Italian Pasta Casserole

Submitted by jessi_mcg

"From Healthy Cooking, but with my changes. The original recipe called for 1/2 lb turkey Italian Sausage and 1/2 lb ground beef with no mushrooms, which I'm sure would be fine. I added the fennel to sort of capture that sausage feel. If you use home-canned tomatoes you may want to drain just a bit; mine came out a little bit watery."

 

• Ready In: 45mins
• Ingredients: 16
• Serves: 6

ingredients

• 2 cups spiral shaped pasta
• 3⁄4 lb ground turkey
• 1 cup mushroom, sliced
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 garlic clove
• 2 (14 1/2 ounce) cans diced tomatoes
• 1⁄3 cup tomato paste
• 3⁄4 teaspoon italian seasoning
• 1⁄2 teaspoon chili powder
• 1⁄2 teaspoon fennel seed
• 1⁄4 teaspoon oregano
• 1⁄8 teaspoon salt
• 1⁄8 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1⁄8 teaspoon thyme
• 1⁄8 teaspoon pepper
• 1 cup part-skim mozzarella cheese, shredded

directions

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Cook pasta according to package directions.
3. Brown turkey and onions over medium heat, adding mushrooms about halfway through cooking.
4. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, and spices to the pan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 5 minutes.
5. Mix pasta and tomato mixture.
6. In a greased 2 qt casserole layer half the pasta mixture then half the cheese. Repeat layers.
7. Bake, covered, 20-25 minutes.

Reviews

[morgainegeiser]

This was a very tasty recipe, made it exactly like it called for. It had a very nice flavor, only change I would make is I thought it could use more tomatoes and definitely more cheese, otherwise great recipe.