Cooking for a family can be hard work and time-consuming, especially if you’ve got young children who are fussy eaters. In that situation, it’s a lot more effort and time (not to mention washing up) to make one meal for the adults and another for the children.
It’s even more challenging to find something simple that suits everyone while also not being full of ultra-processed ingredients. Fortunately, that’s where a simple pasta bake comes in.
Despite being ever so easy to make, a pasta bake can be a rich and indulgent meal for the grown-ups while also keeping the kids happy. What’s more, it can be made as a simple and quick midweek meal or enjoyed as a warming evening meal on the weekend with a glass of wine.
I made Jamie Oliver’s sausage pasta bake. One of the pleasures of this recipe is that it gives you the chance to turn leftovers (in this case, bread) into something delicious. I also added leftover prosciutto (Parma ham), which goes crunchy and gets even more flavourful when cooked, as well as bacon that needed eating.
The sauce is rich, and the breadcrumbs and oregano topping add an extra layer of flavour as well as a satisfying crunch. If the bread happens to be homemade or from a quality independent bakery, that’s even better.
This recipe serves four people but you could increase the ingredients if you want to make a bigger pasta bake and have more leftover to freeze for super-quick future evening meals. I didn’t include the garlic or chilli flakes so that the rest of the family would eat it, and I don’t think the omissions affected the dish’s quality.
