Fall officially arrives on Thursday and I’m happy to report I checked off half of the items on my summer bucket list. Not bad considering I was overambitious. (I’ll just have to sow seeds and make ice cream in the months ahead.)
Before shifting from healthy salads to hearty soups and stews, I’m savoring seasonal produce, including a bumper crop of homegrown cherry tomatoes. Which brings me to this zesty baked Feta pasta, a riff on a recipe that went viral early last year and calls for two pints of little love apples.
Better late than never: Besides being incredibly easy to assemble, zesty baked Feta pasta is exquisite. And if you ask me, a few extra ingredients – Calabrian chiles, lemon zest and toasted bread crumbs – take the original version over the top.
Have you jumped on the baked Feta pasta bandwagon? Do you think the recipe is worth the hype?
Recipe adapted from ScheckEats.
- 8 ounces Feta cheese
- 2 pints cherry tomatoes
- 1 head garlic
- ¼ cup olive oil, plus more for finish
- 1 teaspoon honey
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano
- ¼ teaspoon dried chili flakes
- ¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 12 ounces radiatori or other short pasta
- ½ cup torn fresh basil
- 2 Calabrian chiles in oil, removed from oil and roughly chopped
- finely grated zest of 1 lemon
- toasted bread crumbs (for topping, optional, see notes)
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Place Feta cheese and tomatoes in a 9" square baking dish. Cut about ¼ inch off the top of the head of garlic and nestle in the baking dish. Drizzle with olive oil and honey and season with oregano, chili flakes and pepper. Bake for 40 minutes and then remove from the oven. When cool enough to handle, squeeze out roasted garlic and return to baking dish.
- Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook pasta until al dente according to package directions. Using a slotted spoon, transfer cooked pasta to baking dish with Feta cheese, tomatoes and garlic.
- Add basil, Calabrian chiles and lemon zest and stir to combine. If necessary, add some of the reserved cooking liquid to loosen the sauce. Drizzle with olive oil and top with toasted bread crumbs, if using.
