When you think about pasta sauce you think it should be served over pasta, but there are so many other great recipes that can make use of it as an ingredient. From breakfast to snack to dinner Great Value Pasta Sauce is an excellent addition to your menu. Try an absolutely delicious Shakshouka Goes to Italy made easy with Great Value Onion and Garlic Pasta Sauce and amazing Powerhouse Pizza Rollups with the luscious Great Value Four Cheese Pasta Sauce. All of these recipes incorporate this underused condiment in unique and tasty ways!
I am lucky. I feel lucky every day. My Baby had a very rough start in life and spent more than 7 weeks in the hospital after being born but once she got home it was easy. Well, not really easy but in comparison to all the weeks in the NICU it felt much better. I went back to cooking almost right away after we got home and I haven’t stopped since. Of course there are days when she has meltdowns and tantrums; there are still nights when she doesn’t sleep; there are weeks when she refuses to eat more than a spoonful of anything. But overall I am lucky as I get to cook and photograph and blog with her by my side. At first she was sleeping in her little bouncy chair right next to me in the kitchen while I chopped and stirred and cooked. As she got bigger she moved to her high chair watching me carefully from this new and unusual vantage point. Lately, as she’s becoming more and more mobile, she’s sitting on the floor next to my working surface, playing with my measuring cups (best toy ever!), opening her mouth eagerly when I give her a piece of tomato or a slice of cucumber. I talk to her when I cook sometimes: this is an onion, this is a carrot, this is garlic. Sometimes she looks up with curiosity but most often she ignores me. I look forward to her standing on a chair in the near future and helping me while I chop and stir and cook.
A few months ago when Baby went through a phase of refusing any solids, in desperation I gave her a piece of lasagna that I just made. Surprisingly, she gobbled it all up without any teeth and asked for more. After a few weeks of experimenting it turned out that she loves pasta sauces! Since then I’ve been looking for ideas on how to incorporate pasta sauce into recipes that aren’t just pasta. As it turned out, it’s extremely easy and delicious. As a stay at home mom I don’t have access to a car during the week, so I have to rely on the stores that are within walking distance from my home. Over the past year I’ve been going to Walmart a lot and I love their Great Value line of products. Great Value Onion and Garlic Pasta Sauce is chunky and you can taste the ingredients; it’s fresh and delicious and, most importantly for me, not very salty. I find that a lot of pasta sauces have too much salt, but this particular kind doesn’t have salt listed as one of its first ingredients, so that’s a plus. Great Value Four Cheese Pasta Sauce is smooth and creamy, made with ricotta, Parmesan, Romano, and provolone cheese, it’s perfect for dipping. Baby liked both but she preferred the chunkier Onion and Garlic sauce.
First recipe I tried was Powerhouse Pizza Rollups. I have to confess, it was my first time using refrigerated crescent rolls dough and I loved it! It was so satisfying hearing the packaging lightly pop and the dough spill out. The recipe comes together really easy and I can totally see how Baby would love helping me making these Pizza Rollups in the future. It’s so easy: slice bell pepper into thin strips, crumble some feta, unroll the crescent rolls and assemble. A little bit of the delicious Great Value Four Cheese Pasta Sauce, a few spinach leaves, cut up bell peppers and feta. Roll, bake, and serve with more sauce! Baby was super curious about the sauce and loved the rollups. She shoved the whole thing into her mouth and sat there happily, not even able to chew at first.
Powerhouse Pizza Rollups
When you think about pasta sauce, you think pasta but there are so many other recipes that make use of this ingredient. From breakfast to snack to dinner Great Value pasta sauces are an excellent addition to your menu. Try this amazing Pizza Rollups with luscious Great Value Four Cheese Pasta Sauce | #WeLoveGreatValue #ad | Imagelicious
Ingredients
- 1 cup baby spinach leaves
- 1 medium red pepper, cut into thin strips
- 1 package refrigerated crescent rolls
- 1 cup Great Value Four Cheese Pasta Sauce
- 1/2 cup feta cheese, crumbled
Instructions
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Preheat oven to 375F (190C).
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Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Separate crescent rolls into eight triangles and space evenly on baking sheet.
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At the wide end of each triangle, place a generous teaspoonful of Great Value Four Cheese Pasta Sauce. Top with three or four baby spinach leaves. Add three or four pepper strips and one teaspoon of feta to each triangle. Roll up each triangle loosely. Careful not to overload contents, as it could result in improperly cooked rolls.
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Transfer sheet to oven and bake for 11-13 minutes.
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Serve with remaining Great Value Four Cheese Pasta Sauce for dipping.
Recipe Notes
Find original recipe here.
The next day I made Shakshouka Goes to Italy. This recipe for eggs poached in tomato sauce was on my list to make for a few years yet I never got around to it as making tomato sauce from scratch always seemed like overkill for such a supposedly simple meal. This time around I used Great Value Onion and Garlic Pasta Sauce as the base for the Shakshouka. I sautéed some chopped onion and bell peppers, added the pasta sauce and brought the mixture to boil. I then added the eggs to the pan and cooked for a few more minutes. Original recipe called to serve this with chopped basil but I prefer parsley so I used that herb instead. It was delicious!!! An extremely easy and very satisfying meal, it’s perfect, not just for breakfast or brunch, but also for a light and quick dinner. I will definitely be making this recipe again and again. The best part is with Great Value Onion and Garlic Pasta Sauce it’s also a very inexpensive recipe to make.
