3 healthy and delicious pasta recipes to curl up with this World Pasta Day

Two bowls of pasta

Credit: Naomi Vance/Ocado

Strong Women


3 healthy and delicious pasta recipes to curl up with this World Pasta Day

By Lauren Geall

2 years ago

5 min read

Celebrate World Pasta Day with these delicious warming dishes, perfect for enjoying as the weather grows colder.


There’s nothing quite like a steaming bowl of pasta to lift your spirits at the end of a long day, and World Pasta Day (25 October) is the perfect time to make the most of this beloved Italian staple.

While you might enjoy the simplicity of a classic bolognese or arrabbiata, experimenting with new flavours and sauces can elevate your pasta to a whole other level, culminating in a dish that is both delicious and nutritionally balanced. What more could you want?

As autumn wraps its dark, cold arms around us, we know you’ll be on the hunt for warming dishes to cosy up with – so we’ve put together this list of some of the best warming, seasonal pasta recipes for you to try this World Pasta Day. You can thank us later. 


Pumpkin linguine with pumpkin seed ragu

Pumpkin linguine

Credit: Naomi Vance

Embrace the season’s finest produce with this pumpkin-packed linguine recipe from Dean Parker at Celentano’s in Glasgow. Rich in vitamins C, E, iron and folate, the fresh pumpkin puree acts as a base for a rich, sweet sauce that pairs perfectly with the miso in the seed ragu. And the best bit? This recipe calls for all parts of the pumpkin, so you won’t have any waste.

Ingredients  

For the pumpkin puree: 

  • 500g (or half a) pumpkin (diced into 2cm cubes)
  • 100g butter
  • 30ml cider vinegar
  • 200ml vegetable stock
  • 8g salt

For the diced pumpkin:

  • 500g (or half a) pumpkin (diced into 2cm cubes)
  • 660ml beer
  • 270ml honey
  • 150ml cider vinegar
  • 6g salt
  • 6g black pepper

For the pumpkin seed ragu:

  • 300g pumpkin seeds
  • 80g butter
  • 150g shallot (diced into 0.5cm slices)
  • 12 cloves garlic
  • 15g black berber chilli
  • 20g onion powder
  • 20g garlic powder
  • 300ml white wine
  • 100g miso paste (organic soybean ideally)
  • 10g salt
  • 3g pepper
  • The zest of 1 lemon

To serve:

  • 100g of linguine (per person)
  • Bunch of cavolo nero
  • Fresh marjoram
  • Corra Linn cheese (or pecorino)
  • Vegetable oil
  • Salt and pepper

Method

For the pumpkin puree:

  1. Heat the butter in a pan on a medium heat until golden.
  2. Add the pumpkin and gently caramelise over a medium heat. Add salt.
  3. Pour in the vinegar and reduce.
  4. Then add the vegetable stock and cook down gently.
  5. Add all ingredients to a blender and blend until smooth. Chill and store for later.

For the diced pumpkin:

  1. Add all the ingredients, apart from the pumpkin, to a pot, and bring to the boil.
  2. Add in the pumpkin, then take off heat and leave to chill naturally. Set aside for later.

For the pumpkin seed ragu:

  1. Lightly roast the pumpkin seeds in the oven at 180°C for 10 mins.
  2. Golden the butter in a medium pot.
  3. Add garlic and cook until it starts to colour, then add the shallots.
  4. Boil the wine in a separate pot, then pour over the garlic and shallots.
  5. Add in the roasted pumpkin seeds.
  6. Season with the miso paste and grate in the lemon zest.
  7. Blend with a stick blender until most of the seeds have been broken up.
  8. Set aside to chill.

To serve:

  1. Cook linguine to package instructions
  2. Fry 2 leaves of cavolo nero per person in vegetable oil in a frying pan until it starts to pop and slightly char. Stir and char the other side.
  3. Drain onto paper and season to your taste with salt pepper. Set aside for plating.
  4. Heat up 30g of seed mix, 25g diced pumpkin and 30g pumpkin puree per portion.
  5. Mix in with your cooked linguine.
  6. Plate up, finishing with your cavolo nero leaves, some fresh marjoram and grated corra lin.

Beetroot pasta bake

Beetroot pasta bake

Credit: Love Beetroot

Packed full of antioxidants and good for your gut health, beetroot is the root vegetable that just doesn’t stop giving. This recipe from Love Beetroot is proof that the stuff isn’t just good for mixing into salads; combined with celery, onion and carrot, the beetroot-infused sauce at the heart of this pasta bake is ideal for upping your weekly plant intake while enjoying this seasonal vegetable in all its glory. Opt for plant-based cheese to make this dish fully vegan.

Ingredients

  • 250g vacuum-packed beetroot
  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • 2 onions, finely chopped
  • 4 celery sticks, finely chopped
  • 4 carrots, finely chopped
  • 30g basil
  • 3 garlic cloves, crushed
  • 400g pasta
  • Salt for seasoning
  • 100g feta, to serve
  • 50g grated cheese, to serve
  • 15g basil, to serve

Method

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 180°C.
  2. Carefully open the vac-pac beetroot, draining the juice into a jug and set it aside. Chop the beetroot into quarters.
  3. Meanwhile, put the oil into a large frying pan on a medium heat. Add the onions, celery and carrot, and two-thirds of the drained, quartered, beetroot, cooking until soft, about 10 mins.
  4. Roughly tear the basil into the pan and add the garlic, stirring constantly. Remove from the heat after 30 seconds.
  5. Bring a pan of salted water to the boil and add the pasta, simmering for 8 minutes. Drain, reserving 200ml of pasta water.
  6. Meanwhile, in a blender or food processor blitz the onion and beetroot mixture, along with the reserved beetroot juice. Slowly add the pasta water to loosen the mixture until you have a pourable consistency.
  7. Pour the drained pasta into a large oven-proof dish. Stir the sauce through the pasta, ensuring the pasta is well coated.
  8. Top with the remaining beetroot quarters, plant-based feta and grated cheese, if using.
  9. Bake in the oven for 20 mins, until crisp on top. Top with the fresh basil, if using.

Creamy green pasta

Creamy green pasta

Credit: Ocado

Serves: 3 (or 4 smaller portions)

If you don’t fancy going shopping for a trolley’s worth of ingredients, opt for this simple but delicious recipe from Ocado. Combining antioxidant-rich broccoli with the healthy fats of the avocado, this dish is as tasty as it is good for you (aka, very). 

Ingredients

  • 4 large frozen broccoli florets
  • 4 blocks frozen spinach
  • 2 garlic cloves, halved
  • 1 low-salt vegetable stock cube
  • 75g cashew nuts
  • 1 ripe avocado, halved
  • 200g pasta

Method

  1. Put the frozen veg, garlic, crumbled stock cube and 70ml water in a small saucepan over a medium heat. Cover, bring to a simmer and cook for 8-10 minutes, until the veg has softened. Drop in the cashews for the final few minutess to soften.
  2. Pour the contents of the pan (liquid and all) into a blender. Add the avocado and some black pepper; whizz until smooth or still a little chunky, depending on how you like it.
  3. Meanwhile, cook the pasta as per the pack instructions. Drain, reserving a mugful of the water, then tip the pasta back into the pan.
  4. Add 4-5 big spoonfuls of the green sauce to the pasta, mixing until well coated. Add a splash of the reserved pasta water to loosen and make it silky. Stir in the remaining sauce if you like, or keep it for another day (it will last for 2 days in the fridge, or freeze in ice-cube trays for up to 3 months).

Images: Naomi Vance; Love Beetroot; Ocado

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