Easy dinner for a rainy/sick day

Looking for a quick meal on a cold, rainy day?  Do your kids love spaghetti, but you wish you could get them to eat more green veggies or avoid preservatives from canned sauce?  Well, here's my solution!  Make your homemade marinara on a day when you have a little extra time (only 10 min prep, then it simmers on its own for 30min), freeze it, and yank it out when you're ready for a yummy, tummy satisfying dinner. 
I made an extra batch of sauce after making spinach lasagna one day a few weeks ago, because I didn't want to waste 39 cents of tomato paste in a can I'd already opened.  I froze it in double-layer ziploc bags, and pulled it out this week to have for dinner tonight.  I knew it was going to be a rainy day, and Tony was going to work late, so we needed a dinner that could sit on the stove staying warm after Abbie and I eat. 
Boy am I glad that I did this, because I ended up getting really sick yesterday and am still feeling the effects today... I've spent most of the day in the reclined position!   I don't think I could convince myself to spend more than 10 minutes in the kitchen, and yet my family will have a yummy, homemade dinner tonight.

So, here's the recipe for the red sauce (stolen, halved, and slightly altered, from my spinach lasagna recipe)...


Sauce:
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 large garlic clove, finely chopped
1 28oz can crushed tomatoes, undrained
1-2 Tbsp tomato paste (I like more than the recipe calls for)
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 Tbsp dried oregano
1/2 Tbsp dried basil
1/4 tsp crushed red pepper
1/4 tsp ground black pepper

After pulling it out and thawing, I added 9 oz of leftover cooked spinach from Abbie's dinner two nights ago.  I put about 5 Tbsp of sauce, plus the spinach in a mini food processor to get it finely chopped and mixed.  Then, I stirred all of that back into the sauce.

Want to add some protein to this?  It doesn't take long to brown up some ground meat or grill and chop some chicken breast to add in.  I personally prefer Italian sausage but realize that this isn't on everyone's diets these days.

So, now all I have to do is boil some pasta tonight, and dinner is ready!  Abbie gobbles this stuff down, and I am satisfied that we're all getting a great serving of veggies.