Zucchini Pasta

After work on a Monday, I can never be too bothered spending much time cooking dinner... so a quick, easy and tasty pasta always does the trick for me. This pasta is very simple and I do love dishes that use only a few ingredients and still pack a punch! Now I'll admit that this isn't the best thought out dinner because it doesn't contain that much vegetable, nor does it contain protein... But hey, it's nice now and then.

This recipe takes no more than 15 minutes and will serve 2 not too hungry people.


For this you'll need:
1 large zucchini
2-3 cloves of garlic
handful flat leaf parsley
Pasta (I prefer linguini for this recipe but ran out so used spaghetti instead)
olive oil
salt and pepper
parmesan cheese

1. Put your salted pasta water onto the boil. In the meantime, coarsley grate the zucchini into a bowl.

2. Crush the garlic and throw it into the bowl with the zucchini. If you're feeling lazy like me you can finely grate the garlic cloves so that they as fine as they'd be minced.

3. Put the pasta on and pour yourself a glass of wine :)

4. Heat a good slosh of olive oil in a pan and throw in your zucchini and garlic. Season generously and stir, then cover and continue to cook over medium heat.

5. In the meantime, roughly chop the parsley and add it to the pan.

6. Drain cooked pasta and add straight into pan and toss through zucchini mixture. Check seasoning.

7. Serve and top with finely grated parmesan. Enjoy :)


Tips:
The main thing to watch for with this dish is that your zucchini does not overcook - it shouldn't be on the heat for more than 5 mins I'd say, otherwise you'll lose that lovely fresh green colour of the vegetable :)

Don't worry too much about super draining the pasta - some of that pasta water will be more than welcome in the pan and keep the pasta moist.

PS - sorry for the blurry pic - couldn't find the camera in time so grabbed the iPhone!