My mom started buying me cookbooks in the late 80’s, so I blame her for my obsession. I have to blame someone right? It was around the same time she started entering her recipes, my recipes and any family member who was willing to give up a recipe into our local town cookbooks. I’ve got two of these small town family cookbooks with a handful of my recipes in them. Seems so ironic to me with where I ended up in life, as a food blogger and writer with a full time passion for food. Destiny perhaps or, someone knew before I did where my path would go.
My cookbook obsession runs deep. For years I’ve had cooking magazine subscriptions. In fact I’ve only within the past two years cancelled a few of them because I’m running out of room. I’ve also been lucky enough to receive many cookbooks as gifts from media events, and I take them out from the library from time to time. In fact I’m even thinking about joining a 12 month Instagram Monthly Cookbook Club this month because I love cookbooks so much. It could be worse I think.
A recent trip to the library with the kids to pick up some books and I ended up coming home with Guy Fieri’s “Guy on Fire Cookbook”. I refrained from bringing home a huge pile, as I have in the past (new goals right) and only brought home one cookbook. See cookbooks inspire me, and I certainly do enjoy this book by Guy.
After choosing no less than 20 recipes to try I had to narrow it down to one. So I choose pasta. My family loved this recipe. Guy uses olive oil, I used canola oil. I also used less red hot pepper flakes and it was still a bit spicy for one of the minions, but it was oh so delicious. And that fresh rosemary on top – a show stopper.
In this cookbook Guy shares 130 recipes for adventures in the outdoors. I noted several of the BBQ’d meat recipes required brining the night before so you will have to allow yourself the time to do this. After pouring through it several times, I can tell you it’s fun and has several recipes I would like to try. I love that he’s dedicated it to his dad and father-in-law. Lucky “guy”.
Ingredients
- 2 tbsp canola oil
- 1 yellow onion diced
- 3 garlic cloves minced
- 3 Italian sausages uncooked
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 28 oz diced tomatoes with juice
- 1 28 oz crushed tomatoes
- 1 tbsp dried thyme
- 1 tbsp dried basil
- 1/4 tsp dried red pepper flakes
- salt and pepper to taste
- 1 lb ziti or penne
- 1 lb fresh mozzarella grated
- 1 1/2 cup ricotta chesee
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup parmesan grated
- 2 tbsp fresh parsley for garnish
- 1 tbsp fresh rosemary chopped for garnish
- Cooking spray
Instructions
- Heat canola oil in a large pan over medium high heat. Add the onion and garlic and saute for 5-7 minutes, until the onion starts to soften.
- Add the sausage and beef, breaking it up with a masher or spoon. Saute until it's cooked through and is starting to brown nicely.
- Add thyme, basil, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper. Stir and cook another 2 minutes.
- Add tomatoes and any juice, stirring occasionally for 25 minutes. Remove from heat, seat aside to cool slightly.
- Preheat oven to 375 F.
- Cook the pasta in a large pot of boiling, salted water until just short of al dente. Drain the pasta and reserve.
- In a large bowl, combine 3/4 of the mozzarella, ricotta, egg, salt and a pinch of pepper. Mix well and toss in the pasta. Add the meat mixture and toss all ingredients to combine.
- Spray a casserole dish or large cast iron pan with cooking spray. Pour the mixture in and top the ziti with remaining mozzarella and parmesan cheese.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes until bubbly and golden brown. Garnish with parsley & rosemary.
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