I usually consider cooking to be a relaxing, almost meditative activity. But sometimes, life needs to be easier. There are days when I want dinner to be quick and to require very little thinking, and that’s often when I (and you, too, I suspect) turn to pasta. Pasta is the king of the quick and easy dinner. You can mix almost anything into a bowl of pasta and it will turn out great. It requires few dishes, and a minimal amount of time, leaving you the rest of your evening to unwind and feel refreshed enough to face the rest of the week.

The best easy pasta dishes bring together different flavors and textures, and end up so wildly colorful and bright tasting that you can hardly believe it only took 20 minutes to get it on the table. This particular pasta dish absolutely achieves that objective. The mushrooms and pasta are chewy and tender, the broccoli big and crunchy, and it’s all tied together with a little slip of cream and goat cheese. The sun-dried tomatoes and basil bring big blockbuster summer flavor to the party.
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