Baked spicy saffron macaroni!

I can't believe I've got yet another pasta dish for Ruth's Presto Pasta Night over at Once Upon A Feast! I'm sure I've cooked more pasta this month than usual :) But it tastes so good, and is so comforting on a cold January evening!

Anyway, as a variation on a theme, this week I've prepared a spicy pasta bake. It was based on an episode of Come Dine With Me (one of the best Sunday afternoon reality/cookery shows EVER! If you haven't seen it, you're missing out...!) I think the woman decribed it as a baked pasta paella!

Oven baked spicy macaroni

• 500g cherry tomatoes
• 1 red onion, halved and sliced
• 2 cloves of garlic - crushed
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 11 oz small macaroni
• 4 boneless, skinless chicken thighs, quartered
• 6 merguez sausages (original recipe specified chorizo - but when I saw these in my local sausage shop, I had to have them!)
• Small handful fresh chopped rosemary (I got mine from my garden - yay!)
• 300ml chicken stock
• Pinch of saffron
• 200g cooked prawns - the original recipe used large raw prawns - but these were what I had!
• Handful of basil leaves, torn, ready to serve
• Salt and pepper

Put the cherry tomatoes into a casserole dish and sprinkle with olive oil. Roast in a preheated oven at 220c for 15 minutes. Then add the garlic and red onions, and place the sausages on top then cook until the tomatoes are soft.


Remove from the oven. Take out the sausages, and cut into chunks. Add the macaroni, chicken, and sausage pieces rosemary, stock, saffron, salt and pepper. Mix well and return it to the oven to bake for 30 minutes.

Add the prawns, stir and allow the prawns to warm through for 3/4 minutes. You don't want to put it back in the oven at this point or the prawns may go tough.

Sprinkle with basil and serve.

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