Baked Spaghetti

AJ and I love to cook pasta.   I do the sauce and he cooks the pasta.  That’s always been our assignments, because I don’t know how to cook a perfect al dente pasta hehe.  I am afraid of high heat in the gas stove and the first time I cooked pasta noodles, it was a disaster haha!   Half of the noodles did not cook properly and stuck together.

But now with my Saladmaster Electric Skillet, I no longer have to worry over having  under- or overcooked pasta noodles.  Why?  Because with Salamdaster, you can cook the pasta with the sauce.   I made Baked Spaghetti last Saturday to test this, and it was a success!

For this recipe, you will need:

• Garlic, minced
• 1 onion, chopped
• 300g ground pork (or beef)
• 750g spaghetti sauce (we used Clara Ole Three Cheese Spaghetti Sauce)
• 500g penne noodles
• 750g water (or equal part of the spaghetti sauce)
• 250g all purpose cream
• sliced sausages
• bacon (optional)
• 180g cheese (quick melt is better)
• 200g mushroom, sliced

Tip:  To easily grate cheese (especially a quick melt one), put it in the freezer and let it stay there until it is ready to be grated.   But to tell you what, I opted to chop the cheese block into small pieces, and I think it turned out better that way.

Procedures:

1.  Set the electric skillet’s temperature to 220 degress.

2.  Saute garlic and onion.

3.  Put in the ground pork and stir until it slightly brown.

4.  Add spaghetti sauce followed by water, stir until mixed well.   Add the uncooked penne noodles and stir together with the sauce.

5.  Add half of the all purpose cream, sliced mushrooms and sausages.

6.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.   Cover the skillet.

7.  Wait for the vapo valve to click then stir all ingredients.  Cover again and set temperature to 120 degrees.   Leave for 10 minutes.

8.  After 10 minutes, put the remaining all purpose cream and grated cheese.

9.  Cover skillet and set the temperature to 80 degrees. Leave for another 10 minutes.   Sprinkle with grated cheese before serving.

The finished product (served directly at our dining table):

I could tell that it was good because my parents and office colleagues loved it!   There’s already a request from the latter for me to make more of this next time hehe!

The best thing about this pasta dish was that the noodles were cooked al dente, something I was finally able to achieve without cooking it separately over high heat, and no need to guard it too to prevent overcooking.