One Pan Tomato and Basil Pasta

Don’t you just love one pan recipes, as who likes spending their time doing dishes? Not me! This recipe is based on one that went viral when it appeared on the Martha Stewart website about five years ago. All the ingredients, including the raw pasta, are added to one pan and the pasta is cooked similar to risotto. The most important things are, the pasta must lay flat in the frypan, but if you don’t have a large enough pan I see no reason why the pasta can’t be broken in half, and you must use good quality dried pasta. One cup of the water can be replaced with a stock of your choice if you want a more intense flavour. Serves 4 or two hungry teenagers with a bit left for lunch the next day, as I found out the hard way!

Ingredients

• 1 onion, thinly sliced
• 3 cloves of garlic, thinly sliced
• 350gm spaghetti or linguine
• 350gm cherry or grape tomatoes, halved or quartered if large
• 1/2 tsp red chilli flakes
• 2 spring basil, leaves picked an torn if large, extra for garnish
• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil, plus more for serving
• Course Salt
• Freshly ground black pepper
• 4 cups water
• Freshly grated, Parmesan cheese for serving

Heat the oil in a large straight sided frypan (the frypan should be large enough that the pasta can lie flat) over medium heat. Add the onion and garlic and cook stirring occasionally until the onion is tender, you don’t need colour here, about 3 – 5 minutes.

Add all the rest of the ingredients to the frypan with 2 tsp salt and 1/4 tsp black pepper.

Bring to the boil over a high heat. Boil mixture, stirring and turning pasta frequently with tongs until pasta is al dente and water has nearly evaporated, about 9 minutes.

Season to taste with salt and pepper. Divide between 4 bowls, garnish with basil, drizzle with olive oil and add grated parmesan to taste.

I hope you give this a try, it is a bit of fun and an interesting way to cook pasta for a change. Please leave me a comment if you do try it out as I’d love to hear how you went. Sheryl x

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