Cooking Cheap

This qualifies as Cooking Cheap.

Feeds Two (2) if you have salad and bread.

The mega mart shelves have lots of jars of marinara sauce. Acres of shelf space of glass jars of “spaghetti sauce”. About 3″ off the floor is the Hunt’s Brand in cans. Half the price off the supermarket generic brand’s glass jar and way less than the celebrity brands of marinara. Get a can of the Hunts. It’s really pretty good as is but we’re going to help it shine.

Go to the butcher “block” and get one (1) italian sausage link, roughly a 1/4 lb fella. Hot or sweet. I bought sweet. If you need it, get some generic brand mozzarella cheese and you’ll need a 1/3 of a pound of dried pasta. I like the Penne or Ziti, generic brand. That’s also a 1/3 of a package,

What’s in your fridge’s veggie bin? I had half a green bell pepper to use up but a chunk of onion or celery or carrot (or all of them) will work. If it’s green you can tell Mom you’re eating your vegetables. Might even be good for you.

Start a pot of water boiling for the pasta. Add the dried pasta (and salt and oil if you believe in that) Start cutting your veggies into small bits. Remove the casing on the sausage. Heat a skillet on medium heat and brown the sausage for a few minutes. When the pasta is cooked, drain and let it cool. Add the veggies to the skillet of barely cooked sausage. Fry, stir break up the the meat. When the meat is not pink anymore and the veg looks soft (10 minutes?) add half of the can of Hunt’s Marinara. Drop the heat on the skillet down to med low or low and stir every so often. It’s all cooked by know, just keep it warm.

Start heating your oven to 350F. Spray a cassarole dish with veggie oil spray,. Grate a 1/4lb of the mozzerella. Put the pasta in the cassarole dish, add the meat, veggie and sauce mixture. Stir it around slightly. Add more sauce from the can if you think it’s too light on sauce. Put the grated cheese on the top and put the dish in the oven for 25 to 35 minutes, then let it cool out of the oven for 5 minutes.

Simple? Yes! Crude? Yes! Delicious? Yes!

One could mix some grated parmesan into the sauce or on the top. One could add some half and half to the sauce so it’s rose colored or a pat of butter and 2% milk. One could add some pepper flakes to the sauce while it’s simmering. What you don’t want to do without tasting, is add spices or salt. There’s plenty in the can.

Save the left over sauce in the fridge covered in plastic wrap and a rubber band or some plastic lidded container. There’s enough there to make this again,