Mac 'n' Cottage Cheese

It's coming to that time of year where we need to think of creative, but tasty ways to use up ALL of that ham. So here is my version of Mac 'n' Cheese. It's a little bit less fuss than standard mac 'n' cheese, because there's no white sauce to make, which makes it ideal to throw into the oven when you have a busy house. Plus the leftovers are delicious cold as well. To make it simply mix cooked pasta with sautéed onion, then stir through a basic mixture of cottage cheese, with a few generous handfuls of all that leftover ham of course, bake and devour. The below quantities serve four, but it can be easily doubled, or tripled to feed a crowd. 



Ingredients (serves 4) 

• 300g dried pasta, macaroni or spiral pasta are good shapes to use
• 1 onion, diced
• 1/2 green capsicum, diced
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• handful of fresh thyme, or 1/2 tsp dried
• 250g tub of cottage cheese
• 1/3 cup of blue top milk 
• 2 large free range eggs
• 1 tsp salt 
• 1 tbsp cracked pepper
• leftover diced ham, about a cup full
• 1 tomato, thinly sliced
• 3 tbsp breadcrumbs
• 1/3 cup cheddar cheese, grated

To Serve: Salad and your favourite relish. 

Method

Preheat oven to 180 degrees celcius and grease a lasagne dish (approx 18x25cm for this quantity).  

Cook pasta in rapidly boiling salted water for 1-2 minutes less than the packet directions. You want it to have a little bit left before it bakes. Drain and set aside. 

Over a low heat, sauté onions, capsicum and thyme in olive oil for 5 - 10 minutes until softened. 

In a large bowl beat cottage cheese, milk, and eggs with a fork. Add salt, pepper, ham, cooked pasta, and cooked onions and capsicum and mix till well combined.  

Spoon mixture into the greased lasagne dish and flatten with the back of the spoon. Layer sliced tomatoes on top. Sprinkle with breadcrumbs, then with grated cheese. 

Bake for 40 minutes until egg mix has set and it is golden on top. 

Now here's the hard part. Wait for 5 - 10 minutes before using a metal spatula to cut and scoop out slices. 

Serve with relish and a large salad. 

Enjoy.