One Pot Pasta: Baked Feta & Tomato

Apparently,  there is a pasta dish recipe that has gone viral. 

It involves broiling any entire block of feta & many cherry tomatoes into submission & then stirring it all up with pasta. Here's the original recipe (as far as I can figure). Deb Perlman of Smitten Kitchen has her own version with chickpeas.

Of course, my husband wanted to try & recreate this amazing pasta dish. 

Of course,  I obliged.

 

I made a few slight changes when I did though.  I didn't quite have enough cherry tomatoes, so I cut 2 whole tomatoes into 8ths and mixed them in.  I also used Calabrian chilies & about 6 cloves of garlic--making sure to squash them after they had been roasted with the rest of the dish & before I mixed in the pasta.   In the original recipe she doesn't specify a type of pasta, but I used cavatappi.  It is, as advertised, exceptionally easy and quick to make.

 

Here is the feta/tomato/pepper mixture just after being broiled:

 

 

The feta looks like a solid block, but the inside has been melted into a creamy "sauce" and the blistered bits on the outside and fantastic, chewy, salty bites. 

 

And here it is after I mixed the pasta in:

 

It is VERY delicious, but very rich.  I suggest a nice full-bodied red to help with your digestion.

Buon appetito!