Sunday, March 07, 2010

Cheesy Herb Tortellini

I just have to share this recipe. It is SOOO good! For one of my wedding showers the people in attendance were asked to bring a couple of favorite recipes to pass on to me. This one was from my sister. We made it for the first time a month or two ago and right away agreed that it would be finding a place in our regular rotation.

We followed her recipe to get a basic outline, but we added a lot of extra vegetables and we added meat to it.

Ingredients:
  • approx. 3 cups of cooked tortellini (or whatever pasta you would like to use, the original recipe called for fettuccine)
  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • 2 crushed garlic cloves
  • 1 tsp each, dried oregano and basil
  • 2 tsp chili pepper flakes (we used less than this and it still had a bite to it, so leave them out if you don't like spice)
  • 1 cup chicken broth
  • 1/3 cup white wine (can substitute water)
  • 36 small snow peas
  • 1 red pepper, sliced
  • 1/2 cup parmesan cheese
  • 1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
  • OPTIONAL: meat of some variety (the first time we did boneless skinless chicken thighs cut into small pieces and this time we tried ground turkey)
Directions:
  1. Boil pasta until barely tender, drain and rinse with hot water.
  2. Cook meat until well done and set aside.
  3. Cook in a pot over medium heat: oil, garlic, basil, oregano and pepper flakes for 3 minutes. Add chicken broth and wine (or water) and let boil for 3 additional minutes.
  4. In a 3L casserole dish (we use our dutch oven, and my sister said she uses a small roaster, make sure it's a big enough container because it makes a large quantity) toss broth mixture with meat, noodles, vegetables and cheese.
  5. Bake covered at 350F for 25 minutes. Remove the lid, stir and let cook for another 10 minutes.
  6. Enjoy!

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