Mediterranean Pasta

A quick and easy light pasta dish full of seasonal healthy ingredients, including garlic, onion, zucchini, bell peppers and fresh basil.

Savour the bright array of sunny Mediterranean flavours in this vegetarian pasta dish and you’ll be hooked. It’s the kind of dish you know will taste great even before you take the first forkful!

I absolutely love Mediterranean food and this pasta is no exception. That’s likely because of my Italian background where a Mediterranean diet shaped my taste buds from the beginning. I crave ingredients that are cooked with olive oil (which has a number of health benefits) and lots of quality fresh market vegetables.

This pasta dish is full of healthy and simple ingredients like olive oil, onions, garlic, red and yellow bell peppers, zucchini, sun-dried tomatoes and kalamata olives that combine beautifully with tender pasta. Fresh basil plucked from the garden and crumbled feta cheese compliment the dish. That’s a lot of bold flavour packed into one pasta dish!

If you want to get dinner on the table quickly, grab the season’s fresh veggies and put together this pasta dish. It’s so simple and appealing and looks like summer in a skillet. With its gorgeous bright colours, it’s no wonder this pasta dish has been popular in our family for years. I hope it will become your new favourite weeknight family dinner too!

You can use whatever shape pasta you wish for this recipe, but I think bow tie (also known as farfalle) is a perfect choice since some of the feta cheese crumbles get caught in the folds the bow and it looks so pretty. It’s amazing how only 3 cups of pasta (about 300g) can provide up to 6 servings when it’s bulked up with an abundance of fresh veggies. I look at this as a sneaky way to get fewer carbs and more veggies into the family’s diet!

If you happen to have any leftovers of this pasta dish, you might be fighting over them for lunch the next day. I advise hiding the leftovers in the back of the fridge so only you know they’re there and only you get to eat them!

Although this crowd-pleasing pasta dish is thoroughly satisfying as a vegetarian meal on its own, it can be served as a side dish alongside grilled chicken or any other meats.

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Mediterranean Pasta

Full of healthy ingredients like olive oil, onions, garlic, red and yellow bell peppers, zucchini, sun-dried tomatoes and kalamata olives that combine beautifully with tender pasta. Garnished with fresh basil and crumbled feta cheese.

Servings 6 people

Author Rita Jakobschuk

Ingredients

• 3 cups bow-tie farfalle pasta (approximately 300g)
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 large sweet onion sliced
• 2 garlic cloves crushed
• 1 red bell pepper sliced
• 1 yellow bell pepper sliced
• 1 medium zucchini sliced into thick rounds then halved
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• ½ cup julienned sun-dried tomatoes in oil
• 2 tablespoons oil from the sun-dried tomatoes
• ½ cup pitted and sliced kalamata or black olives
• 1 ½ cups crumbled feta cheese
• ¼ cup chopped fresh basil

Instructions

1. Heat olive oil in a large 12” skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and sauté for two minutes. Add garlic, bell peppers, zucchini and oregano and sauté while stirring for about 3 - 4 minutes until the vegetables are just tender. Season with salt and pepper.
2. Meanwhile, bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil over high heat. Add pasta and cook for 9 to 10 minutes, or as package directs, until al dente.
3. Reserve about ½ cup of starchy pasta water. Drain the pasta and add it to the skillet with the vegetables. Add sun-dried tomatoes, sun-dried tomato oil and olives; toss to combine.
4. Cook for 2 minutes over medium-high heat, adding a little bit of the reserved pasta water to loosen the pasta, only if necessary. Just before serving sprinkle with feta cheese and toss lightly to combine. Sprinkle top with basil.