How To Make a 'Bangin' Pasta Bake.

I feel extremely big-headed saying this, but I make the best pasta bake in existence. No other pasta bakes can compare. So I'm going to share with you the secret of the best pasta bake in the world.

There are two secrets. One is in the sauce, one is literally heaps and heaps of cheese.

So. You will need (roughly):
- A mound of dry pasta (in any shape you like, but I like the bows or the twizzles) about 3 cups worth.
- 1 jar of Homepride creamy tomato and herb pasta bake sauce.
- A pepper, or a third of three different types of peppers. Personally I enjoy green, red and yellow.
- One small onion.
- a pinch of garlic powder/ a tiny clove of garlic.
- Lots of cheese.

THIS is how delicious your pasta could look.
From nomoneynocry (link at bottom of page)

- a medium sized saucepan
- a strainer
- a grater
- a shallow ovenproof dish.
- knife, spoons, cutlery to eat with, etc.

This recipe feeds two very hungry people.

1. Cook the pasta, with water, in a saucepan. Pretty obvious, but most recipes don't tell you to do this. I find it's much easier and tastier when the pasta has already been cooked before it's placed into the ovenproof dish.

1+1/2. preheat oven at 200 degrees Celsius.

2. While the pasta is cooking chop up the pepper/s and onion. Plonk it in the ovenproof dish, add some garlic powder and any other herbs and spices you think will go down nicely.

3. When the pasta is cooked, drain it and then mix it in with the vegetables in the ovenproof dish. Now pour in the sauce (it's delicious) and stir.

4. Grab your cheese block and grate it away over the top of the pasta/vegetable/sauce. Make sure to cover it all over. Lots of cheese makes it so, so good.

5. Place your dish in the oven and leave until the cheese has melted and gone a goldeny colour. Usually takes about 20-30 minutes.

6. Eat the most amazing pasta bake ever. You won't regret it. I promise. (That is, unless you don't like an ingredient in it.)

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For other Homepride Recipes, there are lots on the website.
Click HERE for further details.

Picture: http://knowmoneynocry.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/pasta-bake.jpg

Stereotypes are always right?

Women are usually seen as notorious for moaning about things. And so who am I to stray from this stereotype? And talking of stereotypes, that is one of the things that can annoy the heck out of me.

I'm a female, 19 year old student studying Criminology, so of course I am a perfect example to start with.

Firstly, being a female comes with a whole batch of stereotypes. I am, in fact, despite common belief, a woman. I have all the usual bodily parts to prove this. (You know, the ones that are normally involved in womanhood.)
But I don't always talk about clothes, shoes, handbags, etcetera. (Although I must admit, it definately occupies some brain space, along with the breaking-a-nail reflex action). Nor do I watch shows such as Desperate Housewives and Sex and the City, because frankly, they're pretty soul destroying.

But I will freely admit that I do drool over hot male celebrities. Only in the form of the cute and gawky Justin Long and the also rather gawky (yet exceedingly handsome( James Marsden, rather than the supposedly 'gorgeous' Robert Pattinson. (Seriously? His face is flat, his American accent isn't that great and I'd much rather he kept his shirt on.)
- To redeem him though, he does have a lovely original English accent. (Yes, he is English.)

Secondly I'm a teenager. (I know, on the cusp of turning the dreaded two-oh, but still a teenager nonetheless). And teens don't half get bad press.
Because not all of us are knife-weilding, heroin-taking juvenile delinquents. And I am most certainly not. In fact, I'd rather be sat at home reading a good book than out torhing houses and generally being an idiot.
Some of us do like to help our communities and or/just generally do absolutely nothing wrong.

Students also have a bad stereotype. I can safely say that here the stereotype may fit. Vaguely. I like the odd party, and the odd drink, but never overdo it. I'm not one of the people that go out clubbing every night and get absolutely off their heads. Because to be honest, the people who do that just look ridiculous.
Most of all, our studies are actually important to those of us who want a good future. So we will turn up to every seminar and lecture, no matter how late we stayed up the night before.

Last but not least, Criminology.
Before you ask, not all of us want to be policemen/women. You can go into security, the prison service, law, the probabtion service, etcetera, or, yes, the police.
But I guess there is one thing that stands true to the Criminology stereotype: Our sense of humours. It isn't half odd.

One other stereotype that I have to mention would be blondes. Because they get bad press too. They're seen as dim-witted and vain. And, although some of them probably are, some are not like that. Take my lovely sister. Her A level scores were a grade higher than me on everything. And she is ridiculously knowledgeable. And Philisophical. Oddly.

So now that we have examined stereotypes, the next time you see a little old lady in the street, you should probably wonder whether she really does own lots of cats and knit.
You never know, she may own budgies and sew.