like an old sweater, but better: baked pasta with roasted vegetables

It's been rainy and grey for the past 2 days now and I'm totally getting back into cooking and baking again. It feels good and familiar, like wearing a comfy sweater with holes in the cuffs to poke your thumbs through. I may not win any style points but it feels so right. Last night's dinner is like that sweater. It ain't pretty but it was comfort through and through.

baked pasta with roasted vegetables
My fridge is pretty packed with vegetables and I had to do something with them before things turned bad, so I pulled everything out onto the counter and decided that roasting them would be the best option. I turned on the radio to my favorite station and poured myself a bit of wine and got busy. Onions were peeled and chopped, green beans were snapped, cauliflower was broken into florets, cherry tomatoes were chopped in half, kale was roughly torn and into the pan went a lone yam. Everything was drizzled with soy sauce, a generous glug of balsamic vinegar and a pull of olive oil. Salt, pepper, rosemary, oregano, a few cloves of fresh garlic and even a chopped apple rounded out the mix. Into a high heated oven it went and I tossed things occasionally to keep the cooking even. When I felt things were almost ready, I put on a pot of water, set it to boil, salted the water and added in some whole wheat rigatoni. Another glass of wine was poured and the pasta drained.

In a large oven proof pot I mixed the pasta and the roasted vegetables and tore up some slices of emmental cheese, threw in some leftover soft stinky cheese left over from a party last week, and stirred in a few heaping spoonfuls of ricotta. If I was so inclined I would have covered the whole mess with buttered crumbs, but I wasn't....so back into the oven this meal went. A few minutes later, once all the cheese got all melty and creamy, it was out of the oven and into a couple of waiting bowls....Oh yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Comfort through and through.

get your veg on.

It was so sunny and bright and warm this afternoon that I spent a lot of time wandering my neighbourhood. It was a welcome relief from being chained to the computer working on client projects. The sun was strong and it smelled like springtime -- a welcome relief from the cloudy drizzle that the Pacific Northwest is known for. I went to the little Italian market in my neighbourhood and picked up some beautiful looking vegetables that could, by their very presence, transform my kitchen into a bit of early spring.

With this recipe, any vegetable combination would work well. Use what's in your kitchen and I'm sure you'll be fine.

roast vegetable pasta bake
250 g dry short pasta (I used Creste di Gallo)
1 red onion
5 cloves of garlic
1 small zucchini
6 large mushrooms
1 small red pepper
1 small yellow pepper
2 large leafs of kale, torn into small pieces
salt & pepper
3 T olive oil
1 T dried basil
zest of 1 lemon
2 T capers
1 c grated mozzerella
1/2 c crumbled feta cheese
1/4 c grated parmesan cheese
2 c cubed bread

1. Cook pasta as per box directions. Drain and set aside.

2. While pasta is cooking, preheat oven to 400 degrees. Chop onion into large chunks and roughly chop the garlic. Cut zucchini into 1/2" slices. Cut mushrooms into quarters and chop up the peppers into large pieces. In a large bowl, toss the vegetables with 2 T of olive oil, some salt & pepper and 1/2 of the basil. Dump the vegetable mixture into a large baking dish and roast until vegetables are somewhat soft, about 20 minutes.

3. Add the cooked pasta into a large bowl and toss with the capers, lemon zest, roasted vegetables, kale, feta cheese and the grated mozzerella. Add a bit more salt & pepper and throw in the rest of the basil. Pour out into a large baking dish.

4. For the topping, combine the bread and parmesan cheese with the reminder of the olive oil and spread over the pasta mixture. Bake uncovered for 400 degrees until golden, about 30 - 40 minutes.