Quick Meatball Pasta Bake

One of the byproducts of winter is, of course, winter colds and flu.  And my now longer commute seems to have given me more opportunities to catch said colds and flu.  So, having succumbed, I spent yesterday at home on the sofa feeling sorry for myself and using my weight in tissues.  I roused myself an hour before Hubby came home though, in order to have something warm ready and waiting for him when he got in from work.

Last weekend we'd made the trip to Ikea, and along with many possibly unnecessary purchases we made, was a kilo bag of frozen swedish meatballs.  I figured a pasta bake with those would be the ultimate simple dinner.

I fried off some green onions with a heaped teaspoon of garlic, then popped in half the bag of meatballs.  Once browned off, I added in dried basil, oregano, chilli powder and lots of paprika (I like paprika).  I let it cook off for just a moment, then added half a tin of tomato paste, two cans of diced tomatoes, a good slug of Worcestershire sauce and some salt and pepper.  Then more dried basil.  Then half a capsicum, roughly chopped, a handful of broccoli florets and a double handful of roughly chopped mushrooms.  Can I just say, it's VERY difficult to work out what's missing from a dish when your sense of taste and smell don't work.  By the time Hubby got home, I was mixing the meatballs and sauce with pasta to and putting it into casserole dish, and he assured me it smelled great.  I topped it all off with lots of grated cheese, and slices of boccocini we happened to have in the fridge.

Because everything was already cooked, it only needed to stay in the oven long enough to melt the cheese and get it nice and brown on top.

It looked great, and it certainly made a great warming dinner.  Unfortunately, due to illness, I couldn't taste it, but Hubby assured me it tasted as good as it looked.  Midweek dinner win!