Olive Garden Baked Pasta: my version (sort of?) So ridiculously easy, and so good.

Yum

I have a deep dark secret.

I love the Olive Garden.

Listen, I know. It’s terrible for me. It has a ton of sodium. I should be supporting local restaurants and businesses instead.

But. Like. I really like the breadsticks. And the really cold salad.

One of my most embarrassing fun facts: I once ate at the Olive Garden in Times Square. I’m the utterly mockable tourist that, in the face of a city full of new and exciting food experiences, chose to stand in line for the massive (overpriced) Olive Garden in the middle of the neon lights of Broadway.

A few years ago my Man-husband and I went to New York to see a whole bunch of Broadway shows. We played it cheap (I mean, we are teachers) and stayed in a tiny economy room and ate a lot pizza-window pizza and taco truck burritos. We did explore some other food interests as well of course, but after a week we we were looking for something comforting and familiar before getting on our plane back home to Indianapolis. Walking through Times Square, we both stared at the Olive Garden sign and waited for the other one to admit that that was what we wanted. We hid our faces in shame, traipsed in, and gleefully tucked into all the carbs in the world.

Listen. It was good.

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I order whatever cheese-covered pasta dish appeals to me on any given night, but Matt always orders the same thing, the four cheese something or other, and this recipe is sort of a copycat version of that questionably-Italian Olive Garden baked pasta. It’s incredibly easy, simple to health-up if you are so inclined (add veggies and sub in some whole wheat pasta), can be made ahead and baked later, works great as leftovers, and is comforting in the middle of this depressing winter.

Looking for another easy weeknight dinner? Check out my easy crockpot chicken nachos.

What is that creamy sauce?

A few years ago I did some googling to figure out what is in the “cheesy marinara” business that they have at a lot of Italian restaurants and made the discovery that usually it is just marinara sauce mixed with alfredo sauce. And hey, on a weeknight you know I’m not about to make sauces from scratch, so I employed the jarred versions here. If you want to go to the effort to whip up a bechamel and a homemade marinara sauce on a Tuesday while trying to write lesson plans and throw laundry in, you do you boo, but I’m going to unashamedly grab that jar of Prego from the pantry.

This Olive Garden baked pasta recipe only calls for half the jar of alfredo, but there’s a lot of stuff you can do with that leftover sauce. Use it as pizza sauce, dip mozzarella sticks into it, eat in the middle of the night with a spoon in the dark of your abandoned kitchen, pour it over steamed veggies. Whatever floats your boat.

What is your embarassing food weakness? Let me know in the comments.

Coming up on KellyLikestoBake: tequila sunrise cupcakes on Sunday… still trying to figure out how, exactly, to get that tequila flavor in my sponge, but I’m getting closer…. AND stay tuned for a pop-up sale of an Easter-themed fun bake later in March!

Easy Olive Garden Baked Pasta

• One large Italian chicken sausage, diced
• Medium onion, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced (I use the jarred kind)
• Half a diced bell pepper (I leave this out because I hate (HATE) bell peppers)
• 1 T olive oil
• 1 jar marinara sauce of your choice
• 1/2 jar alfredo sauce of your choice
• 1 lb. box penne pasta
• 1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
• breadcrumbs for sprinkling if desired

Preheat your oven to 375

Boil a large pot of salted water. When it is boiling, add your pasta, and cook until al dente. While it is cooking:

In a large saucepan on medium heat, saute the sausage, onion, and bell pepper (and any other veggies you want to throw in, like mushrooms or asparagus) until soft and beginning to brown. Add the garlic, continue to cook until it is fragrant. Add the sauces, stir until incorporated and cook on low until your pasta is done.

Drain the pasta and dump directly into your sauce mixture. Toss to coat.

Spray a casserole dish or dutch oven with cooking spray. Add the pasta. Top with shredded mozzarella. Top with bread crumbs if you desire. Bake for 30 minutes or until bubbly and browned on top.

If you would like to, you can assemble this any time in the few days before and fridge until you are ready to bake it!

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