Julie Giuffrida is Test Kitchen coordinator for the Los Angeles Times.
These recipes use 11 or fewer ingredients and can be made in 30 minutes or less.
We’ve all been there: tired and hangry and wishing dinner would spontaneously appear. You want something now and it must be decidedly delicious. Pasta is a good bet, but even with the official pasta sauce power rankings for reference, plain jarred tomato sauce doesn’t always cut it. Not to worry. Here are 11 recipes that use 11 or fewer ingredients and can be made, start to finish in about the time it takes to get the pasta cooked (30 minutes or less).
At moments like these, my go-to is a big bowl of spaghetti aglio e olio, that classic Italian no-sauce-sauce of garlic-infused olive oil and crushed chile peppers (and, for me, lots of ground black pepper). The aroma is intoxicating; the flavor, intense. You’ll want more, long after it is all gone. And it is so easy, you’ll even have time to toss together a salad to go with.
The garlic-olive oil combo serves as a base for many equally or almost as simple and delectable preparations, the operative words being simple and delectable. Fava beans add some protein in a riff on scampi (the splash of lemon makes the flavors really pop). Nutrient-rich, budget-friendly canned sardines give pasta chi sardi a mari a unique depth of flavor, and toasted breadcrumbs augment the texture of the dish. The capers in midnight pasta add some brininess to the party, which is balanced with the sweet buttery-ness of pine nuts.
Orecchiette with broccoli rabe and garlic bread crumbs adds a few more layers of textures, as well as flavor, and you get to check off “eating your vegetables” from your daily To Eat list. Pasta with Italian sausage and broccoli brings new zest and yet another vegetable to the plate, and the spicy sausage amps up the dish’s already-high flavor factor.
Too much garlic? (Admittedly, I can’t really make sense of that phrase, though I know that for some it is meaningful.) The green garlic in whole wheat spaghetti with green garlic and fried egg bears a gentler, more subtle garlickiness than that from mature bulbs. The tender stalks intertwine with the spaghetti strands, which, when coated with egg yolk and garlic oil, is utterly dope.
Still too much garlic? It is completely optional in tomato-y pasta all’ Amatriciana, and neither the ever-popular cacio e pepe nor the spaghetti carbonara even hints at including garlic.
If that jar of marinara sitting in your pantry keeps calling your name, you can use it for one-pan pasta and doctor it up with additional ingredients. Sort of like making lasagna with those no-boil lasagna sheets, the angel hair cooks in and soaks up the sauce, making the pasta extra flavorful. Even better: There is no separate pasta pot to wash.
The best news? You can make one of these dishes in 30 minutes or less.
Cacio e pepe
Three ingredients: spaghetti, pecorino cheese and black pepper. That and a little of the salted water the pasta was cooked in. Toss them together, and you have a great dish.
Time 25 minutes
Yields Serves 6
Orecchiette With Broccoli Rabe and Garlic Bread Crumbs
This simple pasta dish is all about textures--crisp-tender broccoli rabe, slightly chewy orecchiette, crunchy garlic bread crumbs and creamy ricotta cheese, which melts into a sauce.
Time 30 minutes
Yields Serves 4
Fava Bean Scampi
Fava beans combine with lemon, chile flakes and wine for a vegetarian spin on scampi pasta.
Time 15 minutes
Yields Serves 4.
Pasta with Italian sausage and broccoli
This pasta dish is easy, quick and flexible. You can make it with broccoli, broccoli rabe or even Chinese broccoli and Italian sausage or salt pork, guanciale or prosciutto.
Time 25 minutes
Yields Serves 6
Pasta chi sardi a mari
Saute canned sardines in olive oil, garlic and fennel seeds. Toss with pasta, chopped parsley and fennel fronds and golden raisins. Top with bread crumbs toasted in sardine oil.
Time 30 minutes
Yields Serves 4 to 6
Pasta All' Amatriciana
Amatriciana is a simple-to-make, tomato-based sauce — here seasoned with guanciale, a bit of hot chile pepper and onion — and is just incredibly good.
Time 30 minutes
Yields Serves 6 to 8
Midnight Pasta
In the Italian tradition of spaghettata, piping hot pasta cooked at home late at night, this spaghetti is laden with garlic, capers and pine nuts. Add red chile flakes to taste.
Time 20 minutes
Yields Serves 4
One-Pan Pasta with Tomato Sauce
This one-pan pasta recipe with homemade tomato sauce is quick and easy with minimal cleanup for busy weeknights, and leftovers reheat beautifully.
Time 30 minutes
Yields Serves 4 to 6
Spaghetti carbonara
Spaghetti carbonara is one of the simplest dishes to make — it takes only five ingredients. The wonderfully creamy sauce is rich with the flavor of guanciale and cooked eggs.
Time 20 minutes
Yields Serves 4 to 6
Whole wheat spaghetti with green garlic and fried egg
The nutty flavor of whole wheat spaghetti highlights the mellow flavor notes of green garlic. Top colorful plates of pasta and green garlic with eggs fried in the garlic-laced oil.
Time 25 minutes
Yields Serves 4
Aglio e olio
Aglio e olio is the Italian classic no-sauce sauce of olive oil and garlic. Chile pepper, a squeeze of lemon, a pinch of salt and a bit of chopped parsley make the pasta pop.
Time 15 minutes
Yields About 4 servings
