I made the TikTok-famous feta pasta, and I already plan to make it again with a different cheese
- A recipe for an easy pasta dish with feta and tomatoes has been trending on TikTok.
- The recipe is reportedly from food blogger Jenni Häyrinen and was previously popular in Finland.
- The dish was easy to make and delicious, but I liked it even more with smoky Gouda.
One of the latest no-fuss recipes to take TikTok by storm requires one baking dish, one pot, and about 20 minutes.
Most TikTok users put their own spin on the dish, but the general concept is the same - roast a block of feta and tomatoes on high heat in the oven, then mix in cooked pasta until everything is coated in the melty cheese.
According to Today, food blogger Jenni Häyrinen originated the recipe, which she called Uunifetapasta. The dish was so popular in Finland that "stores actually ran out of feta cheese here," she told Today.
I made the dish to see if it was worth the hype and, to take it a step further, I also tried preparing it with Gouda, which has a lower melting point.
The feta pasta was just as easy to make as it looked online
Countless TikTok videos show home chefs filling baking dishes with cherry tomatoes and a block of feta topped with olive oil, salt, and pepper.
In minutes, my dish was ready to cook for 15 minutes at 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Then I cranked up the broil function to brown my cheese and tomatoes.
While the tomatoes and feta were roasting, I boiled a pot of cellentani noodles, one of my favorite pasta varieties.
After removing my dish from the oven, I noticed the tomatoes had released a lot of liquid, so I knew this would be more watery than I'd like.
But none of the videos I watched involved draining this liquid, so I added in the hot pasta and stirred everything together.
It took a few minutes of stirring for the feta to really break down, but once it melted it evenly coated the pasta.
The flavor was pretty good, but feta is pretty salty to eat in such large quantities
I'm used to enjoying feta crumbled over salads or veggies, so this huge amount of feta coating the noodles was a little too salty and overwhelming for my taste buds.
I think if I cut my block of feta in half before roasting it this dish would've been more balanced.
The dish was also a bit too watery, so I'd like to try draining the tomatoes next time I make it.
Alternatively, I wouldn't mind trying this with other vegetables like asparagus, broccoli, or Brussels sprouts.
I liked the flavor enough that I would consider making this simple dish again. Plus the tomatoes offered a bright, fresh flavor contrast to the salty feta.
I also tried a smoky Gouda version of this pasta
Feta is a salty cheese with a high melting point, which is why it doesn't become viscous when you bake, roast, or grill it.
But I wanted to see if this easy pasta dish would still work with a cheese that has a lower melting point.
I went with a smoked Gouda, a cheese I often pick up when I'm grocery shopping.
I knew it would melt pretty quickly, and was concerned it might burn so I kept a close eye on it as I cooked it the same way as the feta.
The Gouda broke down quickly but never burned. It created a thick, gooey pool of cheese in the center of the tomatoes.
It easily combined with the hot pasta, but I noticed it started to coagulate, or firm back up, pretty quickly once it was out of the oven and starting to cool again.
This mixture was also watery from the cooked tomatoes.
I liked the flavor of this version even more because the cheese wasn't as salty
I actually enjoyed this pasta more than the feta version because the flavor of the Gouda didn't overpower the entire meal.
The texture wasn't as ideal, though, since the cheese was pretty stringy and chewy. The feta wasn't stringy at all.
I'll be trying more varieties of this quick, simple dinner in the future
When it comes down to it, I'd love to try this method again - I think it just needs some more experimentation because neither dish was outstanding.
I loved the flavor of the Gouda, but the stringy texture wasn't great. The feta was too salty for my taste buds, but it incorporated into the pasta better.
I plan to test this with more cheeses and different types of vegetables because I can't complain about a dinner that comes together in about 20 minutes with only a couple of dirty dishes afterward.
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