I Tried TikTok’s Dirty Martini Pasta – And It Belongs in Your Weeknight Pasta Rotation
The dish reimagines a classic cocktail as a simple yet elegant dinner.
Photo courtesy of Aly Walansky
Dirty martinis are very much my thing. During the pandemic, as everyone else was working on their sourdough starters or homemade banana bread recipes, I was instead trying to create perfect dirty martinis at home. When we started going to restaurants again, a perfectly chilled dirty martini at my favorite steakhouse was my very first stop. It was what I missed about “the outside” most of all!
Whether you love your martinis as I do – ice-cold vodka in a chilled glass with lots of olive brine, garnished with blue cheese-stuffed olives – or you prefer to go for a gin martini with a twist of lemon, all these flavors immediately came to mind when I noticed a recipe currently trending on TikTok.
@legallyhealthyblonde dirty martini pasta 🫒🫶🏻🍸 recipe below: **measurements are approx. measure with ur heart!** * 1 clove garlic, minced * 1-2 tbsp olive oil * 5-7 pitted Castelvetrano olives, smashed and chopped lightly * pasta of choice * lemon zest * 1-2 tbsp olive brine * 2 tbsp Gin or Vodka * 1 tbsp butter * salt, pepper * Fresh parsley * crumbled blue cheese (optional) instructions: - add olive oil to a pot over med heat. add garlic and stir. - add lemon zest and olive and sauté until fragrant and garlic is lightly toasted - add gin to hot pot and stir until it is almost evaporated. - add olive brine. - Add butter and stir continuously to emulsify butter until fully melted. - add cooked pasta and combine. season with salt and pepper to taste - serve hot and garnish with olives, lemon zest, fresh parsley, and blue cheese crumbles.
♬ This Will Be (An Everlasting Love) - Natalie Cole
Dirty Martini Pasta, via TikTok user @legallyhealthyblonde, is a brilliant pasta dish that takes all the ingredients we love from our martinis and reimagines them in pasta form. And, even better, from chopping to plate, it’s ready in under 20 minutes. From the gin or vodka to the olives and brine, lemon zest, and even the blue cheese, all the elements of a dirty martini make an appearance in this dish.
“Green olives and lemon are a match made in heaven, so I’m not surprised that this pasta dish is trending!” said Food Network Kitchen recipe developer Amanda Neal.
To make Dirty Martini pasta, start by making your pasta – and be sure to save some of that starchy pasta water. While that boils, sauté olives, lemon zest and garlic in some good olive oil. Sauté just long enough that these aromatic ingredients become slightly toasty, but not bitter or burnt. Then, deglaze the pan with gin or vodka – go with your preference of whatever you happen to have handy. Be careful when adding alcohol to the pan! Much as with a classic martini, either gin or vodka will work for this pasta dish – but the gin may offer an especially ideal flavor profile. “The juniper and floral flavor of gin is a tasty option for this dish,” says Neal. The alcohol will burn out with the cooking process, but keep timing in mind: “Once you add the alcohol, cook for at least one or two minutes to cook off the alcohol! You want the flavor of the alcohol, but not the alcohol burn,” says Neal.
Photo courtesy of Aly Walansky
Once the alcohol cooks out, you can add olive brine, al dente pasta and a bit of butter, as well as salt and pepper to taste. Stir until all the ingredients are combined, and add some of that pasta water if you need to here to help to finish off the sauce. The final touches will be fresh parsley and some crumbled blue cheese, to complete the dirty martini theme.
Because it's a simple dish, feel free to splurge on nicer ingredients. For example, “I would recommend a high quality pitted green olive, such as Castelvetrano, because it’s one of the main ingredients and flavors of this dish,” says Neal. Pitting the olives adds a degree of time and difficulty to this dish, so make your life easier by buying pitted olives. And don’t forget to save some starchy pasta water! “If your noodles need to be coated more in the briney sauce, add a few additional pats of butter and a splash of pasta water when tossing everything together.”
Similar to the TikTok video, Neal recommends a long noodle type of pasta for this dish, such as angel hair, spaghetti or bucatini. But make the recipe your own and use what you have! “A short tubular pasta like rigatoni would also be delicious (all the olive and blue cheese bits can get stuck in the tube!),” says Neal.
As a dirty martini fan, I wasn’t surprised that I loved this pasta. I’m always drawn to the salty, briny flavor of my favorite cocktail or a happy hour platter of oysters. Olives bring a salty, savory flavor, while herbs and lemon bring freshness and a pop of green to the dish. The butter and blue cheese also add a richness and creaminess to the sauce and flavor, for a result that is very martini-like – but is actually pasta. And this recipe can also be easily modified to taste, as well. If someone is not a blue cheese fan, a creamy goat cheese or even a salty feta may work well. However, you may want to give those blue cheese crumbles a try even if you aren’t normally into blue cheese – it’s not at all overpowering, and melts beautifully into the pasta. The blue cheese with the lemon, garlic and brine really come together to make this otherwise simple and delicate sauce into something a lot more complex and savory. I’d also love to kick up the texture a bit here next time, perhaps with some toasted pine nuts or bread crumbs to top it all off.
Even those who are not dirty martini fans will appreciate this dish, as it’s a butter and lemon forward spin on a simple pasta night. If someone is a fan of Pasta al Limone, they may love this briny alternative.
I’ve been waiting for years for it to be socially acceptable to have martinis for dinner, and my time has finally come.
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