Buddy’s pasta bake

A great way to use up leftover gralic bread, this easy pasta bake from Jamie Oliver includes broccoli, cheesy sauce and garlic bread crispy bits.

Credit: Penguin Random House / © Richard Clatworthy

• serves

  8

• prep

  15 minutes

• cook

  30 minutes

• difficulty

  Easy

Ingredients

• 2 heads broccoli (375g each)
• 4 cloves garlic
• olive oil
• ½–1 tsp dried red chilli flakes
• 1½ litres semi-skimmed milk
• 100 g baby spinach
• 100 g Cheddar cheese
• 500 g dried pasta shells
• 100 g garlic bread

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C.
2. Cut off and discard the tough ends of the broccoli stalks, trim the green florets into 3cm pieces and put aside, then roughly chop all the remaining stalks and place in a food processor. Peel and add the garlic, then blitz until fine.
3. Place a large shallow casserole pan on a medium heat. Once hot, go in with 3 tsp (14 ml) of olive oil and the chilli flakes, to taste. As soon as they start to sizzle, tip in the blitzed broccoli stalks. Cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, then pour in 1 litre of milk. Pour the remaining 500 ml of milk into the processor with the spinach and crumble in the cheese (I wanted this to be healthy, but now’s the time to add extra cheese if you want it more indulgent). Blitz until smooth, pour into the pan, then bring to the boil and season to perfection. Stir the broccoli florets and pasta shells into the sauce and boil for 5 minutes, stirring regularly.
4. Tear the garlic bread into the processor (there’s no need to clean it) and blitz into crumbs. Sprinkle over the pasta bake and transfer to the oven for 15 minutes, or until golden and bubbling. Delicious served with a fresh green salad.

 

Seasonal swaps

• Go festive and swap out the broccoli for Brussels sprouts – blitz half for the sauce and quarter the rest to add with the pasta. Embrace Christmas cheeseboard cheeses, and try a cheeky crumbling of chestnuts in the garlic bread crispy bits.

Nutrition (per serve)

Energy: 392 kcal

Protein: 22.5 g

Carbohydrate: 65.4 g

 - Sugars 12.5 g

Fat: 12.1 g

 - Saturated 6.2 g

Salt: 0.6 g

Fibre: 4 g

Recipe and image from ONE by Jamie Oliver (Penguin Random House), © Jamie Oliver Enterprises Limited (2022 ONE). Photography: © Richard Clatworthy, 2022.

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.