Vegetable Pasta Bake

Ingredients For This Easy Healthy Vegetable Pasta Bake

• Pasta: You can use white or whole wheat pasta or your favorite gluten-free pasta. We think rigatoni is best in this, but penne, zitii, shells or rotini also work really well.
• Olive oil: You’ll need two tablesoons to cook the vegetables.
• Seasonings: Dried Italian seasoning blend, salt and ground pepper. If you like a bit of spice you can add in a pich of red pepper flakes too.
• Veggies: Garlic, Onion, Orange or Red Bell pepper, Mushrooms and Spinach. You can use yellow onions or red onions depending on what you have on hand. And feel free to mix up the combination of veggies depending on what you have on hand or use leftover roast veggies.
• Crushed tomatoes: I think the flavor of fire-roasted canned tomatoes is really nice in this recipe and elevates it slightly with a more complex and smoky taste. Canned tomato puree and canned tomato sauce also works here. You can even sub in 2 cups jarred pasta sauce or marinara sauce (but only add salt to taste in that case.)
• Fresh basil: This is the magical ingredient in this recipe and what sets it apart from all the rest so don’t skip it. And I do not recomend subbing in dried basil because it tastes completely different from fresh basil.
• Part-skim ricotta cheese or plant-based ricotta: We tested this with both regular cow’s milk ricotta (part-skim) and Kite Hill vegan ricotta alternative. Both were great. The flavor of the Kite Hill is a little like that of goat cheese and quite tangy but very delicious.
• Shredded cheese: You can use cheddar cheese, Italian cheese blend or Italian style vegan cheese shreds. You could also combine part-skim mozzarella cheese and Parmesan Cheese if you prefer. I like to use Shelburne Farm’s Cheddar which is made locally using regenerative farming practices. You can also use pre-shredded Italian cheese blend which is a great convenient ingredient. I also did test this with Diaya vegan cheese alternative. I used the Mozzarella-style shreds. It doesn’t melt like real cheese but my family enjoyed it.

See our variations below and you can make this flexitarian by adding 8 ounces of cooked and crumbled turkey sausage. I also tested it with two types of vegan sausage and both were great. You can use 8 ounces of crumbled Pumfu or Gimme Lean Sausage Style plant-based sausage cooked in olive oil.

Step 1: Cook Pasta

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Check the package of pasta and note the recommended cook time for al dente pasta. Add pasta (photo 1a) and cook according to package instructions.

Drain well and run cool water over it (photo 1b) to wash off extra starch and to prevent the pasta from clumping together. Return to the pot.

Step 2: Sautee Veggies

To cook the vegetables, heat the oil in a large deep skillet over medium-high heat. Add in your chopped onion and teaspoon salt and cook, stirring often until the onion is softened and starting to brown, 6 to 7 minutes. Add in garlic, bell pepper, mushrooms, Italian seasonings and pepper and cook, stirring often (photo 2a) until the vegetables are tender and any excess moisture is evaporated, 7 to 8 minutes. Stir in spinach (photo 2b) and cook until the spinach is just wilted, about 1 minute.

Step 3: Combine Sauce, Pasta and Veggies

Add the vegetable mixture, the canned crushed tomatoes and fresh basil to the cooked pasta (photo 3) and stir well. If using sausage for the flexitarian option, add it to the pasta mixture now.

Step 4: Assemble Vegetable Pasta Bake

Step 4: Transfer the pasta and veggie mixture to the casserole dish (photo 4a.) Dollop the ricotta over the top of the pasta (photo 4b.) Top with the shredded cheese (photo 4c.)