Healthy recipe - Pasta with Bacon, Spinach & Pine nuts

Hi all,

I tried this recipe the other night from healthy food magazine and it wasn't so bad, I had to do a few adjustments to it as I found it to be quite dry without sauce but I guess that's why it's a healthy pasta! When I say healthy though, I'd still eat it as a treat (once a week). But at least it gets rid of my pasta cravings and I'm not using crazy amounts of cream or oil.

Serves 4
(272 calories per serve)

4 cups of cooked pasta (any you like) I used Spaghetti, you could use Tagliatelle.
cooking oil spray
125g shortcut bacon, trimmed and diced (I used weight watchers shortcut bacon)
2 tablespoons pine nuts
3-4 large handfuls of baby spinach
2 garlic gloves, crushed
1/2 lemon, zested, juiced
4 tablespoons grated parmesan
Chilli flakes (optional)
Sprinkle of olive oil (optional)

1. Cook Pasta according to packed instructions. Drain.
2. Meanwhile, spray a frying a pan with oil and place over high heat. Add bacon and fry until just starting to brown (2-3 minutes). Add Pine nuts. Cook for 2-3 more minutes, until bacon is crispy. Add garlic and spinach; toss gently until spinach wilts.
3. Add pasta to frying pan, tossing to coat in spinach mixture. Add lemon zest and juice. Sprinkle with parmesan and season to taste with ground black pepper and chilli flakes.
4. Sprinkle a little olive oil if the pasta is a little dry.

Other variations:
Replace bacon with thin slices of lamb. Try adding blanched broccoli florets to garlic and spinach in step 2. Toss in some roasted sweet potatoe and crumbled reduced-fat feta in step 3.

xx Farrah

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