Shakshuka goes to Italy
When you think about pasta sauce, you think pasta but there are so many other recipes that make use of this ingredient. From breakfast to snack to dinner Great Value pasta sauces are an excellent addition to your menu. Try an absolutely delicious Shakshuka made easy with Great Value Onion and Garlic Pasta Sauce | #WeLoveGreatValue #ad | Imagelicious
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup white onion, chopped
- 1/2 cup sweet pepper, chopped (red, orange or yellow)
- 4 large eggs
- salt to taste
- pepper to taste
- 1/2 cup fresh basil, chopped
- 1 tbsp Great Value Canola Oil
- 1 jar Great Value Onion and Garlic Pasta Sauce (650 ml)
Instructions
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In a large skillet, heat canola oil to medium high. Add onions and peppers and cook for three minutes, stirring often.
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Add Great Value Onion and Garlic Pasta Sauce and stir to combine with onions and peppers. Bring sauce to a boil, then reduce heat to low.
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Make four indentations in the sauce and break in the eggs. Season with salt and pepper. Cover and cook for 10 minutes or until eggs are set.
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Remove from heat, top with fresh basil.
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With a large serving spoon, transfer two eggs to a pasta bowl. Divide remaining sauce evenly between bowls. Serve with grilled garlic toast.
I am also looking forward to trying Great Value Alfredo Pasta Sauce as Alfredo sauce is my secret indulgence. I am eyeing the recipe for Cheesy Chicken Nachos as it sounds quite easy and nachos are one of my favourite snacks!
That shakshuka tho! Gonna keep my eyes open for these sauces. They look great.
I love that he sauces aren’t very salty. Many jarred sauces have salt as 2nd or 3rd ingredient but not these once. They actually have really good, wholesome ingredients and are delicious!
I really need to try shakshuka! I love the alternative ideas to using sauce with pasta!
It was my first time trying shakshuka and I absolutely loved it! So easy and delicious. Great for a light dinner also!
Looks like a yum pasta sauce. I use one particular brans but I think I should change up a bit now.
It is really good. Great ingredients in the sauce and tastes delicious!
a) your baby is the CUTEST!! and b) this shakshuka looks amazing!! It’s one of my fave dishes and I love how many different ways it can be done!
Awww… thank you 🙂 it was my first time trying shakshuka and I was very pleasantly surprised!
So easy for whipping up a weeknight meal!
Yes, super easy and delicious and healthy!
What a great post. Look at how she has grown. My grandkids like pasta too, they ask me to make it all the time. Soon she will be old enough to start helping you in the kitchen.
Thank you, Gloria! I can’t wait for her to start helping me in the kitchen!
Great ideas! And how smart you are to get your baby used to spicy flavours right from the start! Thanks for sharing.
Thank you! Yes, I’ve been trying to feed her everything I eat with some exceptions like not too much salt or processed food but she eats spicy-ish also… black pepper and even I gave her lasagna with chilli flakes
Great ideas! Love the fact that the sauces aren’t salty. This is usually a dela breaker for store-bought sauces. Would love to try shakshuka one day. And the pizza rolls too! Is it possible to make these pizza rolls ahead of time and freeze, and then bake straight from frozen?
Hmmm… Not sure about baking from frozen. I think it should work fine, you might need to increase baking time a little bit.
These are some great ideas for different ways to use pasta sauce. I especially like the sound of the shakshuka with Italian flavours, I’ve been thinking about doing something similar recently so can’t wait to actually give it a go!
Yes, that shakshuka was really delicious and super easy. I hope you give these ideas a try!
Those recipes look fantastic and that baby…swoon!
Thank you very much 🙂
I love pasta and enjoy making my own pasta sauce, this is very useful thanks
Thank you very much!
Pasta sauces are really underrated – they have so much uses, besides in just pasta! And what a wonder-baby you have that loves grown-up food!!!
Oh, thank you 🙂 Yes, she very quickly stopped eating baby food and switched to whatever I eat. I wasn’t even trying to do that.
She will be a chef by the time she’s 5! What a cutie! And how wonderful you love being a mother so much! Enjoy it! They grow so fast! I love all of these easy dishes you have made!
I hope she’ll love cooking 🙂 I’m really looking forward to her helping me in the kitchen!
That shakshuka looks awesome! I have actually never had it before, I want to try it someday. I will have to add this recipe to my meal plans for next week.
It was also my first time making shakshuka and I loved it!
I have not tried the Greta Value sauces must try them soon with your recipe ideas. When a baby loves the food I bet it is considered a success. Lovely baby you have and your pictures look great.
Oh we love Shakshuka in our house.. I make it from scratch most time. I wish we go those sauces here.. Would be so easy to make quick dinners. Cute baby pictures -She growing fast.
I love the recipe for pizza rollups! Perfect lunch idea for the whole family!
What an adorable baby girl. She could sell my anything!! Your recipes all sound so good. It’s great to find versatile sauces you can use in many recipes. What a relief for mommy!!
Those pizza roll ups are calling my name! We love pizza, and eat it every Friday night. I love this little switch up!
Both recipes sound and look fabulous! What a delicious meal. Your little one is adorable! Such a sweet post 🙂
What a doll she is!! And I know what it’s like finding a food your picky eater will eat, and then serving it at every meal in all sorts of ways … sigh. Thank goodness my daughter grew out of that.
Great Valu foods are really good, I’ve used them for years … nice to see one of their sauces featured!