Vegetarian Week- Recipe 3

I m not normally one for posting recipes but this week is special. It is National Vegetarian week and being vegetarian myself I am doing my bit and posting a new recipe each night. These are all easy recipes I use myself. I wanted to show that you do not have to be a fantastic chef to cook meals for your family. I myself am no Delilah but I do like to cook and like to know what we are eating, no additives and preservatives in this house...well not many! I am no Saint either! Anyway today's recipe is:

Cheesy Tomato Pasta Bake

You will need:

• 250g pasta
• Mixed fresh vegetables (eg mushrooms, onions, peppers, carrots etc)
• A tin tomatoes
• A tin of Heinz tomato soup
• Cheese
• fresh basil leaves
• Freshly milled pepper

First part boil the pasta so that it is almost cooked but not quite.  It should still be a little on the firm side.

In a separate frying pan sauté some onions, mushrooms, peppers and whatever other vegetables your family enjoy.  I sometimes add courgette, garlic, carrots or sweetcorn.

Tip the pasta and the vegetables into an appropriate oven dish.  Pour over a tin of chopped tomatoes and the secret ingredient....a tin of Heinz tomato soup. Honestly it is great for this sort of thing. This one is a bit of a cheat recipe.

Next top with grated cheese. If you want it really cheesy, stir some in with the vegetables and pasta first, before adding more on top. Sprinkle the top with pepper (I don't use salt but you could if you wanted to) and torn basil leaves if you have them.  As you can see from the picture below I didn't have any basil in tonight.

Pop into an oven at 180 degrees for about 45 minutes or until the cheese is all golden brown. If you are running late and don't have much time you can just stir it all up in one of the pans to gently warm it and then pop under a grill for about 15 minutes until it is all bubbling and brown.

The result...a meal for the whole family to enjoy (except me who is on a low carb diet). This one is very easy to make and very cheap too!  You can serve it with salad or vegetables and crusty bread. The girls love it served with chopped tomatoes and cucumber chunks and whatever does not get eaten gets divided up into child sized portions and frozen for another day.  Perfect.

Hope you enjoy

Karen x