Not so dull pasta!

So we're students. And hence poor. Therefore pasta and rice is cheap, filling and easy so we have that a lot (at least we do in our house!). But last term we probably had pasta a bit too much and we seemed to have it the same way every time - with a tomato sauce. And that got dull pretty quickly. 


And so I started doing pasta bakes that are kinda like macaroni cheese but with added veg so it wasn't just stodgy pasta but had vibrant colours and different textures. Also it's a prime way of sneakily getting some of your five a days in! I used frozen veg - it's cheap and very convenient, it makes the whole cooking process much faster since you don't have to stand around prepping veg for 20 minutes. Of course, if you're not a broccoli fan, then add whatever veg takes your fancy - carrots, celery, peas, mushrooms, sweetcorn... 

For the cheese sauce:


50g butter
50g plain flour
Pint/600ml milk
However much cheese you can handle without getting nightmares
Salt and pepper


For the pasta:


100g pasta per person
Whatever veg (if using big veg like frozen broccoli, then defrost it in the microwave before adding it to the sauce but small veg like sweetcorn you can just add straight to the pan)


1. Make the cheese sauce - melt the butter in a pan, add the flour and stir until it's all combined. Add the milk a little by little and stir with a wooden spoon until it's all absorbed (if you add too much milk in one go, then you'll probably get a lumpy sauce). It'll be quite thick at the beginning but it'll get there, don't worry! 


2. While you're doing this, boil the pasta until just done and drain. Preheat the oven to 200'C.


3. Once all the milk has been added to the cheese sauce, stir in the cheese and seasoning until it's all melted. Add the veg you're using and tip in the cooked pasta. Stir it all together and tip it into a big baking dish (or even several big plates if you don't have a baking dish). Grate some more cheese over the top and bake for about 15 minutes.


We had this with garlic bread (one of your favourite foods!) and some fresh rocket because it was on offer in Tesco's and because my friend eats it in an amusing way like a rabbit.