While cooking, listen to this: Feels ft. Pharrell Williams, Katy Perry & Big Sean - Calvin Harris

Sometimes I like to cook lavish meals for friends - I'll spend hours in the kitchen making multiple courses with ingredients I definitely spent too much money on. I'll experiment with flavors and try new things, and feel like a total mad kitchen scientist.

Other times, I truly cannot be bothered.

Sometimes Shabbat dinner ends up being sushi or pizza delivered by very nice Seamless people. Other times, we pull an Olivia Pope and eat popcorn and have a bottle of wine each. These meals are eaten in leggings, sweatpants and amorphous sweaters. It is actually frowned upon to show up to a meal like this wearing pants with a button or zipper.

But what about the middle of this spectrum? What if I want to eat restaurant-quality food, but I don't want to put a bra on? Isn't life about balance?

Hell yes it is. This is America, where theoretically you have the freedom to do pretty much whatever you want (if you fit into an ever-shrinking subset of the population, but I digress), which means you should be able to cook and eat a simple, delicious meal in the comfort of your own home without having to deal with like, people, or the subway, or people.

Enter, stage-right: Simple Lemon Linguine. It's right there in the title: this recipe is so easy to make, it's bright and citrusy, and, well, it's linguine. Linguine-y? I don't know. It's pasta. It's divine. Make it.

I made this for a friend recently when we had a Shabbat dinner date. This came together in under 20 minutes, and all I had to do when she came over was pour some wine and grate lots of extra Parmesan into our bowls. She said it tasted like a dish she had had at a favorite restaurant recently. I thanked her drunkenly. The evening ended on the couch with the patting of full bellies and the unbuttoning of pants. If there is a night lovelier than one with a good friend, delicious pasta, and a bottle of wine, I don't know what it is.

This recipe is courtesy of Nigella Lawson, the true queen of food that is easy to make and tastes like you spent hours on it. It is an ideal comfort food meal, full of carbs and Parmesan and enough lemon to cut through the heaviness without burning a hole in your tongue.

So invite some friends over, pop/unscrew a bottle of wine (we aren't fancy here), and fill up your bowls with Simple Lemon Linguine. It's the perfect start to a wonderful evening.

Love and meows, Rina

simple lemon linguine

Yield: 6 servings

Cook Time: 15-20m

Category: Main

Source: the incomparable Nigella Lawson

Ingredients

2 pounds linguine

2 egg yolks

⅔ cup heavy cream

½ cup grated Parmesan, plus more for serving

Zest of 1 lemon

Juice of ½ lemon

4 tablespoons (½ stick) butter, cubed

Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Optional: parsley, basil or other herbs for garnish

Instructions

Prep: in the largest pot you own, add water and a hefty dash of salt and bring to a boil.

Prepare the sauce: in a small bowl, add the egg yolks, heavy cream, Parmesan, lemon zest and juice, salt and pepper. Whisk until the ingredients are just combined.

Prepare the pasta: once the water is at a roiling boil, add the pasta slowly. Stir the pasta often with a pasta spoon so that the pasta doesn't stick together and cooks evenly. Cook according to package instructions, but more importantly by what you like. If you're a fan of softer pasta, cook longer!

Finish the pasta: when the pasta is cooked to your liking, drain it and add the pasta back into the pot. Add the butter and stir until the butter has completely melted and coated the linguine. Add the sauce and stir to combine. Serve immediately.

To serve: garnish with some more grated Parmesan and any herbs of your choice - we went with some purple basil that came in Alyssa's CSA.

To keep: this pasta will keep pretty well in the fridge for a few days in a tightly-sealed container.