Take A Trip to Italy With These 75 Pasta Recipes Perfect For Any Day Of The Week (2024)

This recipe takes inspiration from a classic pasta al limone by using heavy cream as the base for the luscious and decadent sauce. And, just like a dirty martini, we supplement the dish with olives and brine (and booze, of course). The best part? It comes together in under 30 minutes.

Get the Dirty Martini Pasta recipe.

This is the best creamy and bright vodka sauce any of us in the test kitchen have ever had. The secret? Tomato paste. Tomato paste has a more concentrated flavor, and texture-wise, it makes for a smoother, almost velvety sauce your date will love.

Get the Penne Alla Vodka recipe.

When our weeknight dinners start to feel a little snoozy, we activate our go-to formula for supper success: Start with a dish you love, then add something new. Here, the dish we love is chicken piccata, the Italian-American classic, and the new ingredient is one of our favorite pantry items, boxed gnocchi.

Get the Creamy Chicken Piccata With Gnocchi recipe.

Obviously roasting a block of feta with bursting tomatoes is going to be amazing. But is it good enough to break TikTok like this one did? Our answer, begrudgingly, is yes. It's genius—super-easy, but fancy enough for date night. 😍

Get the Baked Feta Pasta recipe.

With a creamy, cheesy sauce and tender chicken breasts, this is the pasta dish we turn to time and time again when we're craving the ultimate comfort meal. If you've never made pasta sauce from scratch before—this Alfredo recipe is where you should start.

Get the Chicken Alfredo recipe.

The trifecta of is an Italian classic, often eaten on its own or tucked into a bun or hoagie. No matter how you serve it, it’s meant to be an easy meal, so we knew we had to keep it that way when developing this pasta version too.

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Based on the traditional lasagna alla Bolognese from the Emilia-Romagna province in Italy, we grabbed what we loved most about the timeless, classic recipe and simplified it to make it weeknight-friendly.

Get the Classic Lasagna recipe.

One-pot taco spaghetti is a fast-as-can-be weeknight dinner that pairs all your favorite taco fixin’s with spaghetti rather than taco shells. It's perfect for those nights when you just cannot stand the thought of a sink full of dirty dishes.

Get the Taco Spaghetti recipe.

Pesto is a sauce that turns any dish into kitchen gold, especially this totally comforting and delicious gnocchi and chicken bake. For the perfect pesto touch, stir a dollop into the tomato mixture, then dollop the top with more right out of the oven for a fresh finish.

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Though many people travel to Rome to experience the Colosseum, for us, there’s only one reason to make the trip: carbonara! The classic Roman dish composed of silky eggs, Sardinian sheep's milk cheese, and al dente spaghetti is comfort food + good for the soul + Italian bliss all wrapped around your fork tines.

Get the Spaghetti Carbonara recipe.

This chicken Parmesan-inspired dish has several key components—bacon, a flavorful panko topping, an easy doctored jarred sauce—and lucky for you, they all come together in just one pan!

Get the Chicken Parm Pasta recipe.

Gnocchi will always hit the spot for a quick, delicious meal. Yes, it’s great on its own as a main, but it also makes for a winning, hearty sidekick to roasted chicken or rosemary pork chops too!

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Chef Millie Peartree's baked is famous for many reasons, the top of which is that she puts an ENTIRE layer of extra cheese in between two layers of (already cheesy) macaroni. Game. Changer.

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Bursting with flavor and so easy to prepare, you'll be craving this pasta every week. The super-fragrant sauce is made with a lot of garlic and anchovies that will have you coming back for more, and the capers and olives add a briny saltiness to the dish. Yum!

Get the Pasta Puttanesca recipe.

Whipped ricotta might just be one of the best pasta upgrades, especially when it’s paired with a sun-dried tomato sauce and spinach like we did here. In one bowl, you get all the enjoyment of a marinara with the creaminess of something like an Alfredo sauce.

Get the Whipped Ricotta Pasta recipe.

If you're looking for a super simple, comforting, no-frills bowl of spaghetti and meatballs to impress your date, you've come to the right place. And if you're feeling adventurous, it's also a great jumping-off point to make your own version of this classic dish!

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When everything cooks together, everyone wins. The chicken here finishes cooking in the sauce, making it the easiest comfort meal ever. It's what weeknight dinner dreams are made of!

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Though you totally could roast your own peppers for this dish, we actually preferred the jarred version while testing this recipe. The store-bought variety tends to be more tender, which makes for a smoother, more velvety sauce. Creamy, smoky, and spicy, this comforting shrimp pasta is low effort, high reward.

Get the Roasted Red Pepper Shrimp Linguine recipe.

Cacio e pepe literally translates to “cheese and pepper." These two ingredients are usually thought of as small components to a dish but in this pasta recipe, they take center stage. The fruity bite of freshly ground pepper combined with salty cheese is complex, earthy, sweet and spicy all at once.

Get the Cacio e Pepe recipe.

This pasta—with roasted butternut squash, crispy sage, creamy gorgonzola, and toasted walnuts—SCREAMS fall. Want to add protein? We think this would be amazing with pancetta or bacon too.

Get the Roasted Butternut Squash Pasta recipe.