I love how the last few weeks of school force me to become extremely domesticated. With limited punches, a tight budget, and having spent all my dining dollars on Starbucks, I have to resort to cooking for myself. This can be dangerous. Some may call me a culinary-challenged individual, and I couldn’t agree more. Popcorn and oatmeal are just few of my masterpiece dishes.
I decided to face my fears. The dish: baked ziti, bread, and asparagus.
Thanks to Southernfood.about.com and Allrecipes.com both websites provided me with really simple ingredients for the dish.
Penne pasta
Vodka sauce
Ricotta cheese
Mozerella cheese
Lucky for me and my lack of culinary skills, the dish is super easy to make. More specifically, this dish does not have a difficult or long preparation. You cook the noodles, and add all the ingredients to a cooking dish. Set the oven at 350-375 degrees. It does require a solid 30-45 minutes to bake.
With my mother on stand-by via speakerphone, she gave me some really good advice about the noodles. The trick is to not cook them all the way. You want to keep the noodles a little harder so when they bake in the oven they will come out soft.
The asparagus is even easier to prepare and cook. I was not sure which was the best way to go about cooking the
asparagus. This page on Buzzle gave me plenty of options. I chose to boil the asparagus.
I was able to learn something new about the vegetable. This site offered a really good tip about rinsing the asparagus in cold water after they have been cooked so they stay crisp.
I had to subject my neighbor to come try the dish with me. It actually turned out really well. I could tell it was ready when the cheese on top was bubbling. The noodles were cooked just right, nice and soft. I added a little olive oil and pepper to give the asparagus a little kick.
I am in no way shape or form a Paula Dean or an Emerald when it comes to cooking. This is a perfect simple meal for college students. However the only drawback is that it is not a quick meal. Make sure your homework is done before you start cooking!
I think this is a great idea, especially the pasta dish. I don't know a single college student that doesn't have pasta and cheese in their apartment. I'd be interested to see if maybe there was a way to incorporate vegetables into the pasta? One step less in the cooking process is one less chance for us cooking challenged people to mess it up. I love asparagus but another vegetable would probably taste better in the actual dish.
ReplyDeleteThis meal sounds really good! I am in the same boat with the limited punches/ minimal dining dollars conundrum. I would be interested to see more blog posts like this. I also agree with Tori in that it would be interesting to try cooking this with another vegetable.
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