This non-recipe recipe came from a particularly lazy night at home, when I didn’t feel cooking a whole shishkebab of a meal from scratch. Ironically, this meal is entirely from scratch but it doesn’t feel like it because it’s so straightforward and simple that it barely feels like a recipe— hence, my calling it a non-recipe recipe.

I had some average tasting cherry tomatoes from the store I didn’t want to eat raw, some kickass rocambole garlic (which, I will say is very important in making this taste that much extra 100) from the farmer’s market, and some good olive oil. Which, as it turns out, all you need for a pasta that tastes like it came from an Italian grandmother. And I would know, because I made this right after coming back from Italy and having severe carb withdrawal.

This is the easiest plant-based weeknight dinner that is definitely a crowd-pleaser, and takes 15 min to throw together. 20 min if you have my crappy knife skills 🤣

Side note— I will say that (and my friend Alyssa also agrees) the two new shapes of Banza pasta is by far the best I’ve had: The Gemelli and the Casarecce are THE perfect noodle shapes for holding the creamy yet delicate sauce that results from this simple recipe and making it STICK. It cooks peeeerfectly al dente. And no, this isn’t sponsored, but I have been a supporter of Banza since day 1 and fun fact I was their first recipe developer and food photographer!

Anyway, let’s get to it because you really should go make this as soon as you can.

Simple 5-Ingredient Cherry Tomato Pasta

*makes 2 servings
Gluten-Free, Vegan, Nut-Free

Ingredients

1 box of GF pasta (I used a mix of Banza Gemelli + Casarecce)
1 pint of Cherry Tomatoes, washed and halved
4-6 cloves of Garlic (Rocambole Garlic is best for this), minced
5-6 tbsp of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 big handful of Arugula
Salt to taste

Recipe

1. Bring water to boil in a medium or large pot. (While water is boiling, begin chopping the garlic and cherry tomatoes if you haven’t.) Add pasta to boiling water and cook according to instructions on the package.

2. While pasta is cooking, heat a deep pan over medium high heat. Add 2-3 tbsp of olive oil to pan, and add minced garlic. Stirring occasionally, cook for about 3 minutes or until garlic softens and looks slightly translucent. Add cherry tomatoes, 1 additional tbsp of olive oil, and a generous pinch of salt. Stir well to coat and cook for about 3-4 minutes until tomatoes soften and begin to lose form. Reduce heat to low and continue to cook for another 1-2 minutes.

3. Drain then DO NOT rinse pasta. Add pasta to pan with tomatoes. Add remaining olive oil and 2 big pinches of salt. Stir to coat noodles evenly with the sauce. Add arugula, and remove pan from heat. Continue to stir pasta to fold arugula into the pasta— the heat from the noodles will gently wilt the greens.

4. Plate and serve!

   📌 PIN THIS FOR LATER ↓