Pasta with Pesto & Chicken

This is about as uncomplicated as an Italian-style weeknight dinner gets. Grilled or broiled chicken, fresh linguine, and a generous spoon of pesto. The magic is in the quality of the ingredients, not the complexity of the technique.

Charring the chicken is where flavor comes from. Tossing the pieces with oil and seasoning before the grill means they pick up proper color and those smoky notes that cut through the rich basil-cheese pesto.

Fresh pasta cooks in just 3 minutes, so have your chicken ready before the noodles hit the water. Stale-water pasta sitting in a strainer while you finish other prep is a cardinal sin.

A few spoons of the starchy pasta water, saved before draining, loosens the pesto and helps it cling to every strand. This is the restaurant finish most home cooks skip.

Kitchen Tips

• Use homemade pesto if you can, but a good-quality refrigerated store pesto works too. Skip the shelf-stable jarred versions, which taste flat and oily.
• Don’t heat the pesto in a pan. It breaks and goes bitter. Simply toss it with hot drained pasta and let the residual heat warm it through.
• Grill the chicken and slice against the grain. Slicing with the grain gives stringy, tough pieces.
• Finish with extra grated parmesan and a crack of black pepper before serving.

Variations

• Add a handful of halved cherry tomatoes and toasted pine nuts for color and crunch.
• Swap linguine for orecchiette, fusilli, or a short shape that catches more pesto.
• Replace chicken with grilled shrimp or seared salmon for a different protein profile.