What's For Dinner: Pasta with Roasted Tomatoes, Basil, and Mozzarella

For tonight's dinner, I threw together a fairly simple pasta dish. Roasting the tomatoes took about 45 minutes, but the other ingredients came together in less than 10 minutes. For this pasta dish, I used an organic gemelli pasta. (Gotta love the multi-packs of organic pasta from Costco!) After boiling the pasta in salted water, I drained the pasta and just tossed it together with the roasted tomatoes, some diced mozzarella, roughly chopped fresh basil, and a little glug of olive oil. So good -- and no sauce necessary!

Roasted Tomatoes

12 cherry tomatoes, cut in half

~2 T olive oil

1 T brown sugar

pinch of coarse sea salt

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Place the halved cherry tomatoes in an oven-safe baking dish.

2. Mix together the olive oil, brown sugar, and sea salt in a glass.

3. Pour the olive oil mixture over the tomatoes, and toss to cover.

4. If necessary, flip tomatoes so they are cut-side up.

5. Roast in the oven for about 45 minutes, or until tomatoes are shriveled.

I served the entree alongside a few pieces of bruschetta, which mimicked the flavors in the pasta. To make this bruschetta, I cut a few slices of ciabatta, drizzled the bread with some olive oil, and then topped each piece with a thin slice of mozzarella, one basil leaf, and one tomato slice. Each piece of bread was then drizzled with a little bit of balsamic vinegar.