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- I made Ina Garten’s favorite weeknight pasta for dinner.
- The dish features classic Italian ingredients like bucatini, pancetta, and red wine.
- I made the pasta after a long workday, and it only took me 30 minutes.
I made my very first Barefoot Contessa pasta while living like Ina Garten for a day during New York City’s lockdown in May 2020. Her approachable and delicious recipes were a dream for a novice cook like me, and I was immediately hooked.
Since then, I’ve made many of her dishes, from comforting breakfasts to impressive desserts. But it’s always her pastas that I’ve loved most — I’ve even ranked them!
When I found the recipe for one of her favorite weeknight pastas, I knew I had to try it.
Ina Garten says her go-to weeknight pasta is quick and easy.
“Everyone needs a few quick pasta dinners in their repertoire, and this one is really adaptable,” Garten wrote in “Go-To Dinners,” her most recent cookbook.
“It’s wonderful as is, but you could also serve it with veal meatballs one night and with a big dollop of ricotta the next,” she added. “The pancetta and red wine give it fantastic flavor.”
After a busy day of work, I closed my laptop and headed to the kitchen. It was time to get cooking!
You probably already have most of the ingredients for the pasta in your kitchen.
To make four servings of Garten’s weeknight pasta at home, you’ll need:
- 1 pound of dried spaghettoni or bucatini
- 1 ½ cups of chopped yellow onion
- 1 cup of freshly grated Italian pecorino cheese
- ½ cup of dry red wine, such as Chianti
- 1 can (14.5 ounces) of crushed San Marzano tomatoes
- 6 ounces of (¼-inch) diced pancetta
- 2 cloves of minced garlic
- 1 ½ teaspoons of sugar
- ½ teaspoon of crushed red pepper flakes
- ¼ cup of julienned fresh basil leaves, plus extra for serving
Garten notes that regular spaghetti, which is thinner than spaghettoni, can also be used with this recipe.
Before I started cooking, I prepped my herbs and veggies.
I chopped the onion, minced my garlic cloves, and julienned the basil.
Once my prep was done, I filled a large pot with water, added two tablespoons of salt, and brought it to a boil so it would be ready to cook the pasta later.
Then, I began making the sauce.
I added three tablespoons of olive oil to my Dutch oven, which I placed over medium-low heat.
I threw in the diced pancetta, using a little more than Garten had recommended.
I had bought two 4-ounce packets of diced pancetta, so I decided to add a little more to the pasta. I ended up loving the extra flavor, so I’d recommend trying this.
Garten recommends sautéing the pancetta for five to seven minutes, until the pieces have browned. Once my pancetta was ready, I used a slotted spoon to transfer it to a small bowl.
After I removed the pancetta, I added the chopped onion.
I sautéed the onion for 10 minutes, until the pieces started to brown.
I added the pancetta back into the Dutch oven, along with the minced garlic and red pepper flakes.
I cooked everything together for one minute.
Then, I added the wine.
Garten recommends cooking everything for three to five minutes, until the liquid has almost entirely evaporated.
Once the wine had nearly evaporated, I added the tomatoes and sugar.
I brought the sauce to a boil, then lowered the heat. I allowed everything in the Dutch oven to simmer uncovered for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
While my sauce was simmering, I added the pasta to my boiling pot of water.
Garten recommends cooking the pasta for two minutes less than al dente according to the directions on the package.
This meant I needed to cook my bucatini for nine minutes, but it definitely wasn’t enough. The noodles were still really tough. I knew they wouldn’t finish cooking in the sauce, so I cooked my pasta a few minutes longer.
Every stove is different, so trust your taste buds (or cook the noodles a little longer in the sauce at the end).
Once the sauce was ready, I seasoned it with salt and pepper before throwing in the pasta.
Garten recommends adding one teaspoon of salt and ½ teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper once it’s finished simmering.
After transferring the pasta to the sauce, I also added a splash of pasta water.
I cooked everything over low heat for two minutes, stirring my noodles with the tongs.
I added more pasta water to achieve the “loose sauce” consistency that Garten recommended.
I took my Dutch oven off the heat and added the pecorino and basil.
I added half a cup of the pecorino and all the basil and tossed everything together with my tongs.
Garten’s weeknight pasta had a rustic charm that reminded me of one of my favorite Italian restaurants in New York City.
One of my go-to spots when I lived in NYC was Cotenna, an Italian restaurant in the West Village. It was tiny, intimate, and affordable, and my girlfriends and I absolutely loved it.
The service was always great, the wine was always cheap, and the pasta was always delicious. Everything about the place just felt warm. And something about Garten’s weeknight pasta — which focuses on classic, approachable Italian ingredients — brought me right back there.
I served the pasta with some more cheese and basil on top before digging in. I was instantly a huge fan.
Garten’s weeknight pasta doesn’t just look like it comes from a cute little Italian restaurant — it tastes like it does, too.
The rich pancetta worked so well with the earthy flavors of the basil and Chianti, and the San Marzano tomatoes added a lovely, subtle sweetness. The kick of the red pepper flakes rounded out the sauce, which had a surprising depth of flavor despite looking quite simple.
This dish was also finished in about 30 minutes with very minimal prep or effort. Who doesn’t love that?
Overall, Garten’s favorite weeknight pasta tasted delicious and elevated. I know I’ll definitely whip it up again, even after a long workday.
Read the full article here
