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This crowd-pleasing grilled vegetable pasta has double the grilled veggies: they’re grilled for the pasta and to blend into the zesty romesco sauce!

Grilled Vegetable Pasta with Romesco | A Couple Cooks

This post was created in partnership with ALDI. All opinions are our own.

It’s officially SUMMER! I can’t even tell you how excited we are about summer entertaining over here. The smell of the grill, a glass of frozen rosé, and the sound of your neighbor mowing his lawn (right?). Alex and I love to create vegetarian grill recipes to prove that grilling is just as delicious without the meat. This year we’ve teamed up with ALDI to make an easy, healthy summer meal featuring the grill: this grilled vegetable pasta. And it turned out so fantastic we can’t stop eating it! It has double the grilled veggies: both for the pasta AND to blend into a grilled romesco sauce. Keep reading for the recipe!

Related: Summer Dinner Recipes to Eat Al Fresco | Vegan Spaghetti with Marinara

Ingredients for cooking

Healthy and fresh foods…for all people

Funny story: Alex and I have been shopping at ALDI since we were newly married (gulp!) eleven years ago! Back then, we used to mainly buy pizza sauce and premade crust. How things have changed! For one, we’ve become obsessed with making our own homemade pizza. And, ALDI has changed too! They focus on offering more healthy, fresh and organic ingredients. ALDI has a mission to provide everyone with high-quality food at affordable prices. 

This is such a fantastic mission, because Alex and I believe that every person deserves to eat good, healthy, and fresh foods. After I visited their wine supplier operations in Washington wine country last year, it was clear that they are uber passionate about offering the highest quality items and keeping the cost low. All that to say, when you’re hosting family and friends this summer, ALDI is a great place to stock up. And, we’ve noticed our bill is consistently lower than when we shop at any other grocery. And this grilled vegetable pasta is a great place to start!

Related: Orecchiette Pasta with Lemon Asparagus

Grilled Vegetable Pasta with Romesco | A Couple Cooks

How to make grilled vegetable pasta

So, this grilled vegetable pasta! Alex and I wanted to bring that smoky grilled flavor to a vegetarian main dish. Oddly, after 8 years of eating mostly plants we’ve never grilled veggies and mixed them into pasta. I guess there are always new things to discover! The fun thing about this recipe is that there are two grilled components: veggies for the vegetable pasta, and bell peppers for the grilled romesco sauce.

What is romesco? Romesco is sauce made of roasted peppers and almonds that originates from Spain. Usually when we make it we use jarred red peppers. But for this recipe we thought: why not grill the red peppers to create a grilled romesco? It makes a creamy bright red sauce for the lightly smoky and addicting grilled vegetable pasta. Top it with feta crumbles, or leave it off for a vegan vegetable pasta. Here we used linguine noodles, but you can use penne or other short shapes. We’ll definitely be eating this grilled vegetable pasta all through the summer!

Blending romesco sauce

To learn more about ALDI, head here. And let us know, are you an ALDI fan? Do you have them in your area?

Looking for more grilling ideas?

Outside of this grilled vegetable pasta, here are a few more grill recipes:

This grilled vegetable pasta recipe is…

Vegetarian. For vegan, plant-based, and dairy-free, omit the feta.

For gluten-free, use gluten-free pasta. *ALDI has some organic, gluten-free options from the liveGfree line, like penne or brown rice quinoa fusilli.

Grilled vegetable pasta
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Grilled Vegetable Pasta

Grilled Vegetable Pasta with Romesco | A Couple Cooks
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This crowd-pleasing grilled vegetable pasta has double the grilled veggies: they’re grilled for the pasta and to blend into the zesty romesco sauce!

  • Author: Sonja
  • Prep Time: 20 minutes
  • Cook Time: 15 minutes
  • Total Time: 35 minutes
  • Yield: 4 main dish servings 1x
  • Category: Main Dish
  • Method: Grilled
  • Cuisine: Italian American

Ingredients

Scale
  • 2 red bell peppers
  • 3 large heads of broccoli
  • 1/2 medium to large red onion
  • 3 tablespoons SimplyNature Extra Virgin Olive Oil, divided
  • 1 teaspoon plus a few pinches kosher salt, divided
  • ½ cup Southern Grove Oven Roasted Unsalted Almonds
  • 2 garlic cloves
  • 15-ounce can Happy Harvest Diced Tomatoes
  • 1 tablespoon fresh squeezed lemon juice
  • 1 tablespoon Stonemill Paprika
  • ¼ teaspoon Stonemill Crushed Red Pepper
  • 1 pound SimplyNature Organic Pasta (linguine or penne, or gluten-free pasta if desired, for example the liveGfree line)
  • 2 to 4 ounces Happy Farms Preferred Feta, optional

Instructions

  1. Grill the vegetables: Heat a grill to medium-high heat. Cut off the tops off of the peppers and remove the pith and seeds. Remove the stems from the top and cut the top in half, then quarter the bottoms. Cut the broccoli into bite-sized florets. Cut the onion into thick slices. Coat vegetables lightly with about 1 tablespoon olive oil and a few pinches of kosher salt. Use your hands to rub the olive oil into the veggies so they are lightly coated.
  2. Place a few sheets of foil to cover the entire grill (or use a grill basket). Poke several small holes in the foil. Place the veggies on the foil and grill them, turning occasionally, until tender and lightly charred (about 15 minutes). Remove from the grill and place the vegetables on a baking sheet.
  3. Make the romesco sauce: Peel the garlic. In a blender or food processor, add the almonds, garlic, tomatoes (including the can juice), 2 tablespoons olive oil, lemon juice, smoked paprika, red pepper flakes, and kosher salt. When the vegetables are grilled, remove the pepper slices and place them in the blender. Process the sauce until smooth.
  4. Make the pasta: Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Boil the pasta until al dente, then drain.
  5. Combine the pasta with the romesco sauce and grilled broccoli and onions, then taste and add additional salt as desired (we added about ½ teaspoon — for the vegan version, you can add more salt than for the vegetarian version, since feta adds salt). Top with feta crumbles and serve.

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About the authors

Alex & Sonja

Hi! We’re Alex & Sonja Overhiser, authors of the acclaimed cookbooks A Couple Cooks and Pretty Simple Cooking—and a real life couple who cooks together. We founded the A Couple Cooks website in 2010 to share seasonal recipes and the joy of home cooking. Now, we’ve got over 3,000 well-tested recipes, including Mediterranean diet, vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian, smoothies, cocktails, and more!

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  1. Brittany Audra @ Audra's Appetite says:

    I love Aldi too! I’ve never made romesco sauce before…I’m not even sure if I’ve had it! But this looks delicious; can’t wait to try!