Sausage, Spinach and Red Pepper Pasta Bake

I have been continuing my foray into new recipes, but I haven't shared a couple of them because we didn't like the end results.  And if it's not good enough for us in Used-to-Bees HQ, it's not good enough for you, dear readers!

Today's recipe was a bit of a hit-and-miss affair.  I liked it (with a tweak, I'd like it very much, but more of that later) but Mr U-t-B wasn't all that keen, and Miss U-t-B wasn't feeling very hungry (ie: had arrived home from school ravenous and eaten toast and Doritos not so very long before it was ready!) so she ate a small portion and expressed no real opinion, except by leaving all the red pepper.  Anyway, as my judgement in these matters is supreme, I will share!

First I skinned and fried some tasty sausages in a little oil.

Then I added a cut up red pepper and fried till the pepper was soft and there were some nice bits of caramelisation going on in the pan...

Then I strained it, as I wanted to get rid of as much of the fat as possible, and put it aside.

I cooked some pasta shapes (a mixture of penne and farfalle as they take the same time to cook and I wanted to finish off the packets).

I made a quick cheese sauce using my lazy method  (explained here).

When the pasta was cooked I drained it and added half a packet of young spinach leaves.  The idea was that they would wilt and get mixed through the pasta.  My pan wasn't large enough, so I had a devil of a job (and messed up almost every pan in the kitchen)...

...before I eventually had (in an ovenproof dish) the pasta into which had been stirred the cheese sauce, the sausages and pepper and the bag of spinach.  This was topped with mozzarella. (There's the tweak I'd do - I'd not bother as I find these days I only like my mozzarella in salads.  I might put a bit of cheddar on top instead, but to be perfectly honest, it would be fine without.)

Into the oven it went to melt the mozzarella.  

Once it was out of the oven, my stomach took over and I dived in to eat rather than taking photos of the finished meal!