kicking the health kick

A powerful health faction has taken up root in the kitchen - where once lurked packets of biscuits, tubs of cream and sliced bread there new resides a collection of seeds (chia, flax, pumpkin...), almond milk, coconut oil, quinoa and rye flour. The fruit bowl overflows with apples, pears, oranges, lemons and so on and the juicer is constantly on stand-by. You can barely hear Bargain Hunt on the telly over the roar of health-conscious machinery. And just as a shift from the centre ground breeds extremists from the opposite end of the political spectrum, so does the presence of a health nut force the meat-eating, cake-eating slob out of the shadows.
'I... must... have... some... meat...'  bellowed the 18 year-old one lunchtime, 'where are the pork pies and the sausages that used to be here? There's nothing in the fridge but spinach and bloody parsley and nothing on the shelves but tins of tomatoes and chickpeas...'
So fed up was she that an unprecedented event took place... she got out of bed and went up the road to Tesco and came back with a packet of sausages. The resulting lunch (which was cooked by another, the 18 year-old having returned to bed, exhausted by the outside world) looked deceptively healthy on the surface, but had within its depths a clandestine layer of sausage meat. It was very good

kicked health casserole
feeds 2

olive oil
2 sausages, skin removed
1 onion, finely chopped
1 tin tomatoes
half a tin of chickpeas, more if you like
3 olives (you can add more but that was what we had in the fridge), chopped
2 oz, more if you like, pasta
handful of spinach leaves, roughly chopped
handful chopped parsley

heat some oil in a pan over a medium heat and fry the sausage meat  until browned and starting to go crispy. Add the onion and fry until translucent and soft. Add the tomatoes, the chick peas, swill the tin of tomatoes out with some water and add that, and then add the pasta. Add the olives. Season with salt and pepper. Cook for five mins or so and then add the spinach leaves and half the parsley. Continue to cook until the pasta is done, adding more water when necessary. Serve sprinkled with the rest of the parsley and a grating - if you feel especially rebellious  - of cheese.