Spinach Artichoke "dip" Rigatoni

There is something seriously wrong with you if you don't love spinach artichoke dip. It’s delicious. And although sometimes my husband and I will have a tapas style dinner, chances are when you're craving spinach artichoke dip, you're not whipping it up as an entree to serve your family. This has pretty much the same creamy, cheesy flavor profile as the dip, but it has been transformed into an entree. TaDa! Magic!

Ingredients:

1 16 oz box of rigatoni

10-15 oz of spinach

5 cloves of garlic (for cooking)

3 heads of garlic (for roasting)

1 chicken breast

3 jars artichoke hearts (14 oz net weight, 8.5 oz drained/each)

14 oz plain Greek yogurt

1/2 cup reduced fat cream cheese (It’s what I had on hand, obviously you can use regular, or save some calories. Not that it'll matter too much when I type 2 cups of cheese next.)

2 cups shredded mozzarella (Bet you didn't see that one coming)

1 tbsp salt

1 tbsp black pepper

1 tbsp garlic powder

1 tbsp onion powder

1 tsp red pepper flakes

Instructions:

1. First thing is first, get your garlic roasting. It will take about 30 minutes. If you have a preferred way of roasting garlic, knock yourself out. If you want a helping hand: cut the tops off the head to expose the cloves, drizzle generously with olive oil and wrap in a little foil home. The recipe asks you to roast 3 cloves, do so! ;) Cook at 400 degrees for roughly 30 minutes. Pull out and set aside.

2. While your garlic is roasting, bring water to a boil and cook your rigatoni according to the instructions on the box. You will want to cook them al dente since they will be going in the oven in a bit and you probably don't want super mushy noodles. Drain them and dump into a large mixing bowl.

3. While your garlic is roasting and your noodles are cooking, cut up your chicken, spinach, artichoke hearts, and garlic and put them into a sauté pan with a few tbsp of olive oil.

4. Cut the chicken up into 1/2 cubes. Loosely cut the spinach since it will cook down anyway. Mince the garlic. And cut your artichoke hearts up into large chunks. Cook until done. (Not every piece of chicken has to be fully cooked, as the dish will continue to bake in the oven. You just need to get it about 80% there.)

5. On top of your noodles add the cream cheese, Greek yogurt and shredded mozzarella.

6. Spoon the hot chicken, artichoke, spinach mixture on top of the noodles and add the dairy products. (Make sure you use a slotted spoon since the spinach will have left a lot of excess liquid in the pan. You really don’t want to transfer that.

7. Add the spices and the roasted garlic cloves (removed from the head) into the bowl. Stir it together until all of the ingredients are well mixed.

8. Transfer into a baking dish and top with extra shredded cheese if you so desire.

9. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

When you pull it out of the oven you will have an ooey gooey pasta bake that is sure to please.

Enjoy!