Fridge Clean-Up Pasta

Since Dan and I are leaving for vacation soon, I'm trying to be as resourceful as I can with the items still left in our fridge.  Whipping up this "fridge clean-up" pasta dish, it did a good job of tiding us over while at the same time using lots of left over veggies and some Brazilian pork sausage too, for some protein.  I harvested my basil plants too, as you can see and picked off all their leaves to create a quick, homemade pesto.  Hope you enjoy it as well, and make your own personal renditions.

Fridge Clean-Up Pasta 

Ingredients (serves 3)

For the pasta:
1 lb of whole wheat spaghetti pasta
10 cherry tomatoes, cut in half
Small handful of kalamata olives, halved
1 1/2 cup of sliced mushrooms
1 medium sized link of pork sausage, chopped
1 small red onion, chopped

For the pesto:
2 cups of fresh basil
2 garlic cloves, peeled and halved
Pine nuts or pumpkin seeds
Salt and pepper to taste
Olive oil

Directions:
Cook pasta according to the directions on the box.

Sautee the onions, sausage and the mushrooms together.  Add a bit of salt and pepper.  Sautee until all the ingredients are golden brown and then add the tomatoes and olives and cook for another 5 minutes until the tomatoes just soften.

In the meantime, prepare the pesto by putting all the ingredients into a food processor and pulsing it until it's well combined and forms a paste.

Add the pasta directly into the sauteed medley and toss well.  Add in the pesto and combine again, adding in a bit of pasta water to smooth it out as needed.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.