It’s day number 3 celebrating National Pasta Month. My personal pasta challenge has been to make and eat pasta every day for the rest of October, sharing the recipes on the aldente canoodler. I’m finding tremendous satisfaction in this self-imposed discipline-measuring, documenting,  blogging-then enjoying the final dish.  All this with zero stress and no planning, simply looking in my fridge and deciding which ingredients to combine. It’s the way I have always cooked, but it’s the first time that I am organizing it so that others will hopefully be inspired by the simplicity of cooking fresh and healthy meals with pasta.

Today, I am finishing off the bag of Al Dente® Egg Linguine that I’ve already made 2 dishes from. This is the final proof that one bag of pasta does serve 6 people when combined with other ingredients. Equally exciting, recipes 1, 2, and 3 in the series have all been prepared in less than 10 minutes!

Al Dente® Pasta with Pancetta, Spinach, Goat Cheese, Walnuts and Sundried Tomatoes

serves 2

Total cooking time: less than 10 minutes

1/3 bag Al Dente® Pasta, 4 oz.

1/2 cup pancetta, small cubes

10 oz. baby spinach

1/4 cup sundried tomatoe slivers, in oil

1/4 cup walnuts, toasted

2 oz. goat cheese

As with all of our recipes, begin by bringing a large pot of salted water to a boil in which you will cook your pasta for approximately 3 minutes and then drain before tossing in the skillet with the other ingredients.

Over medium heat, saute the pancetta until just crisp.

Add spinach to pancetta until just wilted.

Add the slivers of sundried tomatoes.

Toss cooked pasta along with walnuts, heating just until heated through. I found that this dish did not need salt or pepper, but that is to your taste.

Crumble the goat cheese over the pasta, serve and enjoy.