Secret Family Recipe! Baked Ziti

Every year for my husband's birthday, he requests the infamous BAKED ZITI that my MIL makes that is incredible!

This year, due to my dietary restrictions, my sweet and accommodating MIL invited myself and my brother in law's girlfriend (Celiac- also gluten free) to make our own modified version of her famous ziti - gluten free style!

We boiled gluten free noodles half way (5 minutes or so) Note: I usually prefer to use quinoa pasta - but the rice pasta tastes slightly better and is less hard.

Drain the noodles, and stir in a cup of Ricotta cheese.  Then pour in the secret marinara sauce, stir, top with cheese and bake for 15 minutes!

Secret Sauce (Meat Lover Version)
Now, the marinara sauce - for meat eaters, you get Italian sausage from an Italian Market, and what my MIL does is saute crushed tomatoes in olive oil for a few minutes.  Then she adds a can of tomato sauce, and Italian herbs and spices (oregano, garlic, basil).

In a separate pan, bring a bit of water to boil, then sets the sausages in the water until the pink is gone.  Then browns the sausages, and pay attention here, this is the secret tip for not too greasy meat sauce, drain and rinse the sausages before adding them to the marinara sauce! This rids the sausage of the excess fat and grease that accumulates from cooking the sausage.

The marinara sauce marinates with the meat and then she removes the sausages and places them in their own casserole dish.

The sauce she uses to mix in with the noodles and ricotta, which is then baked in the oven for 15 minutes.

Now, for a vegan alternative, use soy flavored mozzarella cheese, and obviously, do not cook the meet in the sauce.  Also, for fellow gluten free folk, you do not want to cook the sausage in the meat either because there can be additives and fillers in some sausages, depending on where you get them, but you want to check the ingredients on those before assuming they are gluten free!

Manji!