Pasta all’Ortolana—translated Garden Pasta recipe—is the perfect way to use fresh spring and summer vegetables! There is no specific vegetable combination that is traditional, per se. However, eggplant, zucchini and a mix of peppers are common in many Italian Garden Pasta recipes. This dish is often prepared with some kind of fresh homemade pasta, such as Tuscan pici. However, you can simply choose your favorite pasta.
A Real Italian Pasta Primavera?
This fast and easy Italian pasta recipe was probably one of the inspirations for the so-called ‘Pasta Primavera’ which is actually an American recipe.
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Italian Garden Pasta: Recipe Ingredients
Soffritto: Onion, Carrot, Celery
Most Italian pasta recipes start with a soffritto. This just means infusing olive oil (or another fat) with herbs and aromatics. For the garden pasta, we want to make a soffritto with olive oil along with minced carrots, onions and celery.
Eggplants: Selecting
Bitter eggplants will ruin any dish. We recommend reading our guide about How to Select Eggplants to learn why some eggplants are bitter.
The short of it? Avoid the dark purple or black oblong eggplants. Instead, reach for eggplants with a bright purple or purple and white skin. Japanese eggplants also tend to be a good choice if the only other alternative is a dark oblong variety.
Peppers: Blanch to Preserve Color!
We use red, yellow and green bell peppers for this dish. We mince half of the peppers and thinly slice the other half.
When presentation matters, we recommend blanching the pepper slices before adding them to the rest of the vegetables. We also blanched a few slices of eggplant in the pictures you see, but that isn’t necessary.
To blanch the peppers, cook the slices of peppers in boiling water (in this case for less than a minute). Then, transfer the peppers to an ice bath.
Why Bother Blanching?
Blanching is optional. However, if you don’t blanch, the colors from the pepper and eggplant will bleed into one another creating a tan sauce that is less appetizing to look at.
We think the tastiest version of this Italian Garden Pasta recipe is the least visually appealing. If you mince all of the veggies, the flavors will marry perfectly creating an incredibly flavorful sauce. However, it will look like a tan mess. By blanching the pepper slices, we get the best of both worlds.
Pasta: Which to Use?
Honestly, any pasta you like would be fine to pair with this Italian Garden Pasta recipe. As we mentioned, there isn’t one traditional recipe associated with this dish. We chose to make a Tuscan pici pasta from scratch. Check out the recipe to try it at home!
Try a fresh spaghetti or even a dry spaghetti or linguine. To make another type of pasta (like fettuccine), check out our fresh egg pasta dough recipe.
How to Make Garden Pasta
Make a Soffritto (Sauce Base)
Cover the bottom of a skillet with olive oil. Sauté the minced onion, carrot and celery over medium heat until they are tender—about 5 minutes.
Sauté the Peppers, Zucchini, Eggplant
Then add the diced zucchini, eggplant, and pepper (slices and minced). Cover the skillet and simmer covered until the vegetables are more or less crunchy, based on your preference. In the meantime, cook the pasta of your choice to al dente, according to the package instructions.
After cooking these ingredients for about a minute, add dry white wine to deglaze the pan. Finally, salt to taste.
Add the Cooked Pasta
Over low heat, add the cooked and drained pasta to the skillet—along with a ladle of hot pasta water!
Add the Parmigiano Reggiano!
Add the butter and stir to combine the ingredients. Then add the Parmigiano Reggiano cheese and continue stirring to create a creamy sauce that coats the pasta. Buon appetito!
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Italian Garden Pasta Recipe
Ingredients
- ½ rib celery minced
- ½ carrot minced
- ½ spring onion minced
- ½ lb eggplant diced
- 1 medium zucchini diced
- ¾ large bell pepper/s mix of red, yellow and green; half minced and half thinly sliced
- 5 tbsp olive oil
- ½ cup dry white wine
- 2 tbsp butter unsalted
- 3 oz Parmigiano Reggiano cheese finely grated
- 11 oz pasta spaghetti, fettuccine or pici—your choice!
- 1 pinch fine salt or to taste
Instructions
Sauté the Vegetables
- Cover the bottom of a skillet with olive oil. Sauté the minced onion, carrot and celery over medium heat until they are tender—about 5 minutes.½ rib celery, ½ carrot, ½ spring onion, 5 tbsp olive oil
- Add the diced eggplant, zucchini and pepper. Cook for about a minute, then add the white wine.½ lb eggplant, 1 medium zucchini, ¾ large bell pepper/s, ½ cup dry white wine
- Cover and cook covered until the vegetables are to your liking (more or less crunchy). Salt to taste. In the meantime…1 pinch fine salt
Cook the Pasta
- Cook the pasta you’ve selected to al dente according to package instructions. Be sure to save the hot pasta water. We need it to create the cheese sauce!11 oz pasta
Finish the Pasta
- Over low heat, add the cooked, drained pasta to the skillet with the vegetables along with a ladle of hot pasta water.
- Add the butter and stir to combine the ingredients. Then add the Parmigiano Reggiano cheese and continue stirring to create a creamy sauce that coats the pasta.2 tbsp butter, 3 oz Parmigiano Reggiano cheese
- Buon appetito!
