
zucchinni once. That was once because
it was weird.
Cover with foil after mixing it all up in your dish (this is super important or your rice will dry out) Put it in the oven. Have a beer.

Stovetop Beef
I brown 1/2 an onion and 4 cloves of garlic with a little olive oil and some pepper. I remove it from the pan. I then brown a 1/2 lb of 90/10 beef. When it is almost browned, I add the previously browned onion and garlic. Pour the meat over the rice and serve. The juices with the meat flavor the rice more.

I swear it tastes better than hamburger helper and is less fattening, perhaps because I use lean beef and don’t add creams and butters. I think it may cost less too, but it depends on your supermarket and the cost of your produce and meat.

Basic meat/carb skillet dinner recipe:
scaled for 4-6 servings
experiment with different combinations

1 lb ground meat

brown in skillet, drain any excess fat

1-2 cups chopped seasoning vegetables (onion, peppers, celery, 1-2 cloves minced garlic perhaps. if you want to use fresh carrots, this is the place to add those. You can add grated carrots here or at the end)

Add to skillet with meat and cook until soft

4-6 cups liquid depending on type & amount of carbohydrate chosen and desired end consistency (consider canned tomatoes as part of the liquid)
&
seasonings – 1-3 teaspoons (see comment by CindyS for different combos)

Add to skillet after seasoning vegetables are softened and bring to boil

desired carbohydrate:
2 cups rice, 4-5 cups noodles or pasta

Optional: 2-3 cups extra vegatables- fresh, frozen or drained canned, sauce additions

Stir carbohydrate into boiling liquid, bring to boil again, turn down and put lid on skillet. Simmer until carbohydrate is cooked. If adding vegetables add them the required amount of cooking time before the carbohydrate will be done.

When the carbohydrate is cooked, adjust consistancy of dish or add additional sauce ingredients (boil off excess liquid, thicken with a little cornstarch, add grated cheese or cheese sauce mix), adjust seasonings.

Possible combinations:
Skillet Turkey & Noodles (ground turkey, onion, celery, carrots, water & bouillion cubes, poultry seasoning, noodles, peas)

Skillet Spaghetti (Turkey italian sausage, onion, peppers, mushrooms, garlic, water and canned diced tomatoes and/or can or jar of spaghetti sauce, basil, broken up spaghetti or use other pasta, top with cheese)

Chili Mac (ground beef, onions, peppers, garlic, water and canned tomatoes, chili powder, macaroni, kidney beans, corn)

While I do try to make most meals from semi-scratch for health reasons, these boxes are a great help when the husband has to cook! They go on sale for $1 per box every few months.