A super simple and flexible pasta recipe that turns your best cherry tomatoes into a light but creamy sauce that cooks in one pan with the spaghetti. A vegetarian summer dinner that couldn’t be easier!

So, one pot pasta is having a moment…

… And having created a few different one pot pasta recipes myself, I was interested to see what the fuss was about when a very simple one pot spaghetti recipe started to do the rounds on social media after being featured on “With Love, Meghan” on Netflix.

In terms of the origins of this recipe, I’ve seen others reference Martha Stewart as the original creator and while she did publish a template for one pot spaghetti, Meghan’s take much more closely resembles this one from Anna Jones, so I would assume that is where she got it from.

So is this recipe any good?

My overall impressions is that this is a solid quick and easy dinner when you have quality tomatoes to hand, some greens to use up, and want something minimal and subtle with a light summery flavor. My One Pot Angel Hair Pomodoro (where the tomatoes are first cooked in butter and balsamic vinegar, and we use veggie stock to cook it in) is a good option if you want something bolder. Or my Parma Rosa One Pot Pasta (where we use a much larger amount of cheese to make a thick sauce) is a good option if you want something richer and cheesier.

There’s a lot of chat about this recipe online right now, and lots of people are finding it too low on the flavor department. I think it is simple enough that it could be bland, but as long as you use quality tomatoes, enough salt, and enough olive oil, it will have adequate flavor. This is why it was particularly useful to cross reference what I saw on TV with the Anna Jones recipe to get those salt and oil quantities right.

There’s also a lot of skepticism about the fact that we don’t pre-cook the garlic or tomatoes, and that we cook the pasta in water instead of broth. I wondered about all this too, but looking into it, both of these were true of Martha Stewart and Anna Jones‘s recipes as well, so I trusted the process and thought it was fine. The tomato flavor is more pure, raw and delicate; the garlic flavor is soft and mellow. Light and fresh is the name of the game with this one.

My final take on the recipe kind of merges Meghan and Anna’s recipes, but I use a little more cheese (and therefore less salt) and a whole lotta fresh basil (’tis the season, after all).

Ingredients and how to flex this recipe to work for you

Any baby tomatoes will work here, in any color, but results will slightly differ. Smaller, more delicate cherry tomatoes will disintegrate into the sauce more thoroughly than more fleshy baby grape tomatoes, which might keep their shape more. It’s all fine, but it may account for your pasta looking a little different from mine.
Your choice is greens isn’t overly important, but I think lacinato kale (cavolo nero) is the best one to include. Anna Jones recommends kale or spinach, while Meghan uses kale, rainbow chard and arugula (rocket) and even includes the chard stems in her pasta. I couldn’t find rainbow chard so I stuck to kale and arugula (rocket). For me, lacinato kale (cavolo nero) was the most worthwhile because it gives you some bite and some texture. I wouldn’t go out of your way to find arugula (rocket) which is pricey and shrinks down a lot, so in my opinion not worth it unless you have it to use up.
Spaghetti or linguine will work equally well here.
The lemon zest is an important source of flavor so don’t skip it!
You want parmesan, pecorino or another Italian hard cheese. If you need this recipe to be vegetarian, note that real Italian DOP parmesan uses calf rennet in its processing so is not technically vegetarian friendly. Depending on where you live in the world, you have options! In the UK, plenty of cheeses which mimic parmesan but go by the name of “Italian hard cheese” will do the job. Look for the V sign on the packaging! In the US, the name “parmesan” is not protected the way it is in the EU so some parmesan cheeses will be American made and use vegetarian rennet. Check out the ingredients list and always avoid the “DOP parmesan”.

Top Tip: Timing Matters!

I noticed that when Meghan plated the pasta it was fairly brothy, with lots of the cooking water left to scoop out. If you want this sauciness, you need to be quick to plate it up! If you let it sit out too long (like me spending forever taking photos of it) the liquid will disappear on you. My photos make the dish look a lot drier than it actually is, because of how long it takes to get the photo setup just right, but rest assured that each strand has a good coating of the silky starchy sauce.

More Summery Cherry Tomato Pasta Recipes

Cherry Tomato Spaghetti Sauce

Bucatini Pomodoro with Cherry Tomatoes

Cherry Tomato & Kale Pasta Bake

Roasted Asparagus and Cherry Tomato Pasta