food thursday: super fast pasta dinner

Really I could call this recipe “pasta & your favorite veggie in your favorite red sauce.” It’s that versatile. It’s also super fast – 20 minutes or less total time required. I’m going to give you the basics and then I’ll tell you how I made it this week. Follow mine or swap in your own preferences – either way you can rest assured that you’re giving your family a delicious, healthy, filling meal.

Simmer Sauce & Pasta

1 box of your favorite long noodle

• 1 lb of your favorite green veggie (i.e. green beans, broccoli, asparagus)
• 1 jar of your favorite red sauce (i.e. marinara, vodka tomato)
• 1 lb of your favorite meat, already cooked and cut into bite size pieces (i.e. chicken, sausage, shrimp)
• 1. Put water on to boil for the pasta and heat a large saucepan over medium heat
• 2. Chop the veggie into bite size pieces
• 3. Cook pasta according to directions and for the last five minutes, add your veggie to the boiling pasta
• 4. While pasta is cooking, simmer your meat in the sauce so the flavors meld together and everything gets nice and warm

5. Drain the pasta & veggies, toss with the meat & sauce. Eat.

We had this for dinner this week with the following choices:

1. Whole wheat fettucini (I went crazy and actually made my own pasta. I love my Kitchen Aid pasta attachments!)

2. Asparagus

3. Roasted red pepper sauce (Emeril’s brand makes a decent sauce)

4. Grilled chicken & gouda sausage (Sausages by Amy makes lots of different & delicious sausages)

This is one of the easiest dinners I know how to make and it’s always a crowd pleaser. Enjoy!

side note: someday I’ll get a camera slightly more sophisticated than my handy dandy point & click. Then I’ll take beautiful food pictures. Of course, I’ll need to do things like pay more attention to the lighting… wipe the slop off the edge of the bowl… hey maybe my current shots aren’t so bad, at least you know they are really from my kitchen!