Name: macaroni with vegetables
Total time: 45 min
Yield: 4
Cuisine: española
Ingredients: 400 grams of macaroni; 1 clove garlic; 2 onions; 2 zucchini; 1 red pepper; 1 green pepper; 1 large eggplant; 1 carrot; fried tomato sauce; Grated or powdered cheese; Olive oil; Salt; Spices to taste such as pepper or oregano

I love pasta and I try a new recipe whenever I can. The other day a friend came over who was a vegetarian and I decided to try this dish suitable for vegetarians: macaroni with vegetables.

On other occasions I had already cooked delicious vegetarian pasta recipes such as lasagna with vegetables that turned out incredibly good.

No sooner said than done. I got into the kitchen and prepared this dish in less than an hour. I used tomato sauce from the supermarket because I had little time. I leave you the recipe for homemade tomato sauce below in case you want to work a little harder than me and make a quality tomato sauce ;).

The result impressed me positively. I am one of those who likes pasta with a little meat. But I have to say that this combination is incredibly delicious.

How to make macaroni with vegetables step by step

Fill a pot with water and bring it to a boil over medium-high heat. We add a little salt to the water.
When the water starts to boil, add the macaroni. It is important to look at the cooking time on the package since it will depend on the type of macaroni we have purchased. Periodically we stir the macaroni with a kitchen utensil to prevent the macaroni from sticking.
At the same time, while the macaroni is cooking, we begin to cut the onion into julienne strips and chop the garlic into small cubes.
Cut the zucchini into cubes, the green and red peppers and the aubergines into strips and we can grate the carrot or cut it into small pieces.
We put a splash of olive oil in a frying pan and wait for the oil to heat up.
Next we add the onion and garlic, which are the vegetables that take the longest to brown.
After about 3-5 minutes we add the eggplant. We wait until the onion and eggplant begin to brown.
Once they have begun to brown, add the rest of the vegetables along with the fried tomato sauce. At this point we can add a splash of additional oil if necessary.
We let the vegetables cook. We stir to ensure that all the vegetables have the same level of cooking.
Once the macaroni is done, we strain it and put it back in the pot.
Once the vegetables are well browned, we throw them into the pot and stir.
We serve the macaroni on plates and put our favorite grated or powdered cheese on top. We can also add additional spices such as oregano or pepper.

The keys to cooking the best vegetable macaroni

There are some keys that will make this exquisite recipe even more delicious. When we make the eggplant, we can leave it cut into two halves for about 30-40 minutes in the oven at 180ºC. This will make the process of removing the pulp from inside much easier.

A key ingredient in this recipe is tomato sauce. We can buy it ready-made, saving us a lot of time, or we can make it homemade, which will always be better and without preservatives.

Preparation of homemade tomato sauce for pasta

It is very easy to prepare a delicious homemade tomato sauce for our pasta dish. We simply need 5-10 tomatoes. It is important that they are soft and contain juice.

Peel the tomatoes and put them in a saucepan for 20-30 minutes over low heat. We also add at this moment a splash of extra virgin olive oil.

After this time we add a little salt to eliminate the excess acidity of the tomato, a little paprika and basil or oregano. We cover the casserole and let the tomatoes cook over low heat for approximately one hour.

We now have an exquisite tomato sauce to add to our macaroni with vegetables recipe!