I Tried the 3-Ingredient Dinner Fans Say Is Better Than Feta Pasta
Does it live up to the hype?
Robin Shreeves
A few years ago, a TikTok trend took the Internet by storm because it made putting a hot dinner together a breeze, and it was something a little different. The simple process of baking a block of feta cheese, tomatoes, and olive oil and mixing it with cooked pasta was so genius that it’s no surprise home cooks embraced it. Then, the various spins on the idea popped up.
Mixing cooked pasta with ready-made dips—often from Trader Joe’s—came next, an even easier way to make pasta. Now, it seems the trend has come full circle with a different baked store-bought product and tomatoes mixed with cooked pasta.
Gen Cohen posted a video on her fitness Instagram account about her “Way Better Than Feta” Pasta, which is made with frozen Trader Joe’s Creamy Spinach and Artichoke Dip, grape tomatoes, and cooked pasta.
I had to give it a try.
How to Make “Way Better Than Feta” Pasta
I've had Trader Joe's Spinach and Artichoke Dip many times. It's a decent and quick substitute when you don't have the time or the ingredients to make hot spinach and artichoke dip. It comes in a frozen block, like a thick hockey puck, and that block usually goes right into the microwave (in a bowl, of course). In about five minutes, you're ready to dip tortilla chips, baguette, or carrot sticks into the hot dip.
Robin Shreeves
While you don't use the microwave for "Way Better Than Feta" Pasta, it's not much more complicated. Here's how to make it:
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Place a block of Trader Joe's Spinach and Artichoke Dip in an 8x8-inch oven-safe baking dish.
Put grape tomatoes all around the dip.
Bake for 45 minutes. (Cohen then broils it after baking, but mine came out browned on top without broiling, so I skipped that step.)
After the dip and tomatoes have been in the oven for 25 minutes, start a pot of boiling water for your pasta. (I used 5 ounces of gemelli pasta because I had an open box, but you can use what you want.) Cook the pasta according to the directions. When you drain the pasta, save some of the pasta water.
After baking the dip and tomatoes, mix them with a spoon, then add the cooked pasta and give it a good mix. The cooked dip becomes a pasta sauce.
Robin Shreeves
Recipe Tips
If you'd prefer to thin the sauce a bit, add pasta water a little at a time until you reach the desired consistency.
It's easy to double all of the ingredients without changing directions, but make sure you use a bigger baking dish.
You can also add protein—cooked chicken or cubed ham would be good—or eat the pasta as-is.
I ate the pasta with just the three ingredients, and it was so good—creamy and savory. The tomatoes added a welcome burst of sweetness and acidity to the mix. The only thing I'd change next time is to add more tomatoes so there would be a tomato in each bite.
The next day, I reheated the leftovers in the microwave. The dish wasn't as good as fresh from the oven; the pasta had soaked up much of the sauce. I added a bit of milk to try to make it creamy again, but that only went so far. The dish wasn't horrible when reheated, but the "oh my gosh, this is so good" vibe I got with every bite when it was freshly baked had faded. I will absolutely cook this again, though.
Was this better than the baked feta pasta? That's up to you. I like them both and can't say one is better. Of course, that's not a problem because who doesn't need more simple 3-ingredient recipes in their arsenal?
Robin Shreeves
Read the original article on All Recipes.
