An easy dinner featuring the super easy trending vodka pasta sauce (Gigi Hadid style) with added kale and olives bringing it extra texture and flavor. It feels like a real treat despite its simplicity, so it’s perfect for a cozy weeknight dinner or date night in!
This dinner feels like some kind of hack, because a tasty and substantial meal like this shouldn’t be that quick. And yet it is! We are winning at life today.
So this vodka sauce is based off the Gigi Hadid recipe which I understand did the rounds on Tik Tok. A tomato paste based cream sauce with the addition of vodka is not a new concept, but this was a quick and easy pared down version which felt so achievable to new young cooks watching her videos, and it’s easy to see why it got so popular.
So I grabbed that sauce recipe, made some minor tweaks and bulked it out to a more rounded meal with kale and olives. Remembering how much I loved kale in my gochujang pasta, I knew it would be perfect here too. It just pulls that silky sauce in every ridge making for super juicy bites.
Black olives were a little pop of salty flavor to liven things up too.
These additions don’t add much in the way of effort (especially if you’ve got pre-sliced olives and pre-sliced kale) but in my mind, they make the meal feel a little more complete.
What do I need to know about the ingredients?
Not much! This is very straightforward.
- Use any kind of kale – curly kale, lacinato kale (cavolo nero), baby kale, it is all good here.
- Penne and rigatoni (I’m using mezze rigatoni here) are my ideal pasta shapes for this recipe, but any short pasta shapes will work well. Shells, orecchiette, etc.
- The amount of vodka that vodka sauce recipes call for varies wildly, and so does the point at which they are added. Do we add it alongside the cream in small quantities (like Gigi) or do we add it earlier in large quantities but let it cook down for a while (like many of the older classic recipes)? I’ve landed on something in the middle, adding a couple tablespoons just before the cream, letting it cook down for a very quick moment to get rid of the harshness.
- One teaspoon of red pepper flakes brings flavor but I don’t find it spicy at all – if you want yours hotter, increase the amount of use a hotter chili flake.
- A good quality tomato paste will make a difference here if you can splash out. I love the Mutti brand.
More Quick & Easy Creamy Pasta Recipes
Easy Vodka Pasta with Kale
Ingredients
- 4 Tbsp olive oil
- 8 oz (225 g) dried pasta
- 2 handfuls kale, chopped
- 1 shallot, finely diced
- 2 large cloves garlic, crushed
- ¼ cup (4 Tbsp) tomato paste
- 1 tsp red pepper or chili flakes
- 2 tbsp vodka
- ⅓ cup (6 Tbsp) black olives, sliced
- ½ cup (120 ml) cream
- 1 tbsp (15 g) salted butter
- ½ cup (120 ml) pasta cooking water
- ⅓ cup (35 g) parmesan, pecorino or Italian hard cheese
- fresh basil, optional garnish
Instructions
- Make sure you have all of your ingredients prepped and ready, then set the pasta going according to package instructions. The sauce will come together in the same time it takes the pasta to cook.8 oz dried pasta
- Heat the olive oil in a deep sided saute pan, over a low heat. Add the sliced shallot to the pan and saute until soft, then add the garlic and cook until the fragrance is released – this will only be a matter of seconds so be prepared to move to the next step quickly.4 Tbsp olive oil, 1 shallot, 2 large cloves garlic
- Add the red pepper or chili flakes and tomato paste and saute for a few minutes, keeping the heat low, until the tomato paste has turned a little darker and formed a rich oily base. Add salt and pepper to taste.1 tsp red pepper or chili flakes, 1/4 cup tomato paste
- Now add the vodka, and allow it to bubble in the pan for just a few moments. There will be a fairly harsh alcoholic smell, but once that settles down, add the cream to the pan and mix through.1/2 cup cream, 2 tbsp vodka
- Scoop out 1/2 cup of the pasta cooking water. Add most of it to the pan (hold back about 1/4 of it) and stir through to incorporate it into the sauce. Cover and turn off the heat until the pasta is ready.1/2 cup pasta cooking water
- Once your pasta only has a couple of minutes left to cook, add the kale to the pan, using a spoon to push it down and immerse it in the water.2 handfuls kale
- Once the pasta is al dente and the kale is bright green, drain and add to the sauce. Turn the heat back on to low. Add the butter, olives and the cheese and stir everything well until the cheese has melted through. Assess the texture of the sauce – if it's too thick, splash in some more of the pasta cooking water to loosen it up.1 tbsp salted butter, 1/3 cup parmesan, pecorino or Italian hard cheese, 1/3 cup black olives
- Serve immediately, with lots of basil for garnish.fresh basil
This is sooooooo good! I added some tuna for protein and to turn it into three servings. Will definitely be making this again!
So happy to hear this! 🙂