Rice Pasta with Roasted Veggies

I recently went to a biomedical support group meeting and was talking with one of my friends there, another mom of an autistic child, and she was telling me that she is struggling with the gluten free/casein free diet. Not that it is so hard, but that she gets tired of the same old thing and has a hard time coming up with new foods, or even those easy foods like grilled cheese, which we all used to fall back on before we cut dairy and wheat from our children’s lives. So I thought I’d try to start sharing some of my favorite recipes and hopefully inspire you to try something new. Don’t forget that it can take as many as 20 times of offering a new food to your child before they will taste it and start to enjoy it. Try not to get too discouraged if they don’t want to eat it right away. And if you have any great recipes please feel free to share them in the comments below!

1 lbs rice pasta – I like Tinkyada penne for this recipe

1 purple eggplant, cubed
2 medium white or yellow onions peeled and quartered
1 pint of white mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
1 red pepper sliced
1 – 2 yellow or green squash, cubed
1 – 2 carrots, peeled and sliced
2 -3 cloves of garlic, chopped or crushed
1 cup beef broth (may need more if you use more veggies)
salt to taste
pepper to taste
rosemary to taste
1 tsp dried mint

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a covered roaster, I like the covered roasters by pampered chef, mix all the veggies, garlic, salt, pepper, rosemary and mint. Pour enough broth in to come 1/4 to 1/2 up the veggies. Roast for at least one hour. Check to see if veggies are soft and broken down into a ragu. If not, roast longer. The veggies should not be watery but should not be dry either.

Cook your pasta and serve veggie ragu over the penne. Yummy, and a great way to use the great veggies starting to become available.