Simple Bursted Tomato and Basil Wagon Wheel Pasta

And that's it

Hey, y'all. It's Dad's Dinner Time. So today I'm using one of my boys' favorite pasta

This is a wagon wheel. When Jack was a little bitty and started to eat pasta

he liked pané pasta, and I liked him to have it because he would stick five pieces on his hand

and he would just eat them. Anything you can do to get your kids to eat is a good thing

and all new parents know that. So wagon wheels, as soon as he discovered a wagon wheel

he was like, Daddy, I want wagon wheel pasta. I've dropped our wagon wheel down in some boiling hot water

So do you want to buy tomato sauce? Sure, you can buy tomato sauce

There's awesome tomato sauces out there that you can buy. You can buy anything you want

but you can also make a pretty tasty, really simple tomato sauce yourself

Grape tomatoes taste like candy. This is the ones that my boys want

I got a super hot pan. We're going to burst these. I'm going to put them on this hot heat with this pan

Put a little bit of oil in here. And these are going to get hot and burst, and they're going to explode

And this is basically going to be all of our sauce for today. I'm going to cover them up

Give them a minute to do their thing. See how they're kind of blistering a little bit

It doesn't take but a second. All these are out of my mom's garden

Nothing tastes better than if you can get it knock a little dirt off of it and pop it right in your mouth Wagon wheels are going good Our tomatoes are going to burst up Give them a little shake

Look at that. Isn't that cool? Can y'all smell that? They're starting to split a little bit

Burst. I'm going to put some fresh garlic on them. So I'm going to chop this up

Garlic and tomato and mozzarella. You're done. That's it. When it can be this simple and this delicious

I've also got some basil. Now, y'all know that Matthew's first plant that he planted was basil

And when I run out there and pick off one of his leaves, he gets such a big kick out of that that he grew something that we get to eat

Our tomatoes are going good. I'm going to put this garlic on top of it. Let these flavors marry each other a little bit

Give it a shake. God, that smells so good. Fresh tomatoes and garlic with a little bit of olive oil

That should be a perfume. Our wagons are going good, and I promise you, it is going to be so, so, so very good

Mozzarella cheese is a favorite in our family. I stick it in a lot of pastas and things like that

You can buy it pre-sliced if you want, but I like to get the big log, because sometimes I leave them like this

Brooke and I have been eating a lot of tomato and mozzarella salads with a little bit of balsamic on it and some fresh

basil from Matthew's plant. It's delicious. You could put some balsamic on this if you wanted to, but this is dad's dinner time

deal So I gonna keep that kind of a big adult complex flavor off of this because I gonna share this with my boys Burst tomatoes y I going to turn it down Let that garlic do its thing My wagon wheels

have got just a few more minutes, so I'm going to cube up our mozzarella. I'm going to put this in

big chunks because I like it when I can get a big piece on my fork. Some of the simplest flavors

that y'all come across are some of the best. It doesn't have to be complicated

It doesn't have to be super intimidating. Take the flavors that you like

combine a few simple ingredients together, and it's delicious. Tomatoes, garlic, mozzarella, basil

That's it. Let's roll one of these wagon wheels out and see where we're at

Oh, you know what? These are perfect. You know what I'm gonna do here, y'all

I'm gonna use this bowl. I'm gonna hold back a little reserve of my pasta water

because that's got, you know, a bunch of big flavor in it because I've got a little bit of salt in this water

and then it's got the pasta, so I can add that to my tomato sauce and give it a little bit of liquid

So I'm gonna drain the rest of this stuff off. Turn my eye down

Roll them right in. I'm going to make sure and get all this garlic and oil

and the tomato essence spread out all over the pasta So good I going to garnish with some basil but I also want to chop some up and get it in there Not only for the flavor but also to add a little bit of color

because we're looking kind of plain in there right now. So I'm gonna cut some ribbons of our basil

So the first time you make something, take my advice and fix it my way

and then when it's time for you to get back in the kitchen, you can do anything you please

That's what I like about cooking. Take a recipe and you make it your own

First, tomato basil pasta. Doesn't that sound fancy? And you know that it's not

Let's turn this off and get our mozzarella in. Now look how pretty that is

Yummy. Let's see what we got here. What do you think

Mmm. So good. We're batting 1,000 here on Dad's Dinner Time. It's fantastic

Mmm. Mmm. Good for you. Good for your kids. Without any protein, this would make a perfect side dish

We've got some zesty shrimp skewers here on the network that would be perfect to pair this with