Spring pasta season is here, and if your weeknight dinner routine feels a little stuck, Martha Stewart has a fix that’s both surprisingly simple and genuinely gorgeous on the plate.

The dish is called Pea-Pesto Handkerchiefs. Yes, handkerchiefs. Stay with me.

Stewart builds a pesto that starts with a familiar base: basil, toasted pine nuts, Parmesan, olive oil, and garlic. But instead of letting the basil carry the whole thing, she leans hard on peas. Blanched peas get blended right into the sauce, turning the whole bowl a vivid, almost luminous green that looks like it took real skill to pull off. It didn’t. That’s the magic.

The color alone is enough to get your kids to the table. And honestly? Getting kids excited about something this green is not a small victory.

Then there’s the pasta shape, which is where Stewart does something clever. She doesn’t call for a specialty noodle you’d have to hunt down at a specialty store. She calls for regular lasagna noodles, broken into smaller, uneven pieces. Those pieces, with their rough edges and natural folds, are the “handkerchiefs.” The broken edges create little ridges and pockets that hold the sauce rather than letting it slide off. Smart. The kind of detail that makes you think, of course, why didn’t I always do this?

If you’ve got a box of lasagna noodles sitting in your pantry right now because you planned to make lasagna back in February and never got around to it, this is your moment.

The flavor is familiar but noticeably different from a standard pesto. Peas bring a gentle sweetness and a softer texture that dials back the sharpness you’d normally get from all that raw garlic and basil. The Parmesan and pine nuts are still there doing their thing, rounding out the edges, but nothing is fighting for attention. It’s mellow and bright at the same time. Good for picky eaters. Good for the grown-ups who want something a little more interesting than the usual Tuesday night rotation.

Pea pesto isn’t a new idea, to be fair. You’ll find versions of it scattered across Italian-American home cooking, and peas have a long history in Italian pasta dishes, especially in spring. But Stewart’s version is a useful reminder that a small twist on something you already love can feel like a completely new dish.

The technique itself is approachable for any home cook. Blanch the peas quickly, just long enough to lock in that color and soften them up. Blend everything together. Cook the broken noodles until just tender. Toss it all. Done. The whole thing comes together fast enough for a weeknight, but looks polished enough that you wouldn’t be embarrassed to put it in front of guests for a casual spring dinner.

Speaking of spring dinners, this is exactly the kind of dish that earns a spot at your Easter table or a backyard cookout before the heat really kicks in. Fresh peas peak from late April through June, so you’ve got a solid window to make this one feel seasonal without any effort.

The original recipe walkthrough and full ingredient list were covered by Taste of Home, where a writer put this dish to the real-world test, made it on a rainy afternoon, and came away already planning when to make it again.

A few tips if you’re going to try this at home this week:

Don’t skip toasting the pine nuts. Two minutes in a dry pan makes a real difference in flavor. Frozen peas work perfectly fine here, which keeps the grocery list short. Blanch them briefly, don’t overcook them, or you’ll lose that brilliant color. Break the lasagna noodles before you cook them, not after. Irregular shapes are the whole point. Finish with a little extra Parmesan and a drizzle of good olive oil right before you serve it.

If your family goes through pesto the way a lot of families do, this recipe is worth keeping in the back pocket for whenever the standard version starts to feel a little tired. It’s the same comfort, with just enough of a twist to make it feel new again.

Grab a box of lasagna noodles, a bag of frozen peas, and whatever fresh basil you can find at the store this weekend. Your spring dinner table is about to look a whole lot greener.