Penne Rustica

You can find the original to this recipe on home based mom. I came across her blog this week and have fallen in love with so many of her recipes! We tried this tonight and it was SO good. MAKES LOTS, so it's a perfect meal to make one for our family and still have a whole dinner to take someone else too. If you want to see the HUGE batch (this doubled) you can find it here.

Here's the recipe with my alterations...

PENNE RUSTICA

Ingredients:
1/2 pound grilled chicken breast

7-8 slices of thick cut bacon
24 oz (1 1/2 boxes) penne pasta
1 large red bell pepper- diced
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp paprika

Gratinata Sauce:
1 tsp chopped garlic
1 cup marsala wine OR (if you don't cook with wine, you can use this as a substitute:

3 TBSP apple juice + 1 tbsp red wine vinegar + enough chicken broth to equal 1/2 cup
1/2 tsp dijon or dry mustard
1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp chopped rosemary
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
4 cups heavy cream

Directions:

Chop bacon and cook in large pan. Once it's cooked, remove bacon and drain all but about 1 tsp of grease. Saute garlic in bacon grease briefly. Add marsala wine (or your substitute), mustard, salt, rosemary, cayenne pepper, and heavy cream. Cook pasta according to directions. Slice chicken into medium-bite size pieces. Combine sauce, cooked pasta, diced chicken, cooked bacon, bell peppers, parmesan cheese, and paprika and mix thoroughly. Spread in 2 - 9x13 pans. Top with chopped rosemary and mozzarella cheese.

Bake @ 475 for 10 minutes. (doesn't need long since it's everything is already cooked)

If frozen, thaw in refrigerator the day of. Cover with foil and bake @ 375 for 1 hour. Remove foil during the last 15 minutes.