This Pasta Salad Is Really all About the Arugula

I thought I was pretty greens savvy growing up. In my parents’ huge garden, I learned that even simple leaf lettuce could—and should—have flavor. I went vegetarian in my teens and sought out mixed leafy greens long before they became the default salad base. But I’d never even heard of arugula until I left the United States.

In the ‘80s and ‘90s on the U.S. West Coast, chain supermarkets regularly classified arugula as an herb. Today’s walls of mixed greens in plastic clamshells didn’t exist. Lettuces, spinach, and other greens were simply sold by the head or bunch. But not arugula. Its rare appearances were inside a tiny blister pack hung alongside rosemary and sage. The packaging weighed more than the food inside. If you were new to arugula, you wouldn’t easily stumble upon it and discover its bright, spicy flavor — at least, I never did.

To become a fan of arugula, I had to travel more than 5,000 miles to the U.K. In London, bundles of funny-shaped leaves called rocket took up serious real estate in the produce section and cost less than many lettuces I readily recognized. I started noticing rocket on menus. Then I bought a cookbook from the vegetarian chain Cranks and truly discovered rocket, aka arugula.

For the rest of my time in London, saving every quid I could for travel and eating on the cheap, I devoured arugula. At least twice a week I blanched some asparagus, shaved a hunk of Parmesan, and toasted a handful of almonds. These were thrown atop as much arugula as I could stuff in a lunch container before rushing to the tube for work. At lunchtime, my co-workers always seemed amused by the American girl with her tub of fresh greens and tiny canister of homemade vinaigrette, sitting by the floor-to-ceiling windows behind her desk and gawking at the city from the 14th floor.

When I returned stateside, I combed the supermarket for arugula. I finally found it, but it was no longer my cheap lunchtime go-to: I’d need at least half a dozen of the tiny herb blister packs, and deep pockets, to enjoy my now-favorite green. America’s idea of arugula was clearly meant to be sprinkled over salad, not form a deep layer beneath it. So I tracked down seed and grew my own. By the time U.S. tastebuds became hooked on spicy greens and arugula became a market staple, I’d progressed from enjoying it on my simple workday salad to tossing handfuls on grilled pizza, turning it into a bed for curried veg, preserving it as a pesto, and even “cooking” it, such as in the recipe I share here.

Don’t worry if techniques in this recipe seem unusual: each has a purpose. Lemon juice mellows the sharpness of raw garlic and keeps arugula bright and flavorful. Skipping the pasta rinse and using the starchy cooking water give the goat cheese something to cling to. Tossing in the arugula after the pot is off the heat keeps it from getting soggy. Toasted sliced almonds give bonus protein and crunch.