You know how I love a 15 minute meal.  Sometimes that’s all I have to pull dinner together.  Such was the case the night I made this, but the inspiration for the dish had come a few months before.

When I went to Nashville for Blissdom, a group of us had dinner together the first night.  Tricia from Once a Month Mom was our ring leader and she took us downtown to Demo’s Restaurant.  I chose the spaghetti with brown butter garlic sauce.  It tasted really good, but I had an inkling that I could make it better at home.

I was right!  And it can be made in the time it takes to boil water and cook the pasta.  Here’s what you’ll need: 

My family loves creamy pasta dishes.  They’re so quick and easy to make that we can have this favorite meal on a busy week night or cooked up after church on a Sunday.

This version has roasted red peppers, sun-dried tomatoes and chicken marinated in red wine vinegar and homemade Italian Herb Salt.  Serve it up with a salad and a loaf of crusty bread with seasoned olive oil for dipping.  Even better than going out to eat and much cheaper too!  

I usually take ingredient photos, but I can’t find one for this dish on my computer.  We must have been really busy the night I made it and I forgot to take the photo.

I am a huge fan of the 15 minute meal.  Some days, there just isn’t any more time than that to pull dinner together.

I’ve even got an eBook full of 15 minute meals.  I frequently pull it out when I need something quick for dinner.  A quick scan of the book, matched up with the items in my pantry will always yield a dinner idea.

This meal idea came from my mom.  She had something similar when she ate out recently.  I’m not sure what restaurant and I don’t know exactly how she fixed hers.  There are many different ways you could take this, depending on what your family likes and what you’ve got in the pantry.

I happened to have a variety of bell peppers in the fridge, so I used them to add color and flavor.  Doesn’t this pan of cooking peppers and onions look good?

Here’s what you’ll need for this quick meal: 

This is so good and so easy!  I think I actually like it better than cooking it on the stove.  And it’s perfect for a day when you have a few minutes to pull dinner together in the afternoon.  It only cooks about 3 hours (you can stretch it to about 5 if you cook on low).  I love having dinner ready at dinner time, without doing any cooking right then.

I completely forgot to take photos of the finished dish, so you’ll have to make do with this ingredient photo.

I found the recipe at Crystal & Co. She used a jar of spaghetti sauce, but I didn’t have any, so I made up a quick homemade version.  The hands-on prep is still super quick.

Dinner doesn’t get simpler than this.

If you’re blessed with tomatoes growing in your backyard, you could start the water, pick a couple tomatoes and have the sauce finished by the time the ravioli is done.

I didn’t have fresh tomatoes for this, so I used canned.  The sweetness of the onions goes well with tomatoes.  Cheese ravioli is a perfect base for the sauce.

Here’s what you’ll need. 

No ingredient photo this time because I was cooking fast and forgot to take one.

So I just read the title and it is a bit misleading.  This recipe contains no shell of tomato, crushed or otherwise.

It does have pesto, crushed tomatoes and pasta shells.  And that’s it, except the mozzarella cheese sprinkled on top.  Because you know how I can’t resist cheese.

15 minutes, start to finish and that includes time to boil the water.  Throw a salad at it and call it dinner, and a good one too.

Here’s what you’ll need:

• 1 lb. medium pasta shells
• 28 oz crushed tomatoes
• 4 oz pesto (1/2 prepared jar)

Cook the pasta according to the package directions.  Stir the crushed tomatoes and pesto together in a saucepan.  Heat over medium-high heat while the pasta cooks.

Drain the shells and combine with the sauce.  Serve with a sprinkle of cheese, if you like.

The extra pesto can be frozen for later.

There are nights when I stare into my pantry, wondering what I’m going to fix.  On this particular night, the contents of the pantry made me consider making Italian Sausage with Bowties but I didn’t have any stewed tomatoes.  I decided to change the recipe up a bit and came up with this.

Like the original, it’s a cinch to make and quick too.  This one gets an added taste boost from the peppers.  Here’s what you’ll need:

This post is part of Tasty Traditions at Coupon Cookin’

We love pasta.  Especially if it’s in a creamy sauce.  This dish cooks in the time it takes to boil the water and cook the pasta.  You can’t beat that.

I made it even faster, by using chicken I had grilled, sliced and frozen.  A quick thaw in the microwave and it was ready to use.

