Italian sausage with spaghetti

When my youngest first saw this on the counter, he asked, "Are we eating giant worms for dinner?"  It reminded me of this, so I just told him, "Yes."

I put the sausage in a casserole dish with 1/4 a jar of spaghetti sauce and enough water to cover, then covered that with a lid, and put it in the oven at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. 

I asked Emily what she wanted for dessert and she chose pie.  I thought I had enough rhubarb from this year for one more pie, but I knew I had enough berries from the bushes.  So I mixed up some pie crust and some mixed berry filling (raspberry, black raspberry, blackberry, and blueberry, 1/3 cup flour, 3/4 cup sugar) all picked for free here in Potter County.  Well, not the flour and sugar.  The only thing I did differently was add 1/2 tsp of cinnamon to the pie crust (and that was a WIN.  Definitely doing that again.)  As usual, I rolled out the crust between two sheets of waxed paper, to make the transfer easier.  I was able to put the pie in just as the timer was beeping on the sausage.  The pie actually cooked at 425 for 30 minutes.

I then put hot water on for the spaghetti, pulled the sausage from the casserole dish and put it in a frying pan with only half the water poured on top, cut it into serving-sized pieces (that sausage yielded 7 pieces between 4 and 6 inches) and put the pan on high heat while the spaghetti (half of a $1 package) cooked.  That only took 7 minutes, and the water had boiled off the sausage, leaving it just lightly browned on the bottom and fully cooked all the way through.  In other words: perfect.

The kids loved their meal, especially Lucas, who really enjoyed eating "giant worms". 

The pie was done, but hot, and the kids all opted for vanilla cones (previously calculated at 38 cents a cone)  I'm the only one who had a slice of warm pie.  I still say my kids are nuts.

So the sausage was $4.35 and even though we cooked it all we only ate 4/7 of it (the rest is saved in my fridge for another meal) so that's $2.49 worth of sausage.  The pasta was 50 cents.  The bottle of Francesco Rinaldi sauce was $1.67 (3 for 5 at Costas this week).  The ice cream cones were 38 cents times 3, or $1.14, and the one slice of pie was 1/6 (I know it's a BIG slice.  I'm allowed) of a pie where my only expense was 2 and 1/3 cups of flour, 1 cup sugar, a little cinnamon and salt, and 2/3 cups crisco.  I don't really have any idea how much that all cost, but let's assume $2 tops, and I had 1/6, or 33 cents worth.  So, the total is $2.49 sausage + 50 cents pasta + $1.67 sauce + $1.14 cones + 33 cents pie = $6.13