If you have vegetables to get rid of and enough time to cook a quick brunch, Drew Barrymore's pasta primavera is an easy workday pick-me-up.
Drew Barrymore is, in many ways, the patron saint of earnest enthusiasm. She throws herself into things with such sweetness that you can’t help but root for her—even when she’s just making quick pasta dishes.
In a recent Instagram clip, she begins with an armful of vegetables and immediately offers a disarmingly honest disclaimer: “I just fished out whatever leftover vegetables I had in my fridge … and I’m going to show and demonstrate, as a terrible home cook, how I make pasta primavera with leftover vegetables.”
She is not terrible. She is just refreshingly unpretentious—someone who hisses about her portion of pasta before cooking it, openly admits she doesn’t understand how people make cooking videos, and somehow makes the whole thing feel even more doable.
What is Drew Barrymore’s pasta primavera?
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Drew’s take on pasta primavera isn’t the fussy, restaurant-y version with precisely timed vegetables and immaculate plating. It’s a deliciously simple dish built from whatever’s hanging around in the crisper drawer.
She starts by getting her pasta going, then hits another pan with oil and salt. In go the vegetables and a bit of butter.
From there, she seasons the vegetables, splashes in some chicken broth and lets everything cook down before adding the finishing touches: grated cheese (likely Parmesan), a squeeze of lemon, fresh basil and crushed red pepper—plus a very Drew sound effect that makes no culinary sense and every emotional sense.
How I Made Drew’s Pasta Primavera at Home
I love pasta primavera for exactly the reasons Drew says: It’s endlessly customizable based on what you like and what you have in the fridge.
For my version, I used red bell pepper, zucchini, onion, carrots, tomatoes and garlic. I stuck fairly close to Drew’s vibe on quantity: about a quarter of a box of spaghetti, plus roughly 1/4 cup to 1/2 cup of each vegetable, sliced or chopped to a similar cooking size (I used a vegetable peeler to slice the carrots into thin ribbons so they’d cook quickly and evenly alongside the other vegetables).
I also let my onions and tomatoes cook a minute or two before adding the other vegetables, letting them get slightly jammy. Totally optional, but it made the whole pan feel a little richer.
Just like Drew, I cooked the pasta while sauteing the vegetables, then added the nearly-done spaghetti straight into the skillet for a few minutes more. A splash of stock and a generous grating of Parmesan helped create a light but velvety sauce.
I finished the dish with three large torn basil leaves, the juice of half a lemon, and crushed red pepper flakes.
At the end of Drew’s video, she pauses and says, almost as an afterthought, “You know when a good time for this dish is? Brunch.” In all my years of cooking, I don’t think I’ve ever thought of pasta primavera as a brunch food. But as it happened, I was chopping, cooking and photographing (and then eating) this just before 11 a.m. And of course, Drew is absolutely right. Consider me converted.
Drew Barrymore–Inspired Pasta Primavera
Ingredients
- 8 ounces spaghetti
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1/2 cup sliced onion
- 1/3 cup quartered cherry tomatoes
- 1/2 cup sliced red bell pepper
- 1/2 cup chopped zucchini
- 1/2 cup carrot ribbons
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- Salt and freshly cracked black pepper, to taste
- 1/4 cup chicken broth
- 1/4 cup reserved pasta water
- 1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- Juice of 1/2 lemon
- Fresh basil, torn
- Crushed red pepper flakes, to taste
Directions
Step 1: Cook the pasta
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook the pasta until it’s just al dente. Reserve 1/4 cup of the pasta water, then drain the rest.
Step 2: Start the vegetables
Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onion and tomatoes, seasoning them with salt and pepper. Cook them for four to five minutes, stirring occasionally, until the onion softens and tomatoes begin to turn jammy.
Step 3: Add the rest of the vegetables
Add the bell pepper, zucchini, carrot ribbons and garlic. Cook them for three to five minutes or until the vegetables are tender-crisp. Add butter to the mix, stirring until the vegetables are glossy.
Step 4: Add the broth and simmer it
Pour in the chicken broth and let everything cook for a few minutes until the vegetables are tender and the pan looks saucy.
Step 5: Toss the veggies with the pasta
Add the cooked pasta to the skillet along with a splash of the reserved pasta water. Toss to combine everything, and let the pasta finish cooking in the sauce.
Step 6: Add the garnishes
Remove the pan from the heat. Stir in the Parmesan, lemon juice, basil and crushed red pepper. Serve the pasta primavera warm and top it with additional Parmesan, if desired.
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