Saturday, March 9, 2013

Cauliflower and Pasta casserole with Tomato sauce and Cheese


Pasta it is!! I was shopping at Walmart one day when I came across this jar of blended tomatoes. It was tomato pasta sauce. Of course I wanted to try it! Geez! And of course it does make perfect sense to also buy pasta :) And so I did. 
I had seen a recipe in LauraInTheKitchen describing cauliflower with pasta. So that gave me the idea for this recipe, which is basically the same but I actually baked the whole thing together along with cauliflower. So here is the recipe, if you need a relatively quick dinner and just want to get the ingredients together and let the oven do its thing!!

Ingredients   
1 cauliflower head, cut onto florets
2 cups pasta (any kind will work)
2 large eggs
1 tbsp of butter
2 tbsp all purpose flour
1 cup of tomato pasta sauce(any kind of canned tomato sauce will work)
Salt
Pepper
Garlic powder
Fresh parsley (optional)
About 2 tbsp of bread crumbs and Cheddar Cheese (shredded or chunks) for topping

Steps
  • Pre-heat oven to 350 F (176 C)
  • Spray a casserole dish (about 13 X 9) with cooking spray (or grease with oil/butter)
  • Whisk the eggs with melted butter. Mix in the flour and make a batter
  • Mix the batter into the cauliflower florets. Add salt, pepper and garlic powder and toss the mixture. Set aside
  • Boil the pasta in some salted boiling water for about 10 minutes
  • Drain the water and season pasta with pepper
  • Final step is arranging the casserole - First spread the cauliflower mixture as bottom layer. Add the boiled pasta next and spread it out. Next layer is the pasta sauce
  • Finally garnish with some cheese, chopped parsley and bread crumbs
  • Bake for about 50 minutes to an hour till top is light brown, cauliflowers are tender and cheese is melted
  • Attack with a fork!
This is super easy to bring together on your dinner table.  Trust me the one hour wait is totally worth it. Because in the end you have a beautiful, healthy casserole on your table. Go a step ahead and add a layer of sauted spinach as well! Bon Appetit!

No comments:

Post a Comment