Pasta with tomato sauce, spinach and goat cheese

This is a recipe I adapted from Jamie Oliver's fabulous book, Jamie's Dinners.  Love the format of it - he takes one staple thing, say, a roast chicken, and tells you how to do several things with it.  I also adore the way he writes his recipes, with a "glug" of this and a "knob" of that.  That's my kind of cooking.  I also love that the food is "real" family food - nothing fancy here - although my kids, being decidedly non-British, won't touch curries, so that takes about half of the recipes out of play.   This creamy, gooey, tangy pasta dish has become one of my go-to weeknight dishes.  Fast, easy, and the kids eat it without fail (which is saying a lot in this house).  I generally use a jar of TJ's marinara sauce and tagliatelle pasta, but I've also made it several times with my homemade tomato sauce and a short, semolina pasta such as Cellentani. 

Pasta with tomato sauce, spinach and goat cheese


Ingredients

• 1 lb pasta
• 25 oz Marinara or other basic tomato sauce
• Approximately 1/8 cup each olive oil and balsamic vinegar
• 3 T butter
• 2 oz parmesan cheese, finely grated
• Salt
• Pepper
• About 2 cups spinach leaves, coarsely chopped
• large handful basil leaves, coarsely chopped
• 5.5 oz Goat Cheese

Instructions


1) Boil pasta in heavily salted water per package instructions.

2) Meanwhile, combine tomato sauce and next 5 ingredients (through pepper) in a saucepan and stir until heated through and cheese is melted.   As you can see, I don't actually measure the oil and vinegar - a few turns around the pan are about right!

3) Add spinach and basil to sauce and stir until wilted.

4) Drain pasta and toss with sauce/spinach/basil.

5) Crumble half of the goat cheese and stir gently.  Pour into serving dish (or leave it in the pan if that's how you roll - I serve at the stove most nights) and crumble remaining goat cheese over the top.