Broccoli Baked Feta Pasta

5-6 servings

INGREDIENTS:

1 lb pasta of your choosing
½ cup olive oil + 2 tbsp (used separately)
12 oz of broccoli florets ~ 2 heads
1 white onion
1 lemon zested and juiced
10 oz block of feta cheese
2 tbsp minced garlic
1 tsp of dried basil
1 tsp of thyme
Salt & pepper

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. In a baking dish add olive oil and toss with broccoli, onions, garlic, lemon zest & juice.
Add the feta in the middle of the pan and top with 2 tbsp olive oil, thyme, basil, salt & pepper.
Bake for 30 minutes & then turn the oven up to 450 and bake for another 5 minutes.
Coordinate timing to have pasta completed when broccoli mixture finishes.
Remove the baking dish from the oven & stir. Mix in the pasta & serve.

TIDBITS:

We added rotisserie chicken to ours for some extra protein. Any protein could be added in and we talked about doing Italian sausage next time!
If you like your pasta really saucy I would suggest mixing in a little bit of Alfredo sauce. I thought it was great without it but would add a little more moisture.
The recipe doesn’t specify exactly how much of the lemon to zest. I would go for it and do as much as you’re able to get. I did about half the lemon and wish I would have done more.
I looooove chickpea pasta so that's what we used in ours. Banza is a good chickpea pasta if you like brand names otherwise the Aldi Chickpea pasta is pretty much the exact same.
Also could swap broccoli for cauliflower asparagus if broccoli is too strong of a flavor