If you crave a creamy pasta recipe but don’t want to make a time-consuming sauce, try this absurdly easy, veggie-rich fusilli. You’ll cook the asparagus and peas with the pasta, then melt mascarpone in the same pot to coat the pasta with creamy richness. Crunchy buttered crumbs with toasted almonds bits make it irresistible.
Primavera, Pronto
If you’ve ever made pasta primavera, you know it can involve making a bechamel, and/or blanching all the vegetables separately, making it too time-consuming for a weeknight. In this luscious fusilli recipe, asparagus, baby spinach, and peas capture the “primavera” of spring, without all the steps. A tub of mascarpone coats everything with a light, creamy sauce requiring almost no effort.
Simply Recipes / Mihaela Kozaric Sebrek
Crunchy, Buttery Breadcrumb Topping
If the thought of adding bread to pasta sounds strange to you, hear me out. Using stale bread to make crumbs is old-school frugal, and delivers tons of crunch. By pan-toasting fresh crumbs in butter with chopped almonds and garlic, you’ll create a crispy, savory topping that harkens to the crumbs baked on top of macaroni and cheese. If you don’t have bread to use up, you can always use panko, too.
Curly Pasta Cradles Tender Veggies
Fusilli or rotini are the curly spirals designed to wind around bits of veggies and trap sauce. You can sub cavatappi or gemelli if you have some in the cupboard already.
Frozen peas can go straight to the colander, awaiting a hot bath when you drain the pasta, and asparagus just joins the pasta in the pot for the last 2 minutes. Spinach wilts in melted butter in the hot pasta pot, giving you a trio of green veggies with your pasta.
Simply Recipes / Mihaela Kozaric Sebrek