One Pot Pasta with Broccoli and Parmesan
A simple pasta dish that you can serve as a main or a side. Leave vegetarian or add rotisserie chicken
Servings 4 servings
Ingredients
- 8 ounces pasta (I like spaghetti, linguini, fettuccine) cooked to package instructions.
- 2 cups fresh broccoli, cut into small florets
- 1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese (grated finely, I use a microplane)
- 1 tablespoon lemon zest (again I use a microplane)
- 1 small clove of garlic, peeled and minced (I actually use a microplane again to grate the garlic)
- 4 tablespoons butter
- 2 tablespoons good quality olive oil (separated)
- sea salt
Optional ingredients: roasted pine nuts, red pepper flakes
Instructions
- Place a medium sized pot of salted water to boil (must be big enough to accommodate pasta and broccoli)
While waiting for pasta water to boil prepare the rest of the ingredients:
- Using your microplane, grate parmesan and place in a small bowl, grate lemon zest, add to parmesan and gently toss until combined. Set aside. Grate garlic.
- When pasta water is boiling, add pasta. Stir occasionally. When there are seven minutes left on pasta cooking time, add broccoli florets to pasta water (this means if the cooking time on your pasta is 11 minutes you will add broccoli when pasta has cooked for four minutes) When pasta is al dente, pour pasta and broccoli into a strainer (do not rinse) and immediately put pot back on medium heat.
- Add butter and 1 Tablespoon olive oil to pan. As butter melts, add garlic. Stir for 30 seconds. Add pasta and broccoli to pot, toss with butter mixture. Add remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil to pasta and toss again. Add parmesan/lemon zest mixture and toss until well combined. Add sea salt to taste, toss.
- To plate: pour onto a platter. If desired, sprinkle with more parmesan, sea salt, pine nuts and red pepper flakes. Enjoy!