Caprese pasta with fresh mozzarella
Juicy cherry tomatoes, soft fresh mozzarella and basil tossed with warm pasta, like summer in a bowl with almost no cooking.
- 30 min total
- 15 min hands-on
- Anyone can make this
- Serves 4
- About $3.78 a serving
- 600 calories
- Vegetarian
Dolly says: I’d make this on a weeknight. It’s on the table in 30 minutes.
Ingredients
For 4 servings.
- 1 lb cherry tomatoes, halved
- 1 clove garlic, grated
- 8 oz fresh mozzarella, torn into bite-size pieces
- 1 cup fresh basil, leaves
- 12 oz penne
From your pantry
- 1 tbsp salt, plus a big pinch
- ¼ cup olive oil
- ½ tsp black pepper
- 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
Each serving has about 600 calories, 23 g protein, 70 g carbs and 25 g fat, and costs about $3.78 at typical US grocery prices. Both are estimates from what the recipe uses.
Missing something?
- No penne? Rigatoni or elbow macaroni works.
Steps
Tap an underlined word for a quick explanation.
Fill a large pot with water and bring it over high heat.
Bring to a boil. It means heating a liquid on high until it’s fully boiling before you move on. A lid on the pot gets it there faster, which makes it a good moment to chop something.
How you’ll know: Big bubbles break all over the surface, and they keep coming when you lift the lid.
High heat
While it heats, the tomatoes and put them in a big serving bowl. Add the olive oil, pepper and a big of salt, the garlic over the top, and stir.
Halve. Halving means cutting something into two equal pieces. Even halves cook at the same speed, so one doesn’t dry out while the other finishes.
How you’ll know: The two pieces look like mirror images of each other.
Pinch. A pinch is what you can hold between your thumb and two fingers, less than an eighth of a teaspoon. It’s a small, forgiving amount, so there’s no need to measure.
How you’ll know: It’s a light sprinkle you can barely see on the food, not a little pile.
Grate. Grating means rubbing food across the holes of a grater to make fine shreds or flakes. It spreads cheese, garlic or ginger evenly through a dish so it melts right in.
How you’ll know: Even shreds fall off the back of the grater, and you stop while the piece is still big enough to hold.
Dolly’s tip: The salt pulls juice out of the tomatoes, and that juice becomes your sauce.Tear the mozzarella into bite-size pieces and pick the basil leaves off their stems.
Add the salt and penne to the water and cook until , about 11 minutes.
Boil. Boiling means heating a liquid until big bubbles rise and break all over the surface. It’s the fastest way to cook pasta, potatoes and eggs, because it’s as hot as water gets.
How you’ll know: Bubbles are breaking across the whole surface, not just at the edges, and steam is rising.
Al dente. Al dente is Italian for “to the tooth”: pasta cooked until tender but with a slight firm bite in the center. It holds up in sauce and keeps softening a little after you drain it.
How you’ll know: Bite a piece a minute before the package time: tender, with a slight firm bite in the middle and no crunch.
High heatTimer: 11 min
the pasta and tip it straight into the bowl with the tomatoes. for a minute so the heat the tomatoes a little.
Drain. Draining means pouring off liquid, like tipping pasta into a colander or spooning extra fat out of the pan. Pour hot grease into a can or jar, not the sink, where it hardens and clogs the pipes.
How you’ll know: Only a few drips are left, and the food isn’t sitting in a puddle.
Toss. Tossing means gently lifting and turning food so everything gets coated, like pasta in sauce or vegetables in oil. It coats every piece evenly without mashing anything.
How you’ll know: Every piece looks glossy or evenly coated, with no dry spots hiding underneath.
Softened. For vegetables it means cooked until they bend and lose their crunch; for butter, left out until it dents easily. Soft onions taste sweet, and soft butter mixes in smoothly.
How you’ll know: Onions squash easily against the pan with your spoon, and butter dents under a finger without looking greasy.
Let it cool for 3 minutes, then add the mozzarella and most of the basil and gently.
Toss. Tossing means gently lifting and turning food so everything gets coated, like pasta in sauce or vegetables in oil. It coats every piece evenly without mashing anything.
How you’ll know: Every piece looks glossy or evenly coated, with no dry spots hiding underneath.
Timer: 3 min
Dolly’s tip: A short cool-down keeps the mozzarella soft and creamy instead of melting into strings.Taste and add salt if it needs it, then serve with a of balsamic and the rest of the basil on top.
Drizzle. Drizzling means pouring a thin, slow stream over the top of something. A thin stream spreads a little flavor a long way.
How you’ll know: You see thin lines across the food, not a puddle collecting underneath.
Plan this in Dollop, and get the grocery list
Dollop puts this dinner on a night that suits your week, lists only what you still need to buy, and walks you through each step while you cook.
