Fans Say Giada's 6-Ingredient Spinach-Goat Cheese Pasta Is a "Favorite Go-To for Comfort Food"

We can never have enough easy, weeknight-friendly dinner recipes on lock. Everybody needs those classic, go-to recipes that you can make in about 30 minutes—preferably without breaking a sweat. That's why we can't wait to try out Giada De Laurentiis' thrillingly simple Pasta with Spinach Sauce.

This creamy, veggie-loaded pasta has only six ingredients and can be whipped up in 25 minutes, which is a huge win for all the busy home cooks out there. Plus, it stars anti-inflammatory garlic and spinach. (Spinach, by the way, is one of the best veggies you can add to your diet if you want to lower your blood pressure, and it boasts lots of other health benefits as well.)

You'll just need a few ingredients to copy this pasta dish, and you may already have some of them on hand. For the sauce, you'll need fresh garlic cloves, goat cheese, reduced-fat cream cheese, fresh baby spinach, salt and pepper. The recipe also calls for 1 pound of pasta—Giada uses a shorter cut, like Fusilli Corti or penne, so options like rigatoni or campanelle would also be right at home in this creamy dish. You'll also want a little bit of grated Parmesan to garnish your pasta bowls once you're ready to serve.

Making this sauce is pretty darn simple—just combine those sauce ingredients, minus some of the spinach leaves, into a food processor and let it run until the cheese-spinach mixture is smooth. While you're working on the sauce, let the pasta cook in boiling water until al dente. When the pasta is done, be sure to pull out 1 cup of that glossy, steamy pasta water before you drain everything down the sink. Once your pasta is drained and your sauce is ready, get out your serving bowl and distribute the remaining spinach leaves evenly in the bottom of the bowl. Add the pasta to the bowl, then add in the spinach-cheese mixture from your food processor. Toss everything together, using the pasta water to loosen up the cheese mixture until everything is coated in that beautiful green sauce.

When it's all coated, give your pasta a taste and season with additional salt and pepper if need be. Dish it up, sprinkle on some Parmesan and dinner is served. This dish would probably be filling enough on its own, especially if you opt for whole-wheat pasta or a legume-based pasta, but you could always top it with grilled chicken or tofu for a high-protein option. You could also serve it alongside a yummy salad, like our Best Caesar Salad with Crispy Parmesan.

Fans were quick to comment on this recipe post with rave reviews and questions about substitutions—the folks at Giadzy told one dairy-free reader that you can swap the goat cheese and cream cheese with a dairy-free cream cheese substitute to kick the dairy out of this pasta while still keeping that creamy quality. Another fan said this recipe was a longtime favorite in their kitchen. "We discovered this watching you on the Food Network and have been making it since 2006!," they wrote. "It is one of our favorite 'go-tos' for comfort food! Sometimes we make the sauce just to have it on hand for a quick dinner side."

Add Giada's pasta to your dinner rotation this week to shake things up a little bit—it might just become a new favorite in your kitchen, too.