I was passing through Waitrose in need of a lemon Fanta after a great nine holes, when one of their recipe cards caught my eye. And this is me having a bash. There’s lots of disparate parts here. but I’m a sucker for a pasta bake, and one of my favourite meats chorizo has a look in too.

The results were nice, but could’ve been a lot better. The elements were tugging at each other, rather than coming together harmoniously. If I did it again, I’d get the chorizo sweating early in with the tomato sauce, to get a more developed flavour out of it. I’d also be adding a little stock to thin the sauce out, encouraging everything to blend and get a bit more moisture to the whole dish. Finally I’d be slicing the aubergine and pepper before griddling, getting more smoky flavours throughout. Can’t really see what good the basil leaves are doing that early on either. A good first draft though, see you next time. Below is the method on this effort.

Chorizo pasta bake:

1 aubergine, halved

1 red pepper, halved

200g rigatoni

1 tin tomatoes

Handful of basil leaves, torn

1 ball mozzarella, torn

200g chorizo, diced

Preheat the oven to 200C.

Cook the pasta according to the packet instructions.

Griddle the aubergine and pepper until charred on both sides.

Meanwhile, heat the tomatoes and add the basil leaves.

Dice the veg and pour the tomatoes, pasta, chorizo and veg into a baking dish.

Tear over the mozzarella and bake for 15 mins.