Lemon spaghetti with spinach, feta & walnuts
Why I Love This Recipe
Fact: I can’t live without pasta. I would probably starve without it. I’ve been known to eat some form of pasta almost every day, sometimes for both lunch and dinner. It’s inexpensive and comforting, and somehow I’m always in the mood for it. The smell of it boiling reminds me of my favorite day of the week when I was a kid: Monday, believe it or not, because it was when my mom would make pasta with her sauce that she spent all day Sunday cooking.
Here’s a pasta dish I like to make whenever I have fresh lemons needing to be used. It has a creamy-tasting and textured sauce without a lot of fat thanks to the addition of Greek yogurt, and spinach gives it color and vibrancy.
Ingredients You'll Need
2 oz. whole wheat spaghetti
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 lemon
1/4 cup pasta cooking water
1 tablespoon Greek yogurt
1/4 cup feta cheese crumbles
1 cup spinach
1 tablespoon grated parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons walnuts, chopped
Pepper to taste
Directions
Heat up a saute pan on high heat. Add the chopped walnuts and toast them for about a minute. Be careful not to burn them – they will smell nutty as soon as they’re finished. Set aside.
Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and cook the spaghetti for about 8 minutes. Right before you drain the pasta, grab a coffee cup and take out about 1/4 cup of the pasta water and set it aside.
Heat saute pan on medium heat and add the olive oil and minced garlic. Saute the garlic until soft.
Add the drained pasta to the pan and toss. Using a microplane zester, zest half of the lemon and add it to the pan. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze each half onto the pasta.
Add the pasta water, Greek yogurt, feta cheese and spinach, and let simmer until most of the liquid is absorbed and the spinach has wilted.
Add pepper to taste. Top with the parmesan cheese and walnuts.
