Pasta Aglio e Olio Recipe 🧄 (AKA Pasta With Garlic and Oil) | Mediocre Chef (2024)

In this post we’re reviewing Pasta Aglio e Olio from Chef (recreated by Binging With Babish). Spoilers: it's pretty damn tasty. 👌

If you ever find yourself in a scenario where you need to seduce Scarlett Johansson at midnight, may we suggest making Pasta Aglio e Olio from Jon Favreau’s Chef? If your date isn’t Scarlett Johansson, don’t sweat it. This recipe is perfect to make whenever you need to impress someone — a date, your mom, your father-in-law, whoever! The garlic breath is worth it.

This recipe is cheap and delicious — the name literally translates to “garlic and oil”. To make this, you just need 6 simple ingredients!

Pasta Aglio e Olio Ingredients

• 1 box of spaghetti or linguine noodles

• 1/2 head of garlic (or more if you really like garlic)

• 1/2 cup of chopped parsley

• 1/2 lemon*

• 1/2 cup high quality olive oil

• 1 tsp red pepper flakes (or more if you like spice)

• salt and pepper to taste

*We wanted to note here that this isn’t a traditional pasta aglio e olio, as it is a recreation of the dish as it appeared in the movie Chef. Traditional aglio e olio doesn’t have lemon, but we enjoy the acid and freshness that it provides.

Because this recipe cooks fairly quickly, we knew that it would be a good idea to have everything prepared and ready to go (this is also known as mise en place). We suggest that you do the same to ensure that things go smoothly. If you don’t prep, you may end up burning your garlic on accident.

To start, you need to slice the garlic as thinly as you can — garlic cooks quickly in hot oil, so any pieces that are smaller will likely be on the verge of burning by the time the larger chunks are perfectly cooked. Next up, chop the parsley, cut the lemon in half, and have the salt, pepper, and red chili flakes ready to go.

Once you have the prep work done, you’re ready to begin your quest for the perfectly seductive pasta! Heat your oil in a pan over medium-high heat — we recommend using a stainless steel pan that has a thick bottom to hold the heat. Once the oil is warm, add the garlic and sauté it. How long you'll sauté it for will depend on how thin your garlic was sliced and how hot the oil is. It can take a few attempts before you get it, so don’t fret if you overcook or burn your garlic the first time. When the garlic looks good, put the heat on low and toss in some red chili flakes.

🍝 Mediocre Tip: In an ideal world, everything will come together at the same time so you can combine the two parts of your dishes (the garlic and chili flakes and your pasta). If you find that you started your garlic too early and need a while longer for your pasta, take the pan off the heat so it doesn’t burn or become too crispy.

Simultaneously, bring a large pot of heavily salted water to a boil. We’re talking like 2-3 tablespoons worth of salt — enough to raise your blood pressure to dangerous levels. Let your pasta cook for about 8 minutes. The best way to tell when the pasta is done is to taste it. Take a noodle out and eat it. Is it crunchy? Yes? Then you need some more time. How long you should cook your pasta is up to you. Just remember that this dish is being finished with a pan sauce, so you want to slightly under-cook the pasta in the water — it will finish cooking in the hot oil.

When the noodles reach the desired tenderness, transfer them to the pan. You can either be super pretentious and transfer the pasta with tongs, or you could be normal and just strain the pasta. Whatever method you choose, make sure to save about a cup of the pasta water for the sauce (more on that below).

Toss the pasta together with garlic and chili oil. Add in the chopped parsley and stir everything together — make sure to be a bit aggressive about this so that all the noodles get coated with the delicious spicy garlic oil and parsley. This is an instance where tongs are going to come in handy (on second thought, maybe tongs aren’t pretentious and you should probably get yourself some).

Once the sauce has coated everything and has thickened up a little bit from the stirring, squeeze the lemon juice on top and give everything a final mix.

🍝 Mediocre Tip: Add a bit of pasta water if you feel like the garlic-oil sauce isn’t “thick” enough. The starch in the water will help it stick. (You want it to be thick, but not t h i c c c.)

