Ever since I discovered how delicious pasta is when cooked in broth instead of water, I’ve been experimenting with all sorts of different ways to play up this simple trick. By simply changing up the add-ins, you can have an endless number of quick one pot or one skillet dinners for busy week nights. This Bacon and Spinach Pasta with Parmesan is my latest quick skillet obsession.
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Bacon, spinach, and Parmesan are not exactly the least expensive ingredients on the planet, so you do have to be a bit careful with this one. I used a half package of bacon and froze the rest for later use. To save on spinach, I skipped the salad sized bags and got a jumbo bag of “cooking spinach”. The big one pound bag was only 20 cents more expensive than the smaller salad sized (9oz.) bags and almost twice as big. I’ll enjoy the extra spinach as salads and freeze some in smoothie packs.
Can I Use Frozen Spinach or Other Greens?
Frozen spinach can be used in a pinch, but make sure not to get “chopped” frozen spinach because it will be in a million tiny little pieces. You can use other greens, like collards, mustard, or kale, but because they’re quite a bit more sturdy, they’ll need to be sautéed down with the onion in the beginning. Parmesan really does top off this dish and make it grand, but you can lighten up on it if you’re strapped for cash. Parmesan is very flavorful, so a little goes a long way.
What Else Can I Add?
If you want to beef up this dish a bit, you can add a rinsed and drained can of white beans, or sauté some mushrooms with the onions. A few red pepper flakes would be nice in here, too, although I like red pepper flakes on just about anything!
Bacon and Spinach Pasta with Parmesan
Servings 4Ingredients
- 6 oz. bacon ($2.15)
- 1 yellow onion ($0.25)
- 2 cups chicken broth ($0.28)
- 1/2 lb. pasta ($0.50)
- 1/4 lb. fresh spinach (about 4 cups) ($1.50)
- 1/3 cup grated Parmesan ($0.55)
Instructions
- Cut the bacon across the strips into one-inch pieces. Sauté the bacon in a large skillet until it is brown and crispy (no extra fat needed). Remove the browned bacon to a bowl with a slotted spoon. Carefully pour the fat off into a separate bowl, leaving about one tablespoon in the skillet.
- While the bacon cooks, dice the onion. Once the bacon is removed and the fat is drained from the skillet, add the diced onions and sauté until they are soft and transparent. Allow the moisture from the onions to dissolve some of the browned bits off of the bottom of the skillet.
- Add two cups of chicken broth to the skillet and dissolve off any remaining browned bits of bacon drippings from the bottom of the skillet.
- Finally, add the uncooked pasta to the skillet, place a lid on top, and let the skillet come to a boil over high heat. Once it reaches a boil, give it a quick stir, turn the heat down to low, and let simmer for 10 minutes with the lid in place. Give the skillet a stir to loosen the pasta from the bottom every few minutes or so, replacing the lid quickly each time. After 10 minutes the pasta should be tender and most of the broth absorbed. There should be a little bit of thick, saucy broth remaining in the bottom of the skillet.
- Add the fresh spinach to the skillet and stir until it has wilted into the pasta. Turn off the heat, add the cooked bacon back to the skillet, sprinkle the Parmesan over top, stir to combine, and then serve.
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Nutrition
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How to Make Bacon and Spinach Pasta – Step by Step Photos
Cut 6 oz. (1/2 of a 12oz. package) of bacon into one-inch strips. The second half will be frozen and used later. I love adding a little bacon to soups and other dishes because it adds a LOT of flavor. Or who knows, maybe I’ll just use the leftovers for an impromptu weekend brunch.
Sauté the bacon in a large skillet over medium heat until it’s brown and crispy. I didn’t add any extra oil to the skillet because the bacon is fatty enough that it releases quite a bit of grease and does not stick. Once the bacon is crispy, remove it to a bowl with a slotted spoon, and pour off the fat into a separate container, leaving about 1 tablespoon of fat in the skillet (for flavor, of course!). When the poured off fat is cool, save it in the refrigerator to add flavor to other dishes, or if you’re not the bacon grease type of person, scoop it into the garbage. Just DO NOT rinse it down your drain.
While the bacon is cooking, dice one small onion. Add the onion to the skillet and sauté until it is soft and transparent. The juices from the onion will begin to dissolve the browned bacon bits from the bottom of the skillet.
Add two cups of chicken broth to the skillet. Stir well to dissolve the last of the browned bits from the bottom of the skillet.
