Let your garden shine with this simple pasta dish
The principle of this dish is to use what’s on hand and what’s in season, so these ingredients are a guide only. We take the lead from the garden and we’ve used zucchini here, which is always abundant – prolific, more like – in summer. If you don’t have zucchini to hand, you can confidently use any other green, such as spinach, chard, rocket, radicchio, spring onion, celery or parsley. On their own or in combination.
Don’t have a garden? Then just raid the fridge for the ‘contents of fridge’ version that uses any compatible ingredients, leftovers or end bits that are lurking there.
Ingredients
- 500 g homemade or fresh linguine
- 40 ml good quality, extra-virgin olive oil, plus extra to serve
- 1 onion, peeled and diced
- 3 or 4 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced
- 4 rashers streaky bacon, rind on, diced
- 2 small hot fresh chilies, or more to taste, finely sliced
- Handful of fresh herbs, such as thyme and sage
- 250 ml white wine
- 500 g fresh tomatoes, roughly chopped
- 500 g zucchini, sliced thinly into ribbons
- Handful parsley, finely chopped, to serve
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper
- Fresh parmesan, finely grated, to finish
Our tips
Get creative here, the greens can be interchangeable. Try different combinations of vegetables that suit what your garden or fridge have to offer. This recipe was created during summer, but you can adapt this recipe for any season!
Method
- To prepare the sauce, sauté onion, garlic, bacon, chilli and fresh herbs in olive oil. When it starts to get a bit jammy, that is, when the onions and garlic have started to caramelise, the mixture has reduced and is starting to stick to the bottom of the pot, deglaze with white wine. Add chopped fresh tomatoes and stir. Keep on a low simmer and let the whole thing reduce a bit.
- While the sauce is reducing, cook the pasta in a large pot of boiling salted water until al dente (follow the directions on the pack).
- Meanwhile, finish the sauce by stirring the zucchini ribbons through the sauce and cook for a couple of minutes. Add a generous amount of the parsley, season and stir.
- Drain the pasta and either return to the cooking pot or place in a large serving bowl. Pile the sauce over the pasta, add the parmesan and a good drizzle of olive oil. Let everyone help themselves.
Images by Hannah Edensor and Mark Roper.
