Holy Guacamole, Batman!

Guacamole is perhaps one of the most awesome things you can make with an avocado. (Right next to The Original Don Special, that is.) So grab some avocados and make some guacamole!

Ingredients:

-2 to 3 avocados

-1 tomato

-1 to 2 cloves of garlic

-1/4 of an onion

Optional:

-Cilantro

-Lime Juice

1. one or two cloves of garlic. I really enjoy garlic, so I mince three of them. Place the garlic in a bowl.

How to mince garlic.

2. Dice one quarter of an onion and add it to the bowl along with the garlic. You'll want to dice this onion as finely as you can otherwise the onion will be overpowering in the guacamole.

3. Dice your tomato and add this to the bowl as well. Since I only had cherry tomatoes, I simply quartered them.

4. Pit and scoop out your avocados. Add them to the tomato, garlic, and onion. Use a fork to mash and mix everything together. Add salt and pepper to taste. If you had cilantro or lime juice this would be the time to add those ingredients.

How to mince garlic.

Here's a quick and easy way to mince garlic. While there are better methods out there, this is what I do when I have to make good quick work out of the garlic I have.

 1. Smash the garlic. You can use the bottom of a jar, the side of a metallic knife, a spoon, etc...


You can now remove the skin easily.

 2. Rock your knife back and forth until all of the garlic is chopped coarsely.

3. Scrape all the garlic into a single pile and wipe your knife clean.

 4. Rock your knife back and forth in a direction that's perpendicular from how you moved it the first time.

5. Scrape the garlic into a neat pile. Don't forget to clean the garlic off your knife!

That's all there is to mincing your own garlic!

Baked Pasta

Pasta tastes better baked. It's just scientific fact. (At least according to this guy it is.) That's why for this post, we're going to bake some pasta. Not only is it an easy way to make pasta and tomato sauce taste better, it also adds in a couple extra servings of vegetables.

 Ingredients:

-Pasta sauce

-Pasta of choice

-Cheese

-Onion

-Bell Pepper

-Garlic

Optional:

-Tomatoes

-Sun Dried Tomatoes

-Sugar

-Frozen vegetables

 1. Start out by pre-heating the oven to 350 degrees and boiling a pot of water. 


Once this is done, dice the garlic, onion, bell pepper, tomatoes, and sun dried tomatoes. 


Don't worry if the alarm goes off or if the water starts boiling while you're chopping. Those can be left alone for a while without any problems.

 2. Heat up a pan and add some olive oil. Once the pan is hot enough, add the garlic then the onions. Let the onions sweat. (They'll turn clear when they're ready.)


If the water is boiling at this point, add the pasta to the water and set the timer to what the recommended cooking time.

3. Drain as soon as the timer goes off, then set it aside in your baking dish.

 4. Add the remaining vegetables to the pan such as the bell pepper, tomatoes, and sun-dried tomatoes.

5. Once the bell peppers soften or the tomatoes break down and give up their juice, add the pasta sauce.

Let the sauce simmer on medium-low for about seven minutes.

You can also add a little sugar if the sauce is too acidic at this point.

6. Pour the sauce into the baking dish and mix with the pasta you've set aside earlier.

7. Smooth out the top a and add the cheese of your choice.

Then cover the dish with foil and bake it in the oven for 10 minutes. Once this is done you need to remove the foil and bake it for another five minutes.

Remove the dish from the oven and let it sit for a few minutes before cutting in.

There you have it: Baked pasta in all its gooey cheesy glory!

A slice of baked pasta.