Here’s what you’ll need:

Ignore the can of black olives in the photo.  I planned to use them, but changed my mind.

• 1 lb. bowtie pasta
• 1-1 1/2 lbs. grilled chicken, sliced
• 1 onion, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, pressed or crushed
• 4 Tbs. butter
• 1 cup half and half, warmed
• 1 cup chicken broth
• 1 tsp. Homemade Seasoned Salt
• 12 oz jar roasted red peppers, sliced
• 1 cup mozzarella, shredded

Cook the pasta according to the package directions.  While it cooks, melt butter in a skillet over medium heat and cook the onion and garlic till soft.  Whisk in half and half and chicken broth.  Stir in seasoned salt and mozzarella.  Lower the heat to keep the sauce from boiling.

Add the chicken and red pepper slices to the sauce.  Stir frequently and keep and eye on the heat so it doesn’t boil.  Drain the cooked pasta and stir it together with the sauce.  Add chopped parsley or basil when serving, if you’re lucky enough to have some.

If you like this post, get more by liking the Eat at Home Facebook page or subscribing by RSS or email.

A sprinkling of fresh, chopped parsley would have done wonders for that photo.  Smart food photographers probably keep parsley in their fridge at all times.

Food photography faults aside, this dish was wonderful!  I based it off of a recipe for Chipotle Shrimp Scampi, from my friend Joyce’s new recipe blog. (Her photo is better than mine.)   One of my kids doesn’t like shrimp, so I decided to use the grilled chicken I had sliced and frozen.  Since I was using meat that was already cooked, I didn’t need to use the chipotle rub that the original recipe called for.  I used the sauce from chipotle peppers in adobo sauce that I had stored in the freezer.

Here’s what you’ll need:

• Angel hair pasta
• 4-6 cloves garlic, minced or crushed
• olive oil
• 1-3 Tbs. adobo sauce from chipotle peppers
• 1/2 cup white wine
• 3-6 Tbs. lime juice
• 5 Tbs. butter
• a few ladles of cooking water from the pasta
• 1 1/2 lbs. grilled chicken, sliced

Cook the pasta according to the directions.  Saute garlic in oil.  Add adobo sauce and grilled chicken.  Cook for a few minutes till the chicken is hot.  Remove chicken.  Add wine, lime juice, butter and a few ladles of cooking water to the pan.  Cook till hot and bubbling.

Drain pasta.  Stir chicken and sauce into the pasta.  Add more pasta water if the dish is too sticky.

A few notes:  I used the lower quantities of adobo sauce and lime juice, but next time I will increase both.  It was good, but the yum factor would be upped with more of each of these.

I buy chipotle peppers in adobo sauce in the small cans.  Most recipes only use a small part of the can, but the rest freezes great.

Cilantro or parsley would be great to add to this too.

Linked to:

This dish is full of flavor – garlic, red onion, black olives, basil, parsley and Parmesan all in white wine sauce.  It pairs up beautifully with grilled chicken, although the chicken didn’t make it into the photo.

Best of all, it is quick to fix.

Here’s what you’ll need:

• Boneless chicken breasts
• Kosher salt
• Black pepper
• Angel Hair pasta, 1 lb.
• 4 Tbs. butter
• 8 cloves garlic, minced or chopped
• 1 red onion, chopped
• 1/2 cup white wine
• 2 ladles of cooking water from the pasta
• Parsley, 1 handful, chopped
• Basil, 1 handful, chopped
• Pitted ripe olives, whole – 6 oz can
• Parmesan, 1 cup shredded

Don’t be intimidated by the long list of ingredients.  There’s really not much to this dish, but it looks long when the salt, pepper and cooking water are listed.

Season the chicken with Kosher salt and black pepper.  Grill outdoors until done.  Slice it thin to serve with the pasta.

While the chicken grills, cook the pasta according to the package directions.

Melt the butter in a skillet.  Cook the onion and garlic for a few minutes.  Add the wine.  I freeze wine in zip top bags.  It thaws quickly on the counter.  Let the wine cook with the onions and garlic for a minute or two, then add 2 ladles of cooking water from the pasta.

Stir in the parsley and basil and season the sauce with Kosher salt and pepper.  Stir in the olives.  Drain the pasta and mix with the sauce.  Add the cheese to the pasta and stir to combine.

Serve with grilled chicken.  I also served this with warm bread and Seasoned Olive Oil for Dipping and a green salad.