Samantha Dawn
- Oct 19, 2016
- 2 min read

Leftover Kitchen: Zucchini One Pot Pasta

I hate wasting perfectly good food. I really do. Nothing peeves me more than when I am throwing out an unopened box of cereal because it's two years old, or a half empty box of chicken broth. It's so wasteful and such a waste of money. I can understand having a full pantry, but not using what you have to cook, buying new food for supper, and throwing out food you could have used just hurts to think about. There are people starving and we can't use what we have before it's gone bad. No, not acceptable world!

I spend a lot of time at home now, so I notice when we have a fridge with food that's going. I also love to cook, so it's a win win for me. We had kale, mushrooms, zucchini, and hamburger (which was already cooked and ready to go, we really needed to use it)

What could I possibly make with this? Well, I checked Pinterest and I found a few things, but I would have to tweek them, so that's what I did. Also, you get so many veggies in this and you could totally make it vegetarian or vegan. This makes like 10 servings and was given a tasty from my whole family.

Here's what you'll need:

- 3 ribboned large carrots

- 4-6 ribboned zucchini

- 3 cups of kale

- 9-10 mushrooms

- 3 cloves of minced garlic

- Hamburger, I have no idea how much I used, assume a package

- 1 can of drained of diced tomatoes

- 1 can of tomato paste

- 1 can of tomato sauce

- 1 1/2 teaspoon of oregano

- 5 dashes of red pepper flakes

- 1 tablespoon of oregano

- 1 cup of cottage cheese

- 1 cup of shredded mozzarella cheese

Here's how to make it: - Peel and ribbon the carrots. To ribbon, you will need to take the side of the cheese grater that has one blade to shred.

- Once ribboned, boil them so that they are floppy when you hold it.

- Ribbon the zucchini. Set aside with the carrots. Chop the kale, set aside in a different bowl then zucchini. Chop mushrooms and set aside as well.

- If you don't already have hamburger prepped, do that now. Cook it however you prefer, but it's easier if it's broken up into chunks, don't cook patties.

- In a large pan with a lid, add a little olive oil and brown the garlic on medium heat. Once the garlic is ready, place the hamburger and mushrooms in the pan. Let the mushrooms cook for 3-5 minutes. You want the mushrooms to cook down.

- Add the diced tomatoes, tomato paste, and tomato sauce along with the spices. Let everything simmer for 5-6 minutes so that the sauce can thicken.

- Add the carrots and zucchini. Let the zucchini cook for 2-3 minutes.