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Here’s a quick and simple recipe for Zucchini Pasta. Grated zucchini melts into a flavorful succulent sauce, perfect for cradling linguini or your favorite pasta! Enhanced with lemon, black pepper and garlic you’ll have dinner on the table in 30 minutes! Vegan and gluten-free adaptable.
Even the most thorough change happens one choice at a time.
Charles eisenstein
This Easy Zucchini Pasta recipe is here to honor the beloved zucchini plant that just keeps on giving! We love the generosity of this plant. And we especially appreciate recipes that help us use them up!
This is a simple, quick dish that comes together in about half an hour. You could also get all the ingredients prepped out ahead of time and then cook this up 10 minutes before serving!
The flavors are clean, light, and savory. Lemon, black pepper, and garlic give their goodness while the chicken broth creates some richness. The zucchini melts as it cooks, turning into a sauce.
Make it gluten-free with your choice of pasta. We add in parmesan, but it is flavorful without if you want to keep it vegan! We love topping our vegan pasta dishes with vegan cheesy sprinkle…so yummy.
Table of Contents
Ingredients In Zucchini Pasta
Ingredient Notes
- grated zucchini – any summer squash variety will work
- pasta– linguine or fettuccine, orzo is fun too!
- parmesan or Vegan Cheesy Sprinkle
See the recipe card below for a full list of ingredients and measurements.
Ways To Enhance
How To Make Easy Zucchini Pasta
STEP ONE
Get your pasta cooking according to the package directions. Grate and chop all your ingredients.
STEP TWO
In a large sauté pan add garlic and olive oil and cook for about a minute over medium heat. Add grated zucchini, and stir to coat with oil and garlic.
STEP THREE
Add in broth and lemon zest and cook for about 5 minutes; the zucchini should soften and come to a light simmer for a few minutes.
STEP FOUR
Toss in parsley, lemon juice, salt and pepper. Toss to distribute thoroughly. Add pasta and sprinkle in parmesan.
Transferring this to a serving dish is helpful as the sauciness tends to sink to the bottom, this way you can scrape all the yummy bits onto the top of the pasta.
Serve with another sprinkle of parmesan.
FAQs
Zucchini has a very mild flavor and adapts to almost any flavor profile, from savory to sweet. It is an easy vegetable to add in as it goes with most anything.
Rich in antioxidants, zucchini is packed with nutrients as well as low in calories, fat and sugars. Also rich in vitamin B which helps regulate blood glucose and may play a roll in protecting from diabetes.
Yes, store shredded zucchini in a sealed container in the fridge for up to 3 days.
Yes. An easy way to do this is to shred the zucchini and lay it out on a sheet pan, freeze, and then seal the shreds in mason jars or a ziplock bags in the freezer for 3 to 4 months. Frozen shreds of zucchini works great for adding to soups, casseroles, sauces or smoothies. Not as great for baked goods.
What to Serve With Easy Zucchini Pasta
More Zucchini Dishes You May Enjoy
Love this recipe? Please let us know in the comments and leave a 5-star ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ rating below the recipe card.
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Easy Zucchini Pasta Recipe
- Prep Time: 20
- Cook Time: 10
- Total Time: 30 minutes
- Yield: 5–6 cups 1x
- Category: pasta, main,
- Method: Stovetop
- Cuisine: American
- Diet: Vegetarian
Description
Here’s a quick and simple recipe for Easy Zucchini Pasta. Grated zucchini melts into a flavorful succulent sauce, perfect for cradling linguini or your favorite pasta! Enhanced with lemon, black pepper and garlic you’ll have dinner on the table in 30 minutes! Vegan and gluten-free adaptable.
Ingredients
- 8–10 ounces pasta cooked in salted water according to the package directions
- 5 garlic cloves (more to taste), chopped small
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1.5 pounds zucchini, grated ( use a hand grater or food processor with grater attachment)
- 1/2 cup chicken or veggie broth; make sure it is flavorful!
- 1 lemon, zested and juiced, keep separate from each other + more to taste
- 1/2 to 1 teaspoon salt (adjust to taste)
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper (this amount give a little peppery zing – adjust to taste)
- 1 bunch parsley, chopped small
- 1/2 cup Parmesan, grated + more for topping (use vegan sprinkle for non-dairy garnish)
Instructions
- In a large sauté pan add garlic and olive oil and cook about a minute over medium heat. Add zucchini, stir to coat with oil and garlic.
- Add in broth and lemon zest cook for about 5 minutes, the zucchini should soften and come to a light simmer for a few minutes.
- Toss in parsley, lemon juice, salt and pepper. Toss to fully distribute. Add pasta and sprinkle in parmesan (optional) evenly. Transferring to a serving dish is helpful as the sauciness tends to sink to the bottom, this way you can scrape all the yummy bits out on to the top of the pasta.
Serve with another sprinkle of parmesan or if keeping it vegan top with vegan cheesy sprinkle.
Notes
Ways to enhance: add Aleppo or red pepper flakes in with the garlic for spice, for dreamy richness add 1/4 cup heavy cream (or rich cashew cream) in with the chicken broth, top with crushed croutons, add chickpeas for plant protein.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 1/2 cups
- Calories: 353
- Sugar: 2.2 g
- Sodium: 439.7 mg
- Fat: 13.8 g
- Saturated Fat: 3.1 g
- Carbohydrates: 46.6 g
- Fiber: 2.6 g
- Protein: 11.8 g
- Cholesterol: 5.4 mg
Keywords: zucchini pasta, easy zucchini pasta, zucchini pasta recipe,
We prepared and tried it last night. It was great. Maybe adding the red pepper flakes would have been much better though.
★★★★★
Love the chili flakes here!
Fantastic!
Was looking for a way to use our continuing zucchini harvest.
I blended up some cashew cream per your suggestion. Also added chickpeas, which I seasoned with s/p and microwaved for two minutes before tossing into the zucchini mixture. Used some nutritional yeast. Can’t wait to make this again! Thank you.
★★★★★
Love where you took this Melissa, sounds amazing!
This reminds me of linguine with clam sauce. This is much healthier.
★★★★★
Glad you enjoyed Tammi!
OMG, this was so easy and SO tasty! Thank you, Tonia– truly, this one is going to be repeated often 🙂
Awesome Kat! So glad you enjoyed!
Absolutely delicious. I had to give some of mine to my husband as he just raved about it. Thank you, Sylvia.
★★★★★
So glad to hear this Judith!