This charcoal grilled version of the famed baked feta pasta will knock your socks off.

Easy-Medium | 10 mins Prep | 40 mins Cook | 6-8 Servings

 * PRO TIP: Cooking the garlic, tomatoes and mushrooms over the charcoal allows some of the moisture to release so the end product isn't watered down.  

AUSSIEQ BBQ VIDEO ON THIS COOK:

TikTok video

 

The Original viral baked feta recipe on TikTok calls for this to be baked, but I found this can be watery and the sauce loses some depth of flavour. if you can't chargrill them, try adding some pasta or pizza sauce to the recipe like this pizza sauce

If you aren't familiar with this TikTok foodie trend, let's take a quick look at how and why this become such a popular dish. Firstly, its pure simplicity and few ingredients is what makes this special. You can either wood fire the vegetables and make pasta from scratch, or use packet pasta and bake everything in the oven.

As Finland found out rather quickly this dish had the potential to completely change the way people looked at feta. Due to the large demand of feta as a result of its viral nature, they actually had a shortage of feta! As you will see we decided to take that original baked pasta dish at take it up a few levels.

The bonus of this amazing dish is its health attributes, with amazing depth of flavour from those grilled cherry tomatoes, garlic and mushrooms. The sweetness from the cherry tomatoes contrasts the saltiness of the danish feta beautifully.  

   

INGREDIENTS:

- 750gm cherry tomatoes

- 1x block of Tasmanian Danish feta (use any brand or even goats cheese)

- 4x large portobello mushrooms sliced

- 1x whole head of garlic peeled

- any type of pasta, but we used our homemade parsley pasta

- 2x tbsp fresh or dried basil

- 1/2 tbsp chili flakes

- 1-2 tbsp AUSSIEQ BBQ HealthIER seasoning (coming soon)

- liberal amount of garlic olive oil (regular is fine)

- homemade flakey salt (regular is ok) and ground pepper

METHOD

1. if you are using our parsley pasta, have this made in advance as it keeps great in the freezer, otherwise use your favourite packet pasta
2. add a half of chimney worth of lit charcoal to your Weber with a chunk of cherry wood to give a subtle wisp of smoke (or preheat oven to 200C)
3. in a large bowl season the tomatoes, garlic and mushrooms with salt, pepper, 1 tbsp chopped basil and garlic olive oil
4. I used the Solidteknics perforated pan to grill the mushrooms, garlic and cherry tomatoes over the charcoal, which provides an amazing subtle smokey flavour. Cook until a nice char forms on all the ingredients which should take approx 5-10 mins
5. then place all ingredients into a baking tray with the block of feta in the centre. Now drizzle olive oil over the feta, add chili flakes and AUSSIEQ BBQ HealthIER rub
6. place the baking tray offset to the charcoal, lid on and cook for approx 15-25 mins or until the feta softens and tomatoes start to shrivel up.
7. whilst this cooking cook your pasta with a dash of salt until al dente
8. then mix the feta evenly through the tray and add the pasta (mix some of the pizza sauce mentioned previously if you want a stronger flavour hit)
9. serve with some fresh basil and a hint of parmesan cheese

You can substitute anything your heart desires, but this combo hasn't failed yet.

If you have any thoughts, tips or tricks on the recipe we would love for you to leave a comment below.