My favorite baked ziti to make is actually from Thug Kitchen 2, and I love how many vegetables you can hide within the sauce! The tomato sauce is made from tomatoes and roasted red peppers, the creamy white sauce is made from nooch, almonds, silken tofu, garlic, and artichokes, and the "filling" is made with just spinach, garlic and onion. So it appears to the undiscerning eye that the only vegetable in this dish is spinach, but little did he know he was consuming not one, but four servings of vegetables. I don't add any salt to dishes like these-- the nooch, the briney artichokes, caramelized onions and garlic and zing from the tomatoes and peppers are enough to keep me high on life.


The topping is just breadcrumbs, herbs and olive oil. Bake it, and thirty minutes later this casserole dish filled with creamy, salty, crispy, tangy pasta is before you. It is the food equivalent of sweatpants and old movies. Or-- attack your Wednesday night blues with a triple threat of all three-- pasta, sweatpants, old movies. I fight melancholia with pasta all the time and I'm still standing <3