Two-dozen pasta recipes to cure the weeknight blues (2024)

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It's hard enough trying to fit everything into your day without that nagging little dinner elf sitting on your shoulder going 'so, what're we cooking tonight? Anything good? Anything at all?' Because we all know that pesky elf isn't going to hang around and do any of the actual planning, let alone the cooking.

You know what they say, when life hands you a dinner elf, make

. There's not a weekday dilemma in the world that a bowl of pasta won't solve. Especially when you can make it quickly and easily. Hop to it, elf.

A lovely little vego option to end the day just right. Polpette are Italian meatballs, but

brings you a hearty plant-based version through the magic of lentils and oats.

Four ingredients and 15 minutes is all you need to make Silvia Colloca's

. Actually, even less time if you put your feet up for five minutes while theguanciale gently simmers.

It's hard to believe you can get such depth of flavour into a dish in just 25 minutes, but this

proves you can. It's a fresh, herby recipe that packs plenty of heat to fire you back up after a tiring day.

Even better than a quick cooking time is a fast clean up. A midweek dinner like

is surely perfection because you get both.

One of Silvia Colloca's genius shortcut recipes,

has all the appeal of a risotto without the tedious stirring. The secret is to use quick-cooking rissoni instead of rice.

This

originated in Amatrice inLazio, central Italy. It's so good that it's been recognised as one of Italy's national treasures. So, not your average Tuesday night dinner then!

Orecchiette translates as 'little ears', but this pasta shape is the boss when it comes to scooping up big flavours. In

pangrattato (olive oil-infused sourdough breadcrumbs) add crunch to a bowl full of anchovy, broccolini leaves and chilli zing.

If adding potato to your pasta seems a little carby, just go with it. The potato adds a luxurious creaminess to

that basically asks you to use up whatever pasta shapes and sizes you have in the pantry. Which are many random packets for most of us.

Inject some extra nutrition into your meal by using a

instead of your regular wheat version. It adds plenty of additional fibre and protein and asks little of any simple sauce that accompanies it.

Brimming with homemade walnut pesto and zucchini, this is one

. We bet you'll make it once and then declare a new Friday Farfalle night ritual.

It's rare for a baked pasta dish to make 'weekday' status, but

makes the grade because it's literally 10 minutes prep then into the oven. That's 10 minutes of faffing when you first get home, and 35 minutes of book reading while the oven goes to work. Bon appetite indeed.

Another whirl for

, this time it's stepping out with an almond, parmesan, tomato, ricotta and basil pesto which is every bit as dashing as it sounds.

Zoodles (ie zucchini spiralised into noddles) have become so ubiquitous that including them in a 'pasta' round-up feels okay. Ish. If you're not on board with this, feel free to quietly substitute spaghetti in

.

Staying with the healthier takes (for now), how about a

that says no to bacon and cream? It's an easy meat-free Monday meal.

We are fairly certain that Silvia would not be on board with a

that lacks meat, but she would definitely okay the lack of cream. Here's her

to whip up tonight.

No other pasta dish earns the 'weeknight' badge like

. This version is a one-pot dish that you can pull together in no time at all. Plus it uses ingredients most of us have on hand most of the time. Hello, dinner!

Fortunately, this

with the very long name takes a very short time to cook.

A bit of heat in your dinner will rev you up for the night ahead and

always do the trick. Feel free to add an extra pinch or two of chilli to the sauce to blow your head off.

Keeping with the sausage theme, let's turn down the heat with

. You basically just toss together a small list of ingredients over a good heat and you're eating.

If you can get your hands on some bottarga, dinner will practically make itself.

is on the table in under 15 minutes. If bottarga eludes you, any other fish roe will be a good substitute, particularly mullet or tuna roe.

Trawl the bottom of the crisper for any green veggie leftovers to make

. Broccoli, asparagus, spinach, rocket, frozen peas - whatever you find will work well.

The word 'lazy' indicates that this is a

we're on board with. It's basically a seafood lasagne with all the fuss and bother removed. All of the oven time is removed too, so you'll have this on the table in under half an hour.

Another

where the oven takes over to give you a bit of breathing space. Prep time is 25 minutes, but it's worth it to bring out the best in cauliflower, olives, anchovies and capers. Plenty of flavour here and the leftovers taste even better for lunch the next day.

Some workdays are so rough that only mac and cheese can fix them.

of the comforting pasta dish is made midweek-healthy with ricotta stepping in for cheese and wholemeal pasta doing the lifting for mac. Goodbye work, hello life.