Gwyneth Paltrow’s Fried Zucchini Spaghetti Is the Easy Summer Dinner You’ve Been Looking for

This simple pasta dish created by Gwyneth Paltrow is an ode to the mountains of fried zucchini she ate at Elio's, an Italian restaurant on Manhattan's Upper East Side, while growing up in New York.

To make this pasta, Paltrow starts by shallow-frying zucchini slices in extra-virgin olive oil until they are golden brown and crisp. She cooks spaghetti until it is al dente and then tosses it with shredded Parmigiano Reggiano, freshly ground black pepper, and torn basil leaves. Paltrow follows a time-honored chef trick of adding some of the starchy cooking water to the cooked pasta a bit at a time until the warm, starchy cooking water melts and emulsifies the cheese. It becomes a light, creamy sauce that coats the spaghetti. She scatters the fried zucchini slices on top, and then showers the pasta with more Parmesan. Squeezing a lemon wedge over each serving at the table adds a bright burst of acidity, which helps balance the richness of the crispy, olive oil-rich zucchini. Paltrow's spaghetti makes for an ideal summer dinner, especially in late summer, when gardens and farmers markets are full of zucchini.