Baked Rigatoni with Brussels Sprouts, Figs, and Blue Cheese (FM)

• 2 tablespoons olive oil, plus more for greasing the pan
• Salt
• 8 ounces rigatoni, preferably whole wheat
• 1 1/2 pounds Brussels sprouts, roughly chopped
• 4 ounces Gorgonzola or other blue cheese, crumbled [use some Danish blue]
• 6 to 8 fresh figs, or 1 cup dried, chopped [Used dried since fresh are out-of-seaon.  1 cup is a whole lot of dried figs.]
• Black pepper
• 1/4 cup chopped almonds, for garnish

Mise en place.

I guess technically you're supposed to blanch the sprouts after removing the pasta from the cooking water, but I flaked on this and figured that steaming them would be good enough.  Also, I didn't think to save any of the cooking water to use later on.  Ohz well.

Stir everything together except for the almonds and add a splash of the cooking water. (Eh, I used heavy cream instead since I had an open container of it.)  Sprinkle with salt and pepper and bake at 400 degrees until mixture is bubbling.

Oh, I also had a little leftover prosciutto which I thought fit well with the rest of the ingredients, but it wasn't really enough to be altogether noticeable.

The almonds were just supposed to be a garnish, but part of the way through the baking process I tried to top the practically overflowing dish with the almonds and tried to toast them along the way.  I didn't really achieve too much of that before pulling this out of the oven.

This dish was fine.  Not incredible but not borderline gross like the cannellini and zucchini dish.