Parmesan pasta with sausage

I think I first started doing this when trying to make an easy substitute for alfredo sauce.  It's one of our favorites and great for left over lunches for the rest of the week.  The make or break for this recipe is a really good steak seasoning.  The one I have has whole grains of pepper kernals, whole seeds, and actual red pepper flakes that hydrate really well in the butter/cheese mixture.  My mom gives it to me as a stocking stuffer every year.  She gets it from the dollar store.

Ingredients:
16 oz bag of pasta
2 tbs margarine
3/4 cup parmesan cheese (or any shaker cheese)
2 links italian sausage
Steak seasoning, garlic to taste (I use a lot)

Direction:
1. In a large pot of boiling water, cook pasta until soft to the bite.
2. In another pot of boiling water, cook sausage links for 10 minutes, then transfer to frying pan to brown the exterior.  Cube sausage once cooked.

3. Immediately once pasta is cooked, strain and transfer to a large mixing bowl.  Add margarine and mix until melted margarine coats pasta evenly.  Fold in parmesan cheese, steak seasoning and garlic.  The cheese will melt into the butter with the heat of the pasta and become stringy.

4. Once sauce evenly coats all pasta, add cubed sausage, mixing evenly.
5. Serve with vegatable. Possibly this one.

Serves:
6-8 people, or 2 people and lunch left overs for a week.

Time to table:
20-25 mintues

Home made "Macaroni and Cheese"

Or, more accurately, Pasta in Cheddar Cheese sauce with polish sausage.  Another fun "cream sauce" recipe.  Interesting fact: Pasta is made in different shapes so you can decide how you want it to interact with the sauce you put on it.  I REALLY love this sauce, so I get shells that will hold extra bunches of cheesey sauce in it's natural bowl.

Simplified instructions: Cream Sauce and cheddar cheese mixed with pasta and hot dogs.

Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter/margarine
1/3 cup flour
3 cups milk
Salt and Pepper to taste
2 cups grated cheddar cheese
1 16 oz bag pasta cooked pasta
3 Bar S Polish Sausage Hot Dogs cooked (I usually fry them for the brown on the outside)
       -Any hot dogs can be used to make this more accessible to those who don't buy this brand of hot dogs in bulk, or a ham steak from the grocery store if you want to dress it up a little extra.

Directions:
1. Melt butter in frying pan on low.  Melt, not bubble.
2. Add flour 1 Tbs at a time, mixing it into the butter until evenly distributed.
(I generally mix it in with a spatula)
Butter/Flour mixture should be doughey. 
3 . Add milk one cup at a time, mixing constantly to eliminate lumps before adding the next cup.
(My mom had the skills to use a whisk.  My white sauces were never really lump-free until I started to use a hand mixer to mix it all.  Hense the cast-iron skillet.)
4.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Be generous.  The white sauce should taste delicious all by itself.
5.  Add Cheddar Cheese to warm mixture, stirring until cheese melts, turing cream sauce a pleasing deep yellow.
6.  Cube polish sausage dogs into centemeter pieces and stir into the sauce.
7.  Stir cooked pasta into cheese/sausage dog mix until all pasta is evenly coated with sauce.
8.  If desired put frying pan directly into oven on broil for 3 minutes to brown and add crunch.

Servings:
6 full adults, or a family of 4 with 4 left over lunches.

Cook Time:
30 Min (including cooking pasta and dogs as prep time)