Add the dry pasta to the skillet and place a lid on top (it’s OKAY if the broth doesn’t completely cover the pasta). Turn the heat up to high and let the skillet come to a boil. As soon as it reaches a boil, give it a quick stir, turn the heat down to low and let it simmer for 10 minutes. Every few minutes, give the skillet a quick stir to loosen the pasta from the bottom and replace the lid quickly each time so that the broth continues to simmer. Make sure the broth continues to simmer the entire time, turning the heat up just slightly if needed to maintain a simmer.
After about 15 minutes, the pasta should be tender and most of the broth absorbed. There should be a bit of saucy broth left in the bottom of the skillet.
Once the pasta is cooked, add about 1/4 pound (or 3-4 cups) of fresh spinach to the skillet. Add a handful of the spinach at a time and stir it into the pasta until it wilts.
Turn the heat off, add the cooked bacon back to the skillet, and sprinkle the Parmesan over top. Give it a quick stir to combine and then serve!
And then it will look like this! Like I said, I probably should have sprinkled a little red pepper or even freshly cracked black pepper over the top just to take it up a notch, but honestly, it’s bacon… I was already dazzled!
BACON.
Does this pasta warm up well in the microwave?
I loved the reheated leftovers. :)
What are leftovers? With this meal, I’m lucky the kids let me have a portion at all! LOL!!!
I just made this and it is delicious!! Definitely a favorite and super simple. Easy for after work and A breeze to clean up!! Could also be classed up with some Prosciutto and a little white wine!!
Had some white wine with it…. delicious!
I added two chicken breasts, roughly cubed, and it really made it into a meal. Plenty enough for the three of us with some left over.
Family raved about this one. Followed the directions exactly. Will add a little more spinach next time – shrinks down so much. Next time I’ll have to cook a recipe and a half (with part in a smaller skillet) because my boys could easily devour more. So easy, and I love that I’m not dirtying more than one pan!
Great week night meal, delish, fast easy. We liked it, will do again and again!
This was a hit in my house! We like to rotate the protein we add to it : Chicken, Pork, Meatballs, Shrimps and even Salmon! I have to admit that a good bacon and chicken broth makes a huge difference!
I made this tonight. I sauteed some diced zucchini with the bacon grease as well and added it the same time as the bacon. Also added some garlic. My 9yr old had two plates and I keep catching my partner sneaking out of the kitchen wirh more in her mouth. Wish I didn’t have a stomach something so I could enjoy it as well. But it seems to be a hit. Thank you!
Hi how are you I made this just last week and it was not good had no taste no one likes it including myself so need less to say I won’t be it again lot of money wasted
What is the name of the pasta used in the pictures?
It’s called campanelle. My favorite. :)
This was fantastic, and so easy. The only change I made was I used frozen ravioli instead of dry pasta and added fresh garlic with the onion. Took a bit longer for the liquid to cook down, but the pasta was done perfectly. Will definitely be making this again.
I made this with rice insted of pasta and Dimsi (Croatian semi-hard smoked cheese from cow milk) insted of parmesan and added diced chicken breast. And it is absolutely delicious. Altough when made with rice it needs a little more chicken broth (1/2-1 cup) than the pasta version. And I don’t really know how much cheese I added, I just grated and stirred and grated and stirred until I was happy with the consistency.
All in all, I absolutely love it.
Delicious! I was out of chicken broth and onions, but I had leftover rotisserie chicken! So, I added that, a little garlic, red pepper flakes and dried minced onion, and it was amazing. Everyone agrees it needs to go in to the regular meal cycle. It seems very flexible, I’m going to try shrimp with it next time.
We had this for the first time tonight. It was great! I cooked the onions more to hide them a bit better from my picky eater. She told me she loved it and I asked her how she liked the onions. She grinned and told me I was tricky. We will be adding this to our regular meal schedule.
This pasta is amazing! My picky 9 year old ate it up. He didn’t eat a ton of the spinach but he ate some so that’s all I care about. This meal was so simple to cook and I’ll be adding this to my recipe rotation!
In the body of the recipe it says to cook the pasta for 10 minutes, but I noticed in the pictures after cooking it that it says 15 minutes. My pasta came out a little more al dente than I prefer, but other than that this was good! Next time I’ll add fresh garlic when I cook my onions.
Good idea on the garlic! Barilla makes a one pot pasta, I used that and only covered it for half of the 10 min and it came out perfect.
Ah I see! Thanks for the tip. The pasta I used was sort of a thick variety so that may have been a lot of it. I’m thinking about trying my hand at this recipe again soon and I’ll look for the one pot pasta.