One-Pot Pasta

How to make a simple and quick one-pot pasta for dinner in a flash!

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Between my photography business, maintaining my household, and keeping up with my daughter and her activities, some days can be really busy and chaotic for me. Sometimes, it seems that after a long day of running around, cooking dinner is a big task that can take forever to do and requires a lot of energy that I might be running low on. So, I tend to rely on quick and simple recipes like this One-Pot Pasta recipe to save the day!

This simple meal is quick, easy, and doesn’t require many ingredients or tools, which makes it a perfect meal for a very busy family! Especially if your family is like mine and you need yummy meals that can satisfy both a picky eater, like my daughter and a vegetarian, like my husband. This is one of those magnificent no-fuss meals that luckily doesn’t require very much time or effort! Que the super-hero music!

Since this recipe is so simple, it also has lots of room for you to change up the dish however you like! If you want to add some protein, cubed kielbasa and shrimp are perfect and just as easy to cook up while you make the pasta. You can also add pesto sauce or any other sauce to personalize the recipe to be perfect for your family. Plus, the vegetables in this dish can be swapped up, as well. This easy pasta recipe can be spruced up with other veggies like diced eggplant or sliced mushrooms, for example.

And the best part of all? I can make this very beautiful and satisfying meal with only a few dishes to deal with during clean-up! With the simplicity and ability to easily customize this one-pot pasta, this dish is absolutely perfect to get creative with! It’s also excellent for keeping in the regular dinner rotation to experiment with for future meals on busy weeknights. Everything considered this recipe is definitely a keeper!

One Pot is All You’ve Got…to Get

Well, for the most part anyway. As with any other recipe, this easy pasta does require a stirring utensil of some kind so everything can be mixed properly. Still, a recipe that requires just 2 cooking dishes to deal with? I’ll take that any day! Here’s what I use:

• Dutch oven
• Wooden Spoon

Simple Ingredients for One-Pot Pasta

When it comes to the ingredient list for this yummy pasta, it couldn’t be any easier! I literally only use a handful of fresh ingredients for this simple recipe. Again though, you can easily add to or swap up the ingredients however you like when you try making this pasta dish at home! Here are my favorite one-pot pasta ingredients:

• 16 oz box Linguine
• 12 oz Ripe Cherry Tomatoes – halved
• 1 Onion – thinly sliced
• ½ tsp Red Pepper Flakes
• 2 sprigs of fresh Basil Leaves
• 2 tsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• Salt
• Pepper
• 4 ½ cups Water

Pasta Garnish:

• Grated Parmesan Cheese

How to Make a Quick and Easy One-Pot Pasta

Now, let me break down this super simple process for cooking this one-pot pasta in a flash! Since there isn’t really a lot to the process, it usually only takes me about 20 minutes to cook and prepare this easy and beautiful pasta dish. Talk about a time-saver! Here’s how I do it:

1. First, rinse, cut, and prepare the veggies for this quick pasta recipe.
2. Then, combine all of the pasta ingredients with the water in a dutch oven, or large pot. Save the parmesan for later.
3. Next, bring everything to a boil over high heat, while stirring the pasta frequently with a wooden spoon.
4. Continue to boil until the pasta is al-dente and the water is almost boiled off. This should take about 9 minutes.

Finally, scoop the pasta into serving bowls and garnish with the parmesan cheese. Enjoy!

Pasta Serving and Storage Tip:

This pasta dish is best served while hot and fresh! It does not keep very well in the fridge as leftovers so I recommend eating all of the pasta right after cooking.

Simple Serving Ideas for Quick Dinners

For us busy parents, these quick and simple recipes make daily life so much easier! If you’re like me then you probably like to keep as many of them in your recipe collection as possible. Here are a few of my favorite quick dishes and simple sides for meals that can be prepared in no time:

• Quick Chicken Alfredo Pasta
• Summer Cucumber Salad
• Easy Coleslaw

Try this simple one-pot pasta with any of these quick-fix proteins:

• Grilled Chicken Breasts
• Oven-Baked Chicken Breasts
• Grilled Shrimp
• Oven-Baked Bratwurst

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