Last night as I loaded dinner into the crock-pot, I thought that I should share it here on the blog. It’s one of those things that is so easy, it’s almost embarrassing to share. But it’s tasty, and most importantly, it’s ready when I want it to be ready.
We have three nights a week that we’re running to and from dance classes right around the dinner hour. Monday night, we actually make the run twice, as Abigail has two classes, but two hours in between them. This gives us time to run home, eat a decent dinner, and then head back for the second class. But it doesn’t give me a lot of time to prepare anything when we arrive home after the first class. This is where the crock-pot can come into play- especially for an already easy meal, like pasta.
So here is my no- recipe method. You need a short pasta of some kind, one and a half jars of your favorite pasta sauce, Mozzarella cheese, and a few slices of pepperoni. Parmesan cheese is good too, and you need a crock-pot with a low setting on it.
Start by boiling your pasta. Follow the directions on the package, but give it a minute less than indicated. You want it slightly undercooked, because it’s going to soak up pasta sauce in the crock-pot, and you don’t want it to turn into a pile of mush. Cook and drain your pasta, and while the pasta is cooking, you’ll want to do two things. One, heat up the pasta sauce in a separate saucepan, and Two, turn on your crock-pot to high to get it going.
Take a good pour of the pasta sauce and cover the bottom of your crock-pot with it. Then, dump your cooked pasta in, and dump the rest of the pasta sauce over it. Stir it up, adding a few shakes of Parmesan if you want. It should be really saucy. If it’s not, add a little more until it is. Even it out, and then take your Mozzarella cheese (about a cup or so) and sprinkle a nice layer on top, followed by your pepperoni slices- it should resemble a pizza. Put the top on the pot, turn it down to low, and in 2 hours you have a wonderful Pizza Baked Pasta ready and waiting for you. The pasta melds with the sauce, the cheese and pepperoni cook perfectly, and it’s ready when you walk back in the door from running your errands. Cooking up pasta takes just 15 minutes in the first place, and this is so much better for you than hitting that drive thru on the way home. Toss a salad before you leave and stash that in the fridge, and you have a complete meal ready and waiting.
