Skillet Pasta

Whilst I was perusing my Martha Stewart Living, April 2012, I found this great pasta basic recipe! The article is titled "Rethink your pasta routine"

So here we go, skillet pasta in under 20 minutes (maybe 30 minutes if you are slower at prepping)!

"1 Create a flavor base.
your pasta water is coming to a boil, heat olive oil or butter in a pan, and cook some onions, leeks or garlic. This is also when you'd introduce cured meat or sausage.

2 Build another layer.
This could mean adding mushrooms, tomatoes, or seafood to the pan or blanching a green vegetable right in the pasta water.

3 Toss in the pasta.
Cook your pasta until just underdone. Then scoop it straight from the pot into the pan. Add a little pasta water to create a silky sauce.

4. Finish with a flourish.
Take the pan off the heat, and add one final layer of flavor: a sprinkle of herbs, cheese, breadcrumbs or even crunchy sea salt."

 So what did I do?

Step 1: Create a flavor base.
While the pan was heating I diced up some onion and a carrot (because I have carrots and always forget to eat them). Once the 1/4-1/2 of sweet onion, 1 small-ish carrot, and 1 tsp garlic powder was in the pan I turned the pasta water on.  Then I added my meat. I used 2 spicy Italian chicken sausages and a chicken breast. I love using sausage because it has all the flavorings already there, you rarely have to add much to the dish. Only spice additions was about a tsp of red pepper flakes because I like my food a little spicy.

Step 2: Build another layer.
I blanched my mushrooms in my salted boiling pasta water (30 seconds) and then tossed them into the pan with the meat. Then I added in 2 cups of dried egg noodles to the boiling water. Cook pasta according to package directions, but be sure to get them out at al dente (probably about 4-6 minutes). They will cook more in the frying pan.

(2a. Here is where timing comes into play, make sure your meat is cooked all the way before you add the pasta in.)

Step 3: Toss in the pasta.
Add pasta to the frying pan. There was quite a bit of liquid from the meat and the mushrooms so I didn't add in any pasta water. In fact I added a tbsp of corn starch to thicken the liquid into more of a sauce. I also added in my ricotta cheese at this point and started to combine until it was the creamy texture I wanted.

Step 4: Finish with a flourish.
Nope, I just didn't do anything here. I added some cracked pepper but that was it.

This made about 2-4 servings. I was hungry so, for me it was dinner and tomorrows lunch. But if you have small kids or are serving it with salad/bread/having dessert etc, you can probably feed more folks.

Enjoy!