Baked Comfort

I'm an all around sports fan and a huge fan of the NCAA Mens College Basketball National Championship Tournament. The big dance. The small bets placed on filling out your own bracket and intently watching every single game, circling the correct picks and sometimes vengefully crossing out your misguided predictions. All in hopes that your bracket will rise to the top and bring home the fairly significant cash prize. I love it. This year I also loved Kansas to win it all, having the Jayhawks in my bracket as the last team standing. Not thinking much about their matchup with Northern Iowa, I fell into a nice Saturday afternoon nap only to awaken with five minutes to go in the game and Kansas is LOSING. The impossible happens. Kansas loses and my bracket goes up in flames. Figurativly and literally.

I needed comfort food NOW...and some vodka. The dish of choice was an obvious pick for me: a cheesy, saucy baked mostaccioli. I've made this, or something similar, countless times and is easily one of my favorites. It's my Old Faithful, it's simple to make, it's chock full of deliciousness in every bite, and will feed you and a small hungry crowd. The leftovers even nuke up nicely, if there are any.

Let's get cookin'!

Baked Mostaccioli

Ingredients:

1 lb Mostaccioli

2 tablespoons olive oil +

1 lb Italian sausage

1 28 oz. can crushed tomatoes

1 red onion diced

two bell peppers diced

1 lb mozzarella cheese chopped or shredded, divided in two

1 6-8 oz tub parmesan

5 garlic cloves chopped

1 package of basil leaves chopped

Panko bread crumbs

1 tablespoon red pepper flakes

salt and pepper

Chipolte flakes (optional)

directions:

Bring a pot of salted water to a boil. Add the pasta and cook, stirring occasionally. Remove and drain the pasta a little bit before the pasta is al dente and still a little tough on your tooth. It will finish in the oven and won't be overcooked. Moved the drained pasta to a large bowl and shake around with some drizzled olive oil. Heat the 2 T olive oil in a large pan and begin to saute the onion and peppers. Add the sausage, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, and garlic breaking up the sausage into small pieces and is fully cooked. Drain or paper towel out the excess grease by tipping the pan and moving the mixture to the high side of the pan. Add this mixture, the crushed tomatoes, half of the mozzarella, half of the parmesan, basil leaves to the pasta. Gently stir to evenly combine, trying not to break up the pasta. Pour this into a greased 13x9x2 baking dish. Scatter the remaining mozzarella over the top. In the tub with the remaing parmesan cheese, add enough panko crumbs to refill the container and shake or stir to combine. Shake evenly over the dish. Lightly sprinkle some chipolte flakes over the top and place in an oven that has been preheated to 420 degrees. Baked for about twenty minutes or until there is some light browning on the crust. Remove from oven and let rest for 6 minutes +/-. Spatula desired portions onto plates and devour.