My Most Favorite Meatless Meal Ever

Today is your lucky day.  I'm going to share my most favorite meatless meal ever!  I've been making this for years -even before I was interested in eating less meat. So, you might ask, what qualifies it for the best meatless meal ever in my book?  I will tell you.
1- It involves pasta, which I dearly love.
2- It's healthy.
3- It takes about fifteen minutes, tops, to prepare.  I can manage this one when I'm too tired to do anything else.
4- It can be made with pantry or fresh ingredients, which means I can make it year around, which I do.
5- It has feta cheese in it.  I heart feta...a lot.
6- It's super easy, yet tastes great!  Everyone I've ever served this to loved it, which takes me to #7.
7- It can be dressed up for company. (Although this changes it's meatless status).
8- It makes your house smell great! (it's the garlic and oregano)
9- It's a one pot meal.
10- It instantly transports me back to Greece, where I took a little trip once upon a time and fell in love with  all things Greek.  Any place that sells feta cheese in huge chunks from wooden barrels and has olive oil on every table is my kind of place.  Add to that ,a few sheep grazing on green hillsides, the bluest water you'll ever see and ancient ruins around each corner.  I'm telling you that place is amazing . See, just thinking about this recipe takes me back to Greece.

Now, are you in the mood for a little Greek food?

Start with tomatoes.  If it's summer and your kitchen counter looks anything like mine,

you'll definitely want to use fresh tomatoes.  This recipe is really the very best when you use fresh tomatoes.  But if it's not tomato season, you can sure get by with a couple cans of diced tomatoes, well drained.  The rest of the ingredient list is as follows: lemon juice, green onions, feta cheese, oregano, olive oil and fresh garlic. 

Today I decided to use some cherry tomatoes.  I halved those, chopped my garlic, green onions and parsley.  It's important to have everything chopped and ready to go before you turn on the heat in your skillet. This cooks in a flash.  

As soon as my pasta is almost done, I start the sauce on the stovetop.  In a skillet, I heat a couple T. of olive oil and then add my garlic and oregano.  This is when your house begins to smell really good.  Stir and watch closely that the garlic doesn't brown.  Browned garlic will ruin the recipe, so you might as well throw it out and start over if it happens.  I speak from a bit of experience here.  If you look closely, you'll see I almost messed up this time, but it turned out ok.

After a couple of minutes, add juice from a lemon, chopped scallions, chunks of feta cheese and at the very end, scatter fresh parsley over the top.  Stir and after a minute or two, turn off the heat.  You don't want the tomatoes to get mushy or all the cheese to melt.   And that is it.  I've been known to throw a few capers and kalamata olives in this sauce and even a handful of fresh spinach if I have it, but it's delicious without those things too.

Now if you want to dress this up, you can add peeled and cleaned shrimp at the end and cook a couple minutes longer until shrimp is pink.  Shrimp cooks really fast, so the sauce will still taste fresh when it's done.   Of course, it loses it's meatless status at this point, but it's mighty tasty and elevates the meal a notch or two.

Served over your choice of pasta - angel hair, spaghetti, linguine or even penne - it's ready in fifteen minutes flat.  Best meatless meal ever.  Go ahead and enjoy a little taste of Greece tonight!