Creamy Veggie Sausage Pasta Bake

A soothing and creamy veggie sausage pasta bake, perfect for warming up the family on a chilly autumn evening. The luxurious sauce is a simple mix of creme fraiche and grated cheddar cheese with a little grain mustard and lemon zest to give it a bit oomph.

You can make it in advance, keep it in the fridge and then bake it once you’re ready to eat. It gives four generous portions with enough to box up for someone’s packed lunch the next day.

I’ve used vegetarian sausages, but you could easily use meaty bangers – just increase the cooking time when you pan fry.

The boys love creamy pasta and launched into it with gusto for a chilly weekend lunch when everyone was feeling a bit sluggish. This dish really is a great big comforting hug of a meal. Just as you’d imagine it’s mega filling though so there were plenty of leftovers.

The flavours stand easily on their own, but obviously Arlo can’t eat anything unless it’s drowned in tomato ketchup – I was exactly the same at his age. I used to go crazy squirting sauce all over my mum’s macaroni cheese, whereas now it’s a little restrained drizzle of  brown sauce. We really are a family of condiment lovers…

Creamy Veggie Sausage Pasta Bake

Serves: 4 (with leftovers)
Prep time: 10 mins
Cook time: 40 mins

Ingredients
250g pasta
8 veggie sausages (I used Sainsbury’s frozen because they’re firm and ‘meaty’)
half a head of broccoli, but into small florets
300ml reduced fat creme fraiche
1 lemon, zest only
1 heaped teaspoon grain mustard
1 tsp dried sage
150g grated cheddar

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 200C/180C fan/Gas 6.
2. Bring a large pan of water to the boil and cook the pasta according to the packet instructions. While it’s bubbling away gently pan fry the veggie sausages until they cook through and get a bit of colour (it should take about the same amount of time as the pasta). Add the broccoli to the pasta for the final 5 minutes of cooking.
3. Slice the sausages into big chunks. Drain the pasta and broccoli, retaining a little of the cooking water. Add the sausages to the pasta and broccoli. Stir in the creme fraiche, lemon zest, mustard and dried sage and most of the grated cheddar. Give it all a good stir, a few twists of black pepper and then turn it out into a baking dish.
4. Scatter the top with the remaining grated cheese and then bake in the oven for 20-30 minutes until golden and bubbling.

I’m joining this recipe up with the brilliant Meat Free Mondays hosted by my buddy Jac at Tinned Tomatoes. Every week she does a fantastic round-up of 7 veggie-friendly recipes for the week ahead to help inspire your meal planning. Check it out here