Mostaccioli (Baked Pasta With Creamy Sauce & Italian Sausag

newspapergal's Note:

Yummy pasta -- It makes a lot (2 9x13 pans) but could be easily halved. Everyone in my office is RAVING about this this week, and it's great b/c it can be adjusted to your own liking.

• Total Time: 1 hrs 5 mins
• Prep Time: 30 mins
• Cook Time: 35 mins

Ingredients:

Yield: 2 9x13 pans

• 2 (16 ounce) boxes penne pasta
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 3 tablespoons minced garlic
• 2 quarts heavy whipping cream
• 2 cups shredded parmesan cheese
• 1 lb mild Italian sausage
• 2 red bell peppers
• 25 -30 sliced mushrooms
• 15 roma tomatoes
• fresh basil
• diced garlic
• olive oil

Directions:

1. Cook both boxes of noodles until they are semi done.
2. Drain and set aside, but do not rinse.
3. Melt 1 Tbsp butter in a saucepot.
4. Add minced garlic (more or less if desired).
5. Slowly add heavy whipping cream to melted butter and garlic mixture.
6. Bring sauce to a slow simmer, then add 2 cups shredded Parmesan cheese.
7. Stir until melted.
8. Let sauce simmer on low.
9. Break into pieces and brown Italian sausage.
10. Add 2 thinly sliced peppers to meat mixture.
11. When both are fully cooked, dump them into the sauce.
12. Saute sliced mushrooms in 1 Tbsp butter seasoned with salt and pepper.
13. When cooked, add to sauce.
14. Place tomatoes in a food processor and process until blended with chunks.
15. Add fresh basil to taste (don’t be stingy — a lot is better).
16. Add diced garlic to taste.
17. Add olive oil.
18. Don’t be afraid to start small and add more basil, garlic and oil as you go.
19. This tomato mixture can be made a day early; let set in refrigerator overnight.
20. Add this dish to the sauce.
21. Bring the huge pot to a boil, let it simmer just a minute or two.
22. Take the penne noodles and divide them into the two 9x13-inch pans, spreading them out evenly.
23. Divide sauce into each pan filled with the noodles and mix it with the noodles.
24. Sprinkle Parmesan cheese over the top of both pans.
25. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes.

Reviews

[Chef #1438451]

WOW! Sooo awesome. I made the full recipe, but switched out one of the quarts of heavy whipping cream with Half & Half. I also didn't have any tomatos, so I threw in a jar of Barilla. This recipe is foodgasm worthy and will become a regular in our home.

[whitty145]

The flavor on this dish is out of this world! Although I read the reviews for substitues I followed the recipe pretty closely except added quite a bit of basil and some shredded mozzarella. The one downside about this is it did take a lot of pans a quite a bit of cooking time before going in the oven. I think next time I make it'll do some shortcuts to minimize the time in the kitchen. I cut the recipe in half and it still had leftovers after 8 servings.

[rbrynsaas]

This wasn't that great for us. It had way too much cream in my opnion. That was all we could taste. DD liked it, but DH and I decided to eat something else for supper. Maybe I did something wrong, because most reviewers loved this.