When laziness wins...

The meal plan for the week showed that tonight's dinner was to be a baked vegetable and pasta dish. Nothing fancy, nothing too involved. Especially because I still had a nice variety of vegetables left in my refrigerator all ready to be used. So while Little Girl napped, I started chopping. As I chopped, though, I realized that I had a lot of veggies. A whole lot. More than would fit in any of my pans to be sauteed before being tossed in with the pasta. And I am way too lazy to use multiple pans - more dishes to wash? No, thank you!

I then realized that I didn't have to saute. I could roast. Why did I never think of this before? No worrying about overcooking none veggie or undercooking another by adding them in the "wrong" order. I pulled out my biggest baking dish and threw everything in all at once - onions, carrots, parsnips, peppers, zucchini, yellow squash, tomatoes, garlic... Add some olive oil and some spiced and get the whole thing into a 425 degree oven, and no more thought necessary!!

Once the veggies were cooked, I added a can of kidney beans, shredded cheese and the cooked pasta. After popping the whole thing into the oven, dinner was ready.

I don't know why I never did this before. In addition to saving on prep dishes in need of washing, roasting the vegetables added a whole new layer of flavor that I never thought of!! This was a wonderful dinner, with plenty of leftovers for Hubby to take to work for lunches! I can't wait to make this one again!