This recipe for aglio e olio proves that you need neither complicated nor expensive ingredients to make a delicious and filling dinner. Here's how to make one of the best pasta dishes of all time: aglio e olio.

There are some pretty fantastic Italian dishes out there but, let's be real, the simpler, the better when it comes to Italian cooking.

There's nothing worse than cream in your homemade carbonara or nasty stuffed crusts on your pizza when cooking authentic. The best Italian dishes are four or five simple ingredients thrown together with some skill and technique.

This, of course, is what makes spaghetti aglio e olio so special. If you're a fan of good food, but need something quick to throw together on a busy day or evening, this simple five-ingredient pasta will more than do the trick.

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Here's our easy yet delicious aglio e olio recipe.

If you've ever gotten home late and decided to order in because you just couldn't be bothered cooking yourself, then you'd be aware of the conundrum. After all, delivery is expensive, and sometimes not even that tasty. So, what if we told you there was a new kid in town? Enter: a simple way to make an Italian staple.

Here's what you'll need to make spaghetti aglio e olio:

• A large pot
• A white pan
• Pair of tongs
• Sharp knife
• Chopping board

As soon as aglio e olio walks into your life, there's no looking back. This dish will be cooked, from start-to-finish, in less than twenty minutes, but will taste better than pretty much any mass-produced pizza or fast food burger from the only spot that's still open after a long night out drinking.

Aglio e olio requires barely any equipment, barely any ingredients, and barely any time. Yet, somehow, it packs a punch and an intensely delicious flavor that you'll never forget. Let's get into it!

There are not many dishes that have as few necessary ingredients than spaghetti aglio e olio, and even fewer as straight forward and inexpensive. Even a good and authentic carbonara, which is simply guanciale, pecorino, pasta, black pepper, and egg yolk, is a more complicated dish due to the importance of using proper pecorino and proper guanciale.

Aglio e olio, on the other hand, uses more-or-less the same quantity of ingredients, but they are things generally found in most kitchens anyway. Frankly, the fact that Parmesan cheese is the fanciest thing in this recipe is quite telling as to how cheap and easy this pasta dish is to make.

Here are ingredients needed for spaghetti aglio e olio:

• Spaghetti (or another long pasta), 3/4 pound
• Large bunch of fresh parsley
• A head of garlic
• Olive oil, 1/2 cup
• Parmigiano reggiano (fresh, not pre-grated), 8 ounces
• Black pepper
• Salt
• Optional: 1 red chili / Red chili flakes, 1 tablespoon

It's best to use high quality ingredients, even if they are simple. The olive oil is particularly important - after all, it's in the dish's name. Feel free to add the chili if you're looking for some spice, but it's perfectly okay to skip it.

It's now time to take you through the process of making aglio e olio. This recipe should be done in around 15 minutes, at most 20 minutes (but, to be honest, it'll likely be less). The techniques are also very straight forward, so don't be intimidated.

Here's how to make spaghetti aglio e olio

Step 1: Fill your large pot with water, salt it, and then place it on the stove to boil. Cover the pot with a lid to speed up the boiling process.

Step 2: While you wait for the water to boil, peel and chop up your garlic. You want it to be in thin slices. We would recommend halving length-wise and then chopping thinly along the length of the clove so that you end up with thin but decently-sized slices of garlic.

Step 3: Put your pasta in to cook once the water is boiling. You need to cook it until al dente, or around 2–3 minutes before the package instructs you to remove it. If you have a specific texture that you prefer, then cook it for however long you want.

Step 4: While cooking your pasta, roughly chop up your parsley and grate your cheese, keeping it all relatively separate. If cooking with a chili, leave it be, if with chili flakes then measure them out.

Step 5: About four minutes before your pasta is set to be ready, put your oil in the bottom of the pan, heat it up till quite hot and then put in your garlic (and your chili / chili flakes if you want them). Sauté until fragrant and slightly golden in color, for around 1–2 minutes.

Step 6: When the pasta is cooked, make sure that the oil is nice and hot and transfer the pasta into your pan, using your tongs to pull the spaghetti up and out of the pot (without draining the water).

Step 7: Toss the oil and garlic into the pasta in the pan, coating thoroughly as best you can. Once completely coated and nicely sizzling, take it off the heat and add around two ladles of pasta water.

Step 8: Combine the water with the pasta and then add the rest of your ingredients - so the cheese and the parsley. Continue to toss until the cheese is melted and the parsley combined.

Step 9: Taste it and season it with salt and pepper. If you have used a chili, remove the chili.

Step 10: Serve with a gentle dusting of cheese and parsley, and a crack of pepper.

There you have it - one of the easiest and most delicious meals ever invented - spaghetti aglio e olio. Try it out, make minor adjustments, and have fun with it. This is an absolute classic and a super underrated dish. Enjoy!

Aglio e olio is an Italian dish that originates from Naples and is typically served with spaghetti. It is a remarkably popular and traditional meal that is typical of Neapolitan cuisine and famous for being easy, delicious, inexpensive, and quick to put together. As such, it is a real home-cooked meal type of dish, and a great one to have under your belt.

The dish is thrown together with only a few ingredients - good quality olive oil, garlic, and sometimes red chili flakes. Its name is quite a literal one, as well, translating literally to mean "Garlic and oil". These two main ingredients may seem basic, but that's the whole idea. It makes for a delicious dish for very little money and in very little time.

If you have never tried aglio e olio before, it's an absolute must if you are ever in Naples. In the case that you won't get that opportunity soon, try making it yourself - it's super easy!

Like most Italian pasta dishes, aglio e olio is meant to be served as its own meal. There's no need to pair it with a salad or some other dish. Spaghetti aglio e olio will shine on its own and will have no trouble filling you up. The only thing we would say is that it can be nice to mop up any left over garlicky oil with a bit of fluffy fresh Italian bread at the end.

Any long pasta will do with aglio e olio, as long as it is packaged or dried pasta, not homemade egg pasta. While we all love our homemade pasta, it just simply doesn't go with aglio e olio and will not have the desired al dente texture that you are looking for. We know that it is tempting, but try to avoid it.

Instead, use one of these pastas when making aglio e olio:

• Spaghetti
• Buccatini
• Linguine
• Spaghettini
• Fettuccine

If you are in a real pickle then you can, of course, use different kinds of pasta like penne or fusilli, but it won't give you the desired effect. You want a high surface area to taste the oil and garlic properly, so long pasta is best.

You can whip together a good aglio e olio in less than half an hour, in more-or-less the time that it takes to boil pasta. Despite being ridiculously quick and easy, it's still delicious and something many would happy to eat at least once a week. On top of that, with only five ingredients (six if you're adding some chili flakes), it is possibly the cheapest pasta dish out there!

The best part, though, is how it tastes. Spaghetti aglio e olio is a light, tangy, and flavorful dish that's incredibly fresh and packed full of flavor, despite having very few ingredients. It'll fill you up and you'll likely walk away feeling light - what more could you want?