The last step: plating. Grab a bowl and use tongs (or a carving fork if you have one) to place your pasta into the bowl. As you're placing it into the bowl, give the bowl a spin to try to make the pasta stand upright if you want to be fancy. If not, a mountain of pasta is fine and just as delicious. (Pasta twirls are a nice touch, though.)

Bonus: Shred some Parmigiano-Reggiano (not that Kraft crap you buy in a bottle) on top of each serving, because mmmmmm, cheese. 🧀

Extra Bonus: Pair this dish with a nice wine — we went with a Pinot Grigio wine from the Okanagan. Any wine will do, but we recommend avoiding wine that’s too sweet.

Extra Extra Bonus: Try making the pasta from scratch. Especially if ScarJo shows up.

Our Mediocre Thoughts

👨‍🍳Trevor: To be honest, I was a bit skeptical when I first heard about this pasta. I didn’t think there was a way that something with so few ingredients could taste so good. It wasn’t heavy like a spaghetti bolognese or fettuccine alfredo, it was light — refreshing almost. The lemon and parsley complement the garlic well. It’s just good, okay?

From a Mediocre Chef perspective, this is a fantastic recipe to learn how to cook by feel and guesstimation. Following a recipe is good, but sometimes you just have to cook by feel. How finely you slice the garlic, how long said garlic is going to cook for, how fine the parsley is chopped is all up to you to figure out — everything is being done to taste and by feel. And honestly, what better way to seduce someone than by cooking something for them without having to look at a recipe? It makes them think you’re better than you really are, and really, that’s the whole point of life.

I’d also like to reiterate one of the bonus tips from above: if you can, try making your own noodles once you’ve mastered this dish. It adds that much more and is sure to impress whoever it is you’re making this for.

👩‍🍳Brittany:I first heard about this pasta when I watched Chef in theatre years back, but I never thought to make this pasta until I saw Binging With Babish’s video. The only thing I’d change about this recipe is to double the garlic, because I’m crazy in love with garlic. (Don’t judge me.)

I’m a huge fan of this recipe because I like pesto — this is kind of like a deconstructed pesto. You have your olive oil, parsley, garlic, lemon, and Parmigiano-Reggiano (which we added). There’s no pricey walnuts or pine nuts (take your pick) AND you don’t have to dirty a food processor to blend it all together. Less dishes to wash = a huge bonus.

This is an easy and budget-friendly recipe that anybody who is looking to up their cooking game should try. Once you have tried it, I guarantee you’ll be hooked. I try to work this recipe into my meal plan at least once or twice a month! It’s that good. It’s also a great recipe to learn basic cooking skills such as cooking your pasta until it’s just right and not burning your garlic (two very important things).

Our Final Review

Taste: 5 empty plates out of 5 🍽️🍽️🍽️🍽️🍽️

Presentation: 4 seductive ScarJos out of 5 🌟🌟🌟🌟

Affordability: 5 broke college kids out of 5 👩‍🎓👩‍🎓👩‍🎓👩‍🎓👩‍🎓

Sometimes, the most enjoyable dishes are made with simple ingredients — Pasta Aglio e Olio proves this. Such simple flavours come together in a pasta dish that is sophisticated and refined. We could eat Pasta Aglio e Olio for breakfast, lunch, and supper (or maybe just Brittany could).

This pasta is sexy. We’re giving it a four for presentation because we didn’t have a carving fork on hand to do the classic twirl — but if you can give your pasta a twirl and have it stand upright, this dish gets a 5 for presentation.

The best things in life are free, but not everything is free in life (groceries sure the hell aren’t). Despite not being free, this recipe is super cheap to make:

• Linguine or Spaghetti: $1.99

• Italian Parsley: $0.69

• Lemon: $0.99

• Garlic: $0.90

• Spices: Free (Not exactly free, but you should have these basic spices in your kitchen. If you don’t, go out and buy them immediately!)

What are you waiting for? Treat yo self to some simple yet delicious pasta, and splurge on a bottle of wine if you can. 🍷You deserve it!

Not convinced that we know what we’re talking about? Follow along with Binging With Babish’s recipe, or watch him make the dish below: