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Pasta primavera

By Laura Vonessen

- 3 minutes read - 475 words

Notes

  • This is my absolute favorite recipe and a staple of my diet. I’ve made it my own over the years; feel free to do the same!
  • The original recipe called for peeling the tomatoes, and left everything to marinate for an hour before the garlic was removed. I’ve removed these steps, but the order of operations in this recipe is designed to allow for maximum marination. However, these are guidelines, not rules–nothing will be ruined if your prep timing lines up differently than the recipe calls for.
  • One of the great things in this dish is the thermal contrast when you serve it fresh–if possible, start with room-temperature tomatoes and fridge-temperature cheese.
  • If it is the heat of summer and you’d like to eat something that won’t cause you to overheat, the best way to lower the temperature of the final dish is to use fridge-temperature tomatoes.

Ingredients

  • Tomatoes, medium dice (6 beefsteak tomatoes, or more if they’re smaller)
  • Fresh basil, 3-4 stalks
  • Fresh mozzarella, 16 oz
  • 4 cloves garlic (NOT crushed)
  • Olive oil
  • Salt, to taste
  • Penne pasta, 1 pack

Instructions

  1. Set the pasta water to boil (I usually add the salt when the water boils, but you do you)
  2. Cut the cloves of garlic into a few pieces each. You will need to be able to find these later, so don’t make the pieces too small, and count the pieces so that you’ll know when you’re done.
  3. Add the garlic and olive oil to a large bowl.
  4. Dice the tomatoes and add them to the bowl.
  5. Add salt and stir. Taste test individual tomato pieces as you do–you want them to be pretty salty because the other ingredients don’t have much salt. Also because salt is delicious.
  6. Check on the pasta water and salt it/add the pasta if it’s boiling. If not, keep an eye on the pot and do it sometime in the next couple steps.
  7. Wash and shake dry the basil, then separate the stems from the leaves. If leaves are large, tear them into a few pieces. Add the basil leaves to the tomatoes.
  8. Dice the mozzarella, but DON’T add it to the tomatoes yet.
  9. At this point, you’re waiting for the pasta to cook. Set a timer to ring 2-3 minutes before the pasta will be ready. If the pasta’s already almost ready, just go directly to step 10.
  10. When the pre-pasta timer rings, search for the garlic in the tomato mixture and remove all the pieces (this is why you counted them earlier)
  11. Mix in the mozzarella pieces.
  12. Once the pasta is ready, drain it and pour it over the tomato/mozzarella mixture.
  13. Serve immediately. If there’s a few minutes of other prepwork left to do before you can eat (e.g. washing up or garlic bread), I usually don’t mix the pasta until we’re ready to